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January 2025 Blog

Radio Frequencies RF That Hi-Fi Can Pick Up.
We've mentioned before about RF & Ferrites to help reduce RF interference. See our Turntable, Phono & Cables page which was writen 2013 vut is as relevant with the growing amount of Mobile Devices & Broadband that is taking over The Airwaves as Analog TV ended to free up these Broadcast Frequencies. The page tells that Transistors can amplify way beyond 20kHz hearing limit, a 2N3055 first around in the late 1960s can go up to 2.5MHz and a small signal transistor BC550 can deal with 150-300MHz. This will have it's uses but in Hifi it's far too Wide Range. Looking at Amplifier specs 20Hz to 20kHz is often quoted, some go up to 30kHz but others go up to 100kHz. Looking online, UK allows Frequencies to be used, http://static.ofcom.org.uk/ shows a lot of Broadcast Frequencies. Ones starting from 19.95kHz is a bit of a worry, Maritime ones will be more Coastal if it seems Insane to allow anything under 100kHz, there is a lot of it. Time Signals are a Bleepy type noise like an old Dial Up Modem & long wires certainly can pick up Picture & Mouse 'noise'. There appears to be 'A Lot' that could potentially be picked up by Hifi which Vintage Amps can run into Trouble with as 50 years ago this wasn't a problem. Excessive RF can trash certain Wide Bandwidth Amplifiers, unwanted RF won't be heard but will Waste A Lot Of Power. Some early designs are just too Wide Bandwidth & need taming down, so they remain safe. One amp picked up RF so badly it Oscillated heavily, originally it used lesser grade capacitors. Modern Capacitors like the Panasonic FC range don't quote a Frequency Range if do give detail on a 100kHz test, which could be way higher than a typical UK-EU TV Grade Capacitor. Google finds Mobile Phones are out of the 100kHz & 300kHz range at 800MHz-2.6GHz. Broadband is over 20MHz if in 2013 we found 2.4GHz-5GHz. Computer LCD Monitor Noise can be a Problem, to see a Monitor can be as low as 30kHz as a Scanning Frequency, which isn't the 50Hz-60Hz refresh rate. We still get RF Noise on our Luxman LX33 1979 valves amp using a 2m cable on any LCD monitor. This therefore is what it picks up & with Lounge TVs being LCD monitors, there's the RF problem. To see as low as 15kHz & 30kHz-83kHz seems rather archaic like the old CRT TV with the Line Output Transformer Whistle. 1960s TV on 405 lines had an even worse whistle of 10kHz & getting our first TV in 1987 the 625 line whistle of 15.6kHz was quite noticeable at our age then. Computer & TV RF noise hasn't been sorted properly, mainly because Hifi of today is well tamed to not have it sounding, Amps past 1973 don't usually pick up RF noise. Ferrites do help, if these are none to limit the 50kHz-300kHz range noise. The Hifi Itself must have it's own RF Attenuation. How to sort the LX33 valve amp picking up RF from cable that goes near the LCD monitor maybe is only solved by moving the amplifier, if it's set up to be easily used. The Computer Mouse uses a much lower frequency of 125Hz to 8kHz on high spec Gaming Mice. We've found some Hifi can pick up Mouse Noise with an amp on the Desk, to pick up Noise from the Twisty Glass ESL Lightbulbs also possible. Again most Hifi is tamed to not pick up these Noises. Limiting Hifi To Stop RF Noise. The trouble with this is like High Filter (Low Pass Filter) on older amps like Quad. It restricts the Treble Detail. Some earlier amps had the Phono & Preamp with a RF Limiter that used to pick up Car Ignition noise. Some Amps go Too Far in design, making the 10kHz Square Wave so restricted it looks like a Saw Tooth or Dog Tooth shape, not the Square Wave shape some amps can do up to 100kHz, such as our LX33 that picks up RF. Can't have it all.

The "Rock Sound" In Amplifiers.
You Need To Know What An Electric Guitar Sounds like through a Marshall or similar Amp. One we heard put out such heavy Sub Bass all the Ornaments Fell off the Shelf! A good way to get rid of those Cheesy Trinkets beloved by many. Rock Guitar has a Solid Midrange Power. Lemmy on his Guitar Amps used to put Midrange to Full to accentuate the Rock Sound as early as 1966 on the Rockin' Vickers CBS B side 'I Don't Need Your Kind'. Your Hearing can make you like Amps with a more Recessed Midrange, 'Further Back' soundstage which leaves Voices both Male & Female, sounding a bit Thin. You only really notice that by Playing Other Amps. The Ultimate Rock Sounding Amp is the 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170 Jumbo, it;s a Guitar amp & was designed to Suit Rock Guitar, if as original they much tamed it. We've had that on Speakers a few days since changing the Tone to sound much better than the Thick Lumpy Sound. Thinking there really can't be anything 'Better' as the Sound is so Listenable, to try the other Receivers. These have all had a lot of Speaker Time so they are well understood. But after the KR-6170 to feel the Sound wasn't as Far Forward as the KR-6170. They were all Great Sounding, if wanting the more Solid Rock Amp Sound the KR-6170 now has. Others sounded Sweeter as the Midrange a little further back, the Wide Stereo in some Amps more than Others. The 1965 Sansui TR-707A was considered the nicest sound if still the more 'Relaxing' Midrange Tone. Back to the KR-6170, it's like the TR-707 with The Midrange Control turned up, if it doesn't have one. The Trio-Kenwood KR-6200 still here so try that. It has a Midrange Control & we've said before it 'Needs -3 on Midrange' to not be so upfront. What you're used to elsewhere certainly does Vary. Try 70s Rock that the KR-6170 did so well, the KR-6200 on -3 Midrange sounded too thin, remembering the KR-6170 sound on the tracks last time, on Headphones. Set the Midrange Flat & the Guitar Solid Roar sounds more like the KR-6170. Black Sabbath 'Paranoid' has the Guitar Power, but -3 midrange loses it, to sound More Domestic. Try The KR-6170 on Headphones, after using the KR-6200. It is a Different Sound, more Authentic on the Rock Guitar Sound, the KR-6200 is not as Subtle. The KR-6170 has precise Impedance Maching & Unique Circuit Design on the Preamp to sound the way it is, the Power Amp board is much like the KR-5150 that is 33w also, just a few resistor changes. Swapping KR-6170 to KR-6200 with matching Midrange -1 on KR-6200 & playing Flat on KR-6170, to get Midrange to sound similar if the KR-6170 has what very few Amps have, a Rich Solid Bass that sets the KR-6170 apart on Black Sabbath & Jimi Hendrix. KR-6170 (our version) has a very solid Funky Bassline. The KR-6200 stays For Sale, certainly is a good one but Domestic Amps don't have the Bass Weight For Rock Guitar. After 3 years the KR-6170 is Finally a Keeper, nothing sounds quite like it, yet nobody wanted it. Because it Has No Cred & takes a lot to bring out this Sound. Rock Guitar as we said needs Knowing A Guitar Amp Loud in a Domestic Room to know what Guitar Can Do. The Guitar Input on the KR-6170 we've not tried, it's the Influence for the KR-6170 Sound. If Hifi Makers put This Sound in all amps, there'd be Trouble as it Sounds so Great, but They're Not Getting That Sound. Guitar in Bigger Stacks played Live At Gigs usually goes through a Mixer, not Plug In Direct into the Guitar Amp. These Days, the Live Rock Guitar Sound probably is all via ICs. No One Instrument in Music is as Awesome as The Rock Guitar with the Right Pedals, The Right Amp & a Fine Axeman on the thing.

First 'Comet' Advert Januay 1969 Hi-Fi News.
As we've Blogged before, the arrival of Aggressive Hifi Discounters upset the Hifi World A Lot. It made Brands who were previously known for quality to Unwisely get in with the Discounters. By making Hifi seem 'Too Cheap' the reality became the Discounters Price became the previous RRP Recommended Retail Price. The Much Advertised Quad 33/303 pre & power pair is £98 in every shop, but Comet start offering the pair at about £83 which is a 15% Discount. In Reality this will remove most of the Profit in New Gear plus the Shop has the Usual Overheads & VAT. Pile It High & Sell It Cheap in what are More Expensive items really isn't good for a Market. To sell Fruit & Veg under this idea similarly only drives down the Price to Buy In & The Quality of the Goods. To see Naive Types on Record Sites complaining of a £150 item needing £8 Special Delivery Post is how Thoughless Buyers are, today they really believe Post Is Free yet it's clear it's Built In to the Price, if you buy Multiple 'Free Post' items the Seller gets paid post twice. Some now offer a Discount on Buying Two as they know Buyers question it if most don't. Comet over the Years gets All The Brands except Yamaha. Quad, Leak, Goodmans, Rogers, Arena, Truvox, Teleton, Garrard, Wharfedale, Thorens, Akai & Sharp all all Big Brands in their First Advert. Marantz, Pioneer & others are added over the years. 10% to 15% Discount is typical if in later years, beyond 'End Of Line' clearouts especially on the unselling 'Monster Receivers when they got much bigger Discounts, 20%-25% and more. It All Adds a Cheapness & Desperation to Hifi. The Market Will Only Pay A Price, but look at Washing Machines prices, today £800 will buy you a good model one as it did 20 years ago. The Quality will have Nose-Dived & how long these items last is the Worry, look at the TV E-Waste piles of gear that is probably not Ten Years Old. Comet only has One Shop in Jan 1969 in Clough Road, Hull. The Prices being 15% less may seem a bit Dodgy, but they put a line "Comet Guarantees That All Prices Quoted Are Genuine" which is reassuring plus they add "All Items Offered Are Available At Time Of Order" which HFN letter writers often complained wasn't the case in other shops. The HFN advert deadlines for Classified Small Ads is a month ahead, for the Bigger Ads isn't so clear if the idea Three Months in later issues will get some items out of stock or no longer available. Seems Comet will have good stocks of the items which again Leads The Way on other Advertisers for a Third Time. Great Business Model, Initially Great for the Buyer to Get 15% off, but ultimately the Harsh Discounts just make Manufacturers Cut Costs so that a previous £300 model once given the Expected 15% Discount really is only made to a £255 price level on the Next Year's Model as the Market Wants It Cheaper. Hifi Quality is noticeably Lower by 1974, then lower by 1977 & by 1979-80 it's really a long way from the 1969-71 models. You Gets What You Pays For.

Harman-Kardon Receivers & Amplifiers.
This isa USA Brand built in Japan. The Early ones are Rarely seen in UK, most online are 110v versions. We first got a HK-730 around 1992 for £20 at a Car Boot & thought it was better than other amps, in the league of Marantz. But as so early for us to not properly appreciate it, but you have to start somewhere. The only HK we found was the HK-930 from 1972. In the Rare wood case, it had the Dual Power Supply but didn't think it was as good as the 1976 HK-730. But to see a bargain buy on a 110v HK-560 40w receiver, to snap it up & find how great it sounds, so unlike a typical thin grainy 1979 amp. So to wonder what came before & after in this Obscure Brand. To find 220v or 240v ones is tough. The 110v ones have the skinny mains cable, the 220v-240v will have a thicker wire. They aren't multivoltage if it could be possible to swap a 230v Transformer if you have a spare one. Our Lists of Receivers & Amplifiers pages shows HK only arrived in UK in 1973... receivers 630EX 30w £149, 930EX 45w £209. 1974 Citation 12 60w power amp £185. 1975 amp Citation 15 ??w £307. 1976 receivers 330A & 330B 22.5w & 20w £110 & £115 +VAT, Model 50+ & Model 70+ quadro hangovers £139 & £219 no power ratings. 1977 A401 20w £105, Citation 16 150w power amp £465, Citation 11 preamp £228, Citation 12 De Luxe 60w power amp £209. Receivers 730 40w £249, 430 25w £179, 330B 20w £125. 1980 amps 503 40w £221, 505 60w £301, Citation range: 16A power amp 150w £665, 17 preamp £488, 19 power amp 100w £514 options no LED or Graphic EQ on pre. Receivers 560 40w £310, 670 60w £443, Citation 80w £1154. 1981 HK725 preamp £117, HK770 power amp ??w £222. Harman-Kardon best known for the Citation pre-power range & the 20w HK 330 receiver we've seen a few times. Earlier Models. The HFE site shows some 1960s ones that are probably 110v only. Models 200, 210, 230, 520, 530, 720. 1956 valve receiver D200 very early. FA3000X looks pre 1971. What Came After? with No Hifi Year Book, to dig around on the HFE site to find the 1980s ones that show a level of quality, before the brand descends into the 'Black Ranges' that seem more Mass Market. 1983 HK 330i 20w. HK380i 30w. HK-570i 45w. HK-580i 45w some of these will be 1984-85 models. 1986 HK795i is 70w. These 'i' ones early-mid 1980s with 4-Digit HK being 1990s to 2000s. Look At The 1983 HK-570i. This being the Next One to the HK-560. HFE shows Six Update Bulletins for this model. Still All Transistors on Phono, Pre & Power Amp which is unusual by 1983. It's not so different to the HK560. Look at the 1986 HK-795i is heading deep into CD & IC territory on all amps, how about HK? Still Transistors & No Relay, starts to head into a Different Territory in design with the Class B 'IC' type circuitry that Yamaha did in 1977. Probably still is way ahead of other 1986 Hifi, but Does It Have that Sound still when The Competition was often Bright, Harsh & Grainy?

1966 'Vox' Organ On 'The Repair Shop'.
Seeing a re-run of this S8 E11 episode, to see they briefly show the 'Vox' name on the back, easy to miss. Later shows as "Vox Continental II" which ebay show in the £2000-£3000 range. They suggest it's a 1966 one used on The Monkees 'I'm a Believer' so a True 1960s sound together with the 'Farfisa' organ used on ? & The Mysterians '96 Tears' from the same year. Oddly UK Record Collectors call any Organ a 'Hammond' which is probably wrong, the Hammond was more a Supper Club-Cabaret sound & the bigger Wurlitzer Theatre Organ sound & many mindless Easy Listening LPs of the late 1960s into the early 70s were often found in our LP Dealing days, they did still sell for 50p in the late 1980s so to buy them. The Organ is a very complex unit, the nearest we've come to one like it is the 'Beat Box' Rhythm Generator in the 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170 Jumbo. Luckily it all works so didn't recap the Guitrar, Echo-Reverb or Sound Generator parts. The Organ uses one Board per note & stuffed with Germanium transistors like the KR-6170 uses, the old Allen Bradley resistors, lots of Film Capacitors & a few Electrolytics which seemed to be the failing here, 1966 Capacitors often long replaced in Amps of the 1965-67 era. They don't show too much & they have to get another to really get the Organ working, if not saying much, if we can imagine it'll have needed a lot to service, as the KR-6170 did. They should tell more on how Difficult Audio Gear is to get right, the idea it's a Cheap Repair comes from TV Grade repaitrs that "Just Got It Going" rather than the way we do it to get it use-daily. There is little point otherwise, if The Cost puts many off, even with the Best Gear. The Owners got it from their Dad, they show a c.1970 picture of him but don't give a name ot group. The Organ will have been Expensive to suggest at least a Semi-Pro name. The Sound from it was interesting, hearing it 'Live' not mixed down. Very Strong very 1966 sound, nice item to have if you play it. Like the KR-6170 Sound Generator as used in Organs of the 1970-75 era, a time where Organs Sold as the 'Henry's Rafio' 1968-72 Catalog shows. They are pre IC with a limited range & the Spring Reverb is a limited use, but Oh So Retro, to Imagine more open-minded thinking Musos would like the Sounds, if sadly Music ain't what it used to be compared to the Last Gasp in the Britpop era in 1992. Kids have No Bands to follow so to Hope that Music Revives one day, else you'll not need Hifi much.

Revealing How Poor TV Sound Is By Having A Reference.
With Trying Ideas on Amplifiers to get a Better sound, it often takes a few tries to perfect it. To 'Reset' the Hearing after one amp needs a few fdays on a Known Amp & to Hear a Reference can Reset it even faster. This shows how Suggestible Your Hearing Is, Compensating for What The Sound Lacks, which means all of it, Bass, Midrange & Treble. One Amp lacked Midrange & what Your Hearing does is to Compensate to make Midrange 'fit' better. This can be from Using the Amp the Day before & It Stays until you Play Hifi again. Crazy but True & it can mean we avoid listening to some amps not wanting to Upset the Hearing Balance. This Hearing Effect can make some think Awesome Hifi is Not Good as they only know Poorer Hifi with an Unnatural Balance. A Neutral Amp that Sounds Spot On can sound 'wrong' if your Hearing has Compensated for the Non-Neutral Amp. We've gone on about this for Years, but you'll not read a thing online about it. You can be made to like Non-Neutral Amplifiers by the Lack of a Reference Amp. This will Confuse Many, if we can hear when an Amp is less Honest with Artficial Sounding Treble, Recessed Midrange & that Boomy Retro Bass. A Reference Sound is A Live Instrument. It can be a Voice in the Room, if this can be tricky as People's Voices can be Deep & Resonant to Thin & Wispy. Some Voices have a Squeaky High Pitched Sound, as in American Women on the Zoo TV Shows. Some have the Squeaky Voice that also has a Deeper Bassy sound to it. A Voice is not such a good reference. What Is Then? To Have an Instrument like an Electric Guitar, or in the case of the 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170, it has a 'Rhythm Generator' like a Beat Box of limited range unlike a later Synthesizer. The 'RG' creates Beats & Boops like you find on Organs of the Era. To Speed It Up or Slow It Down, adding Reverb gives a very clean & solid sound, because it's a Live Instrument & the KR-6170 is a PA amp if only 33w, on 95dB speakers the 'RG' is very strong & loud with a precision. Going Back to TV Sound, to hear how Weak It Sounds lacking the 'Live' Precision. Rarely do you Hear 'Live' sounds without any Mixing Board limiting, the Blog Above with the 'Vox Organ' was a rare chance to hear 'Direct Live' music. Hearing the Vox on the KR-6170 & it's own 'RG' shows what a Great Voice the KR-6170 has, after much upgrading, removing limiters yet keeping the Circuits as Their Design as they showed something special even 3 years ago, if taking years to perfect. Thankfully no-one bought it. The Sound we put in the KR-6170 are ideas from many amps. We thought in a Blog Above if the KR-6170 could be made into a 75w Amp with the JVC 5040 transformer, if possibly it could, to leave it as-is fo reasons of what trouble you could end up with. Especially after trying more with the 1969 Trio KA-6000, things don't always work out. Good to think of ideas, but generally if an amp lacks, sell it & go find another. To TV Sound. What you were used to, eg 'Pawn Stars' soundtrack uses Rock Guitar a lot. It's recorded as Live as a guy playing the short segments & however the Sound Production mixes it. They can't limit it too much as it's not Mixed with other sounds, it's a Guitar Riff added on. With other Music & Voices to hear they aren't so good sounding after the Rock Guitar & the KR-6170 'RG', they sound Soft, Lack Dynamics but it's a TV Show. Similarly on 'Wheeler Dealers' the Music can be much Louder than the Voices giving another TV show that is rather varied in Sound Quality, some can be Soft & other Music can be Much More Kicking & Louder. To Assume they Mix TV Sound on Small Low Powered Speakers not to Realise.On 1960s Vinyl Records, some tracks have No Mixing Down so the Voices are very 'Live' & personal sounding. The Beatles 'Revolution' uses Hard Psych Guitar mixed very 'Live' without going into clipping, the Guitar plugged into the Console rather than a Guitar Amp that was with a Microphone. The 'Hard Rock Guitar' sound is usually mixed down to not be Too Heavy.

Pre Amp Out & Power Amp In Sockets On Receivers & Amplifiers.
The First Amplifier to have these Preamp Out & Power Amp In Sockets was the 1965 Sony TA-1120 early one. They called them "Pre Amp/Amplifier Junction Check Points" which will have just confused owners & pity those losing the Short Connecting Cables. Sony used these on Amplifiers if not Receivers in the 1960s. The Use we see the "Pre Amp Out" is to put the Preamp into a Higher Power Amplifier or as we've heard many times, to use half the amp if the other half is faulty in some way. The 1971 Sony TA-1130 has these sockets if labels more clearly as "Pre Amp/Power Amp" and "Pre Amp Output" & "Power Amp Input". The 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170 has these too adding a switch to add the Reverb output too. Their 1969 TK-140X has these if the 1967 TK-140E doesn't. Some amps & receivers have these or don't if the 1972 Trio-Kenwood KR-6200 only has 'Pre Amp Out' on wanting to try the KR-6170 pre through the KR-6200 power if not possible. To be able to try the KR-6170 through the 1969 Pioneer SX-2500 was possible but it beings up incompatibilities. The Levels Are Not Standardised. Trying the KR-6170 before into the 1971 Sony TA-3200F power amp the levels were too far apart. The 1971 Sony TA-1140 preamp could be played through the TA-3200F. In later years, possibly by 1973 from trying Yamahas a while back, the Standard "!v Level" on both Pre Amp & Power Amp makes this possible. But the Earlier Amps & Receivers can be 400mV, about 750mV, 1v & also 1.4v. The 1971 Sony TA-3200F power amp has a level switch to select 0.3v or 1v which adds another giving 0.3v (300mV) to 1.4v as on the Valved Quad II level. Finding this out in 2002 having the Quad set here & the levels from a few preamps didn't suit the Quad II, only it's own Quad 22 preamp. Having the McIntosh preamps & power amp to find similar with the Tube Technology preamp being too loud for the McIntosh & bringing up the Noise Floor too much as the levels didn't match. Those in later years, by the 1980s, buyimng a Preamp & getting a Power Amp from a different brand will be better matched in Volume, but the Dark Art of Impedance will have some Different Brand Pre-Powers sounding too Dull or Overbright. There really is little point not using a matching Preamp & Power Amp. We tried the Sony TA-2000F on the Tube Technology 100w Genesis & found they were Dull Sounding together if the TA-3200F being the Correct Match sounded very different. Only Worth Mixing Preamp & Power Amp within The Same Brand & Age, if again there will be design changes over the years. Interesting to see if one Yamaha Receiver is better with the Amplifier's Power Amp or it's own one. The Answer there was still the Full Amp as Preamp & Power Amp were always the Best Sounding. The only one that was Better was our Redesigned TA-1140 on the TA-3200F power amp. Currently got a TA-1130 & the Sony TA-2000F/3200F pair so we could mix them about to compare. Another Thing is if you try a 25w Amplifier as a Preamp on a 100w Power Amp, it'll still have the more limited 25w sound. Found this in 2012 with the 1978 Leak 3200 on the 'Solds Gallery', probably using it on a Yamaha. A 25w Power Amp is best with a 25w designed Preamp. A Very Decent Preamp on a lower power Amplifier can sound much better on a Higher Powered Amp, but that's only using Upgraded Amps, the Shop-Bought spec amps are Sold to be Universal & Safe. The 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170 preamp sounds great on the 1969 Pioneer SX-2500 power amp, if the volume difference needed volume near '6', not the usual '3', but interesting to hear. Use Blanking Plugs. These are the RCA Phono type items that are found on Amps sometimes, it 'Blanks' an input, so to use on the 'Unused' part of trying a Preamp on another Power Amp, to keep things safe, especially the Unused Power Amp. Only connect any amps when switched off & hand near the Speaker Switch or Power Button as from what the above says, you might get a Really Loud Pre on a Really Loud Power Amp.

Different Types Of Fuses On Mains, DC & Audio Stages.
On Amplifiers you sometimes find a Different Type of Fuse, seen by us on some 1969-73 era Hifi. These have a 'Spring' section inside & generally are Rarely Seen & Used on the AC Mains Fuse stage, pre the Transformer. These are called "Slow Blow" or "Anti Surge". A Nov 1969 HFN article mentions these as being 50 years ago the info isn't generally known. They say there are Fuses with One or Two 'springs' inside, we've only seen the One 'spring' version. Some amps have Fuses in Clips so to see the Fuse Wire Bend on Turn-On is exactly what the Anti-Surge spring does, it keeps the Fuse Wire straight. A Blown Fuse shows the Wire Bent as it heats up & Fails over it's Rated Current. The 'spring' acts to steady the Wire not to Break. A 2A fuse will always be a 2A fuse if in 'Quick Blow' standard single wire Fuse or the 'Anti-Surge' type with the 'Spring'. Looking on ebay there are Plain One-Wire Fuses called 'anti Surge' but they aren't. There are ones with a 'Blob' on the Fuse wire inside the Glass, these are likely the Modern Version of a 'Slow Blow' having a section, the 'Blob' to take a Surge yet not be a Fast Blow. Ebayers clearly don't know what they have, so look on 'RS' Radio Spares site. These show no 'Anti Surge' ones if Glass or Ceramic ones. On the 'Farnell' site they only have One Anti-Surge 'Time Delay' in a 16A 32mm fuse. Unless it actually is labelled correctly there are No Anti Surge Fuses despite ebayer's incorrect claims. In Reality in Hifi, there is No Real Need for a Fuse beyond the Basic 'Quick Blow' Fuses which still do take time to Blow, based on seeing Damaged Amps still with good Fuses & correctly rated ones. A 3A Fuse covers a 750w Amp, as in the VA Rating, not the Power Amp rating. A 1977 Yamaha CR-2020 rated at 690w (690VA) is close to the 3A rating so a 5A may be better. Some Amps & Even our last Panasonic 32" CRT TV did a 'Boing' on turn on. It's part of the design in some early amps, our 1966 Akai AA-7000 always does this Noise which is Reassuring rather than a worrying noise, once your used to it. The TV Thump is more likely the Turn-On Surge creates some sort of Uneven AC Balance due to the 3kV CRT voltage & a more Heavy Case would deaden it. In Upgrading Amps, to see the Original Fuse is much too low can get Values Uprated, but that's for A Tech to Decide. If You Need a 3A Fuse, Do Not Fit A 13A one, or awful unsafe ideas like Wrap Tin Foil over a Blown Fuse or put a Nail In, like we found on a Leak Stereo 70. If the item blows a Fuse, it does it for a Reason. A Recent Fisher 1968 Receiver had the owner put metal bars instead of Fuses which Much Overheated as it couldn't blow a fuse from Failed Parts. This is called "A Fire Risk". A Fuse is there to Protect You. The General Idea on a Fuse Blow is to put another one in, yet The Surprise people find it Blows Again, wondering why. If a 3A fuse blows, don't put a 13A one in as it may hold it working, but can also be Dangerous!

The Power Rating Game In Power Amplifiers: Can You Upgrade Power?
To see on the 1979 Harman-Kardon HK560 at 40w & HK670 at 60w on comparing on the 560 review...."Not much 40w to 60w in reality. HK560 on ±38v & HK670 on ±43v." So just ±5v makes the difference 40w to 60w? Look at other Amplifiers to see this is a standard thing with what looks an Impressive Power Increase for only a small Voltage Gain. In Reality it's 10v more as 76v to 86v as in the Pre Differential amplifiers with a Single Voltage Rail. Here the 1967 JVC 5040 rated 75w runs on 92v HT, the 1969 Pioneer SX-2500 at 72w is also 92v HT, the 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170 Jumbo is rated 33w on 70v HT. The 1969 Trio-Kenwood KA-2000 at 13w runs on 35v HT. To compare Power Amp Circuits can show small differences, but generally they aren't hugely different in the Capacitor Coupled era beyond the Transformer Coupled designs. The Differential era gets more varied designs that don't really compare to the CC era ones. You Want More Power In Your Amplifier? Upgrading certainly betters the Sound, but overall you'll still have the Same HT voltage whatever you do. Current Handing will improve & to Use the 'Power Into 8 ohms' test using a Resistor as a Speaker & the Oscilloscope on the mode to test Power. We've never bothered test that as it'd gice misleading Power Ratings, much like the "Power Ratings" page has with 50w being 25v to 33v Sine Output, a 32v Sine output is rated 72w on one amp ^ 50w on another. To Get More Power needs a Higher HT Voltage. Ome amp we have rated 25w, but on finding an 'error' or deliberate limiter to keep it 25w, it could be made a 45w amp with a good gain in HT by doing certain things right & making the Amp 'fit' the Higher HT, as you can theoretically do with putting in a Higher Voltage Transformer. Looking at the 1967 JVC 5040 Transformer & Power Amp board that were known working, but the Amp was bought as a Spares Amp with no case as the Input Selector was damaged. Here we have a 75w amp. The KR-6170 on 70v HT is 33w, the JVC 5040 is 75w on 92v. The Trio-Kenwood KA-6000 is 48w on 86v which is quite a difference for 6v HT & why we put Doubled Outputs in the Spare Holes on the Heatsink to make it about 65w-70w. Here the Current adds to the Wattage, if in Reality a Doubled Outputs 65w 1970 Akai AA8500 is otherwise a 40w amp by it's voltages. It's How 200w-300w Amps Are Made, using multiple Output Transistors to Boost Current if not be much Louder than a 120w Regular Single Outputs Amp, as in One Pair of Output Transistors, not 2-4 Pairs. To See How Misleading A Power Rating Can Be. Some amps play Louder than ones of Higher Power, if the High Power Drives Speakers with More Confidence & why Doubled Outputs are Popular in Higher Power Amps. The Pioneer SX-1010 rated 110w puts out 39v Clean Sine around what an 80w Amp would do in terms of Voltage. A True 110w Amp like the Yamaha CR-2020 gives 43v Clean Sine. The JVC 5040 Transformer Could Be Fitted in the KR-6170 & certain alterations made. You'd be upping 70v HT Transformer to a 92v One, 22v extra HT. The JVC 5040 put out 35v Clean Sine uprating the 23v Clean Sine of the KR-6170 plus the Benefits of the Extra Power which were obvious using the KR-6170 into the SX-2500 power amp in a Blog just above, reasons for Thinking On This. Again Dear Reality Tells that Upping The HT Voltage as we did with the 25w to 45w oddity, the Bias will need Redesigning, be it Fixed or Adjustable. The Higher Power KR-6170 could be done, the Power Supply uses Resistors not Regulators, beyond one in the Preamp. To alter the Big Resistors to keep the Other Voltages for Tuner etc. But.. It's Not That Easy. The KR-6170 works on Two Secondary Windings, one 48v-0v DC (70v AC) & the other 27-0v AC (38v DC) for Tuner etc. To Find A Transformer to give the Higher Main HT, but then the Lower Voltage one to be useable too. The JVC 5040 TX works on 63v-0v AC (92v DC) & the other winding is 15v-15v AC with a centre Ground Tap which gives ±20v DC. Has 6.3v DC for Bulbs too. Potentially you may think it has 30v-0v if the Ground Tap not used. But Voltages tried like this don't work out as you'd "hope" as we've found before, Simple Maths doesn't always give the Right Answer. The 'other winding' needs to be 30v DC in use. The 15v-15v AC give ±20v on the Circuit. A TX output using a Centre Tap gives 15v-0v-15v, in trying one once with 32v-0v-32v, without the Ground Centre Tap it wasn't 64v, it was only a 32v single rail voltage. Theory will explain why, the Ground Centre Tap gives a Higher Voltage, in a similar way Valve Amps use a Diode as a Voltage Doubler. Two ends of the TX winding with a Ground Centre Tap play Voltages differently. The Conclusion is that the +92v HT can be used, but the ±20v would only be +20v without the Centre Tap. KR-6170 Second Winding needs 30v for Reverb Drive which is a Power Amplifier of sorts, 22v & 15v from that 30v for the Rhythm Generator which are Germanium Designs that are best not messed with, some Germaniums are limited in spec. -20v to +20v is in theory 40v...?

Voltage Doubling In Power Supply Circuits & Finding 'Hidden' Higher Voltage.
This is Familiar in Valve Amps, the 1965 Rogers HG88 III & 1963 Trio WX400U use this. Looking at the Trio, it uses the "Grienacher Circuit" as you can see drawn differently on the Wikipedia page for "Voltage Doubler". There are other versions, this one in the Trio is known as a Half Wave Doubler. It takes 145v AC & makes it 360v, allowing for Load Losses in the Circuit, Maths says 145v x 1.404 x 2 = 407v DC. It Doubles the Voltage if Halves The Current in the Power Rating way. 260mA is enough to drive 4x EL84 which need 65mA each if there are extra circuits on this 260mA draw, making the 12w EL84 only rate 10w on the Trio WX-400U. You don't often see the Amps a Transformer can offer on Vintage Circuits. The Idea looked at to see if the 20v DC from 15v-0-15v centre tapped JVC 5040 transformer could doubled to 40v. It Could, but the Current will likelly be Too Limited to give good Results. Hidden Extra Voltage? Sometimes an Early Transformer can have an Unused Secondary Tapping, the WX-400U actually did, so to make certain design features on a Higher Voltage was possible, by combining Two Windings. The fact the Trio WX400U had a 'hidden' extra winding is probably unique, resulting from a Design Change or more likely just use a Previous Transformer & not use One Winding. We have the Goodmans Module 80 Transformer still, an open chassis design, if sadly not thinking to keep other Parted Amps Transformers, often the Multiivoltage block is trapped in casing. It has the Multivoltage block & has only the Used Secondary Windings, HT & Bulbs. There are No Extra Ones. Another Open Chassis TX is the Akai AA-7000 one, there are No Spare Winding either. This suggests you'll be unlikely to find a Hidden Extra Voltage beyond the WX-400U. The 1967 JVC 5040 TX on the desk, it has a Metal Case with 4 bolts, so why not unscrew & see what's inside. Here it's like a more Modern Custom Mass Produced TX, with the Wires Connected inside the Windings, not to a Tab with Voltages marked as the WX-400U & AA-7000 are. There probably are No Other Amplifiers with the Hidden Extra Voltage than the WX-400U seems to be the answer here, but worth finding out. The amp version, the W41(U) has an extra marked Tapping if no actual Tag for the Tapping. WX-400U one is a Design Change just left there. What A Shame.

1969 Arena T-9000 75w Receiver From Denmark.
As far as we know, there are Only Three Receivers of this sort of Power, the 1967 JVC 5040U at 75w, the 1969 Pioneer SX-2500 at 72w & this Arena T-9000 at 75w. There are some Amplifiers & Power Amps of this Power & Higher, ones like the 1965 Mattes & other Power Amps, as well as PA Amps for Guitars etc. Arena T-9000. We've seen this in the later months of the 1969 Hi-fi News & it's in the 1970 HFYB for £303. A Customer found a nice one online, but didn't get it likely for Posting Issues as some sellers don't know how to Courier goods. A Shame to not get one & as of Dec 2023 to see HFE now has the Circuit Manals that it didn't have before & having a good set of Photos showing the Insides, Time To Blog this one as it's certainly interesting. The Manual is drawn like a Bang & Olufsen manual like the Beomaster 3000(-2). Here the Transistor Icon is a little non-standard, a 'Cross' with an Arrow is confusing, looks like a FET if they're not. To look at the Circuits to make sense, the Arrow is the Emitter, the 'Other End' is the Collector & the Horizontal is the Base, with only one side connected. Will have confused many, why not draw it as the standard way? Electrolytic Capacitors are shown in a " -] " way with the line the "+" & the ] the "-". Film or Ceramic Capacitors are just drawn as " | " on the circuit line, again not very understandable. This thoughtless circuit diagram will keep the Amp Unrepaired as few will understand it. Even a Zener Diode has a non-standard icon. Once the 'stupid' is understood, to look closer. This is a EU made amp & often these are made with TV grade components. Recapping in any way with Higher Quality Modern Electrolytics is likely to bring up Problems, if the B+O Beomaster 3000 was fine to recap. The Design is a little different, maybe to overcome this, but to never kmow until you try. Inputs go into a 'Transmodul' which is an odd name in these times. These are the Rectangular Plug In Boxes, on an 8-Pin Valve base from having an Arena years back, even after 20 years in the early 1990s the Plug Ins were aged & the Aluminium Controls had greyed as not lacquered. Remember it needed a lot of servicing to get it working again. T-9000 schematic only shows the Plug-In Modules, but doesn't show what's in them & lookinmg at HFE it's all they have. These Modules contained Transistors, Resistors, Capacitors & Diodes, like a Mini PCB so need detailimg. The 'Aux 1' one may be a Buffer Stage like B&O used, though it could add gain as the Heathkit AR-1500 did & have a preset to set Gain. Other Inputs for Phono & Microphone have a Preamp crammed in the tiny 'Matchbox' size units. This lack of info may later be updated, if getting one working alreasy seems quite a job. Preamp-Tone Board. This is the large 'T 76' board with Tone plus Low & High Filters, 7 Transistors per channel include Buffer Stages. A lack of certain features is where this could sound Gritty or have RF issues. Circuits look decent & from remembering the smaller Arena from the early 1990s it sounded decent, as knowing quite a few amps by then. The Reliability was the problem though, the Plug-In boxes were not connecting too well, if that was then. "Chuck It Then" said the Owner, we'd only taken it from the Shop to try. Power Amp. This is all Ditect Coupled, no Capacitors in the Signal path if the Preamp has several. This shows "M10" resistors, looking at others to see '3,9', '180', '4K7' & '18K' can only mean "M10" isn't '10M' but '0.1M aka 100K'. Again they just add confusion if you can read the resistor itself. Means it has '100K' as an Input resistor, that can't be right, or could be a Typo as another 'M10' used makes more sense. Again the lack of certain features where there should be is a bit of a worry, having tried other EU amps, it will be an issue. The Transistor Numbers are Obsolete 'RCA' numbered ones, like '40410' which is a 50w output transistor as a '40409/40410' NPN/PNP pair for the Driver Pair with '40411' 150w 30A or '2N3772' outputs. The Power Supply outputs ±44v & is on 6000µf 60v main Capacitors. This is equal to 88v on a Capacitor Coupled amp so can be 75w as claimed as 75w RMS both channels played. Amp has Two Main Power Supplies, one for L+R plus the Preamp-Tuner one working on +60v. Photos of the T-9000 we have show a one piece unit looking like two units on top of each other, this is how it opens up like a Clamshell. The Front Boards are Tuner & Pre-Power, with the Power Supplies at the back. Inputs via RCA Phono sockets duplicated as DIN as B&O did at the time. Speaker Outputs are DIN if also as Three Screws, L+R plus one for Ground, all very small risking shorting. Not a bad looker, some lettering a bit oversized, Tuner Window on a fascia top edge & basic looking meters. Like most EU gear it uses Axial --[ ]-- type capacitors. Photo set doesn't show the Pre-Power board. Output Transistors are on the rear panel under casing covers each side, as one missing these found online reveals. Hi-Fi News Dec 1969 Review. This gets a long review where they are overall impressed with it. 75w rated they test at 92w, if generally just slightly more current can boost the 75w when Clean Sine will still rate it 75w, why we don't bother testing the way Hifi mags do into a 8 ohm resistor. They do tell of issues they find, Clicks & Plops in use changing Buttons on Functions & Filters are found in other amps too, later design usually hid this with more Buffer stages. One worrying one is "Hum" that was slightly audible & could be heard in quieter Music, as in you'd hear it watching TV without loud soundtracks. They don't say if Hum in Audio from Poor Grounding, or Mechanical Transformer Hum. But to see the Square Waves that HFN recently started adding, 1kHz is a little rounded on the departing edge, a Bass Limitation. But the 10kHz 'Square Wave' is awful, saw tooth-dog tooth shape very rounded showing it's a Soft Dull Treble to be that poor on 10kHz, suggesting it's well tamed to cover the lack of certain parts. There are several reasons why & to Upgrade this would be a tricky one for sure. We've found Japanese Hifi can give a very strong knife-sharp treble, if the USA amps we've had recently roll Treble off quite heavily as the sound matches the poor 10kHz Square Wave. These USA amps use the same EU quality or TV Grade parts. The reviewer mentions this, but doesn't seem to Understand Hum plus Limited Treble is just not very good. Our Verdict. A EU made amp this early does bring Risks as said above. Quirky looks have appeal. Seems a Rare one as the Manual, if ever found much before, does complicate things. One worth trying, if Care Needed & probably way beyond most not to Wreck It. To Upgrade Hum & Limited Treble we've done on Amps before, if it can take Ages & often not be any Idea you've encountered before. For a potential Customer rebuild, having researched this now, to Warn it'd likely be a tricky one, as EU Hifi often is. Arena were a popular brand 1967-69 in the UK as many shops stocked their Midprice gear, soon sold as Bush-Arena if the T-9000 a Hede Nielsen product distributed in UK by Highgate Acoustics. Bush-Arena soon just became 'Bush' who were more a Budget brand into Radio & TV. Prices show unease on this one, £150 to £300 if lots in less main countries suggest it wasn't a seller & sold off elsewhere.

February 2025 Blog

Buying 240v To 100v Step-Down Transformer.
The Answer as we found below, is Forget New Ones, look for Vintage Ones. The 1962 Luxman Valve Receiver needs one. The Pioneer ER-420 is rated 155w so to 'hope' a 200w one would work & be reliable for Hours Use. To see New on ebay a 110g weight 240v-100v "Yazawa HTDC240V1000W Step Down Transformer AC220V-240V to 100V 1000W", are they having a laugh? 1000w 1kW use on that? It'll be some Switch Mode Converter device, not the 'Old Fashioned' reliable Transformer with Primary & Secondary Windings, as on the 240v-120v one we use on USA gear. That is marked 110v yet outputs 120v as it just halves the Voltage, to Input 220v you'd get 110v, but there's a lack of info told on these things. The Yazawa one on sale a lot on ebay at prices £55 to £70 with about £25 shipping from Japan. Not seeing Feedbacks on these, if Amazon has these & as Suspected, they are Rubbish that will Damage your Prized item. Switch Mode Power Supplies first around in 1979 on that Technics Mini System & it involves High Voltage Regulators & High Voltage Capacitors, much like TV & DVD uses today. Note Hifi still has the Transformer, if there will be many varieties of Power Supply. The Fact if we used the 240v-100v Step Down, it'd get Hours Use. The Usual 240v-120v black box one with the handle & orange light switch gets a bit warm, but if kept in open air it's fine. These Ridiculous 1000w 110g weight items will have No Heat Reducing Design. They say you can run a Kettle or Hairdryer, UK ones can be 2-3kW if maybe Japan made ones are much less & of little use. Avoid these modern devices, they are not for Hi-Fi used for jours. Amazon Reviews quickly show "Stay Away" & if you really want a 240v-100v Voltage to get a Transformer unit or possibly a Variac could give the 100v voltage, if a Variac is a Temporary Use item. Low Reviews tell the truth on Amazon, one said the 100v was only 82v so to assume it drew excess current & ruined their Amp. Amazon has a 117v to 100v "VCT VT-1000J" that's a 1kW one to see as a trusted type of Transformer unit, USA to Japan voltage. It says to get Double to 4x Wattage to cover Spikes, the 200w one drawing 155w wouldn't last long. But Why no 240v to 100v of this type? Because there is Litle Demand. To see Higher Power Amplifiers offered on ebay, to Ask Them what they use. Sadly the Japanese market keeps things very Secretive, even in the later 1960s it took UK Distributors to make Good Sales on Pioneer, Sansui & Trio-Kenwood. An Oct 2024 question to one with a Japano-ony Yamaha CA-2000 just gets a smug unhelpful reply, not even offering any soloution to a buyer. A 100v High Power item is seemingly Useless in the UK, the modern 240v-100v Step Down TX are for low power items, if to a point of 'why bother'. If they want Sales a clear solution must be offered. Resistors Dropping Voltage id Dangerous, like that 1979 Technics Mini system pitting 240V AC Direct onto a big Resistor. Do 't Do It. The only Solution really is a Custom Winding of the old TX to suit 240v. Having tried to get the 1966 KLH 27 receiver rewound, today the TX Makers haven't got a clue about Custom work. You'd need to get the right 'swg' thickness wire & know the Turns of wire needed & have it fit in the Amplifier. Any Japan-only 100v Amplifier offered sadly is A Con to unaware buyers as it's Useless in the UK. The Mysterious World Of Japan Electronics is mostly for the Language barrier & generally Google doesn't give much Japan coverage to UK readers. We had a Customer, the Sansui AU-G90X one, who used a 1990s CD player via the front Headphone socket if the Volume Control had worn out. He managed to source one from Japan & even got us an early JVC amplifier manual. Maybe a case of 'Who You Know' if mostly the Language barrier. To ask another with a 100v Amp, it seems Transformer winding no-one commercially does, as Wire SWG ratings are Custom in Transformers. There could be Specialists able to work out SWG ratings, Power Ratings & the Amount of Turns required, if it seems sizes of finished product might not be what you want. The fact UK can't find 240v-100v Step Down TXs doesn't mean Japan doesn't make any, but try find anything online. UK buyers should Avoid 100v Japan items as they are Unusable. But... A 240v To 100v Step Down Transformer is Buyable. Didn't see any on ebay as of typing the above, but Feb 2025 after having taken the Lux HQ32 off ebay, to find there are 240v-100v 600w or 650w units available. These are Used Older ones. Oddly the one we bought at £40 then others £110-£160, as Random as buying anything Vintage, as with the Pioner ER-420 tuner valve, none for ages them some appear. To get the Lux Rebuilt, only just done the 1964 Sansui 1000A. Bought HQ-32 Mar 2024, find 240v-100v TX Feb 2025. 600w suits like the more typical 240v-110v (120v) ones for USA amps, 200w amp allowing 600w for Mains Spikes is the usual idea. There Is A Problem with ours. Turning the Switch off knocks the Circuit Breakers, the Property ones faster than our Plug in one. Maybe it needs updating or repair, to look inside the 240v-120v one. In darkness only to use the Phone Torch to reser. A 600w TX 'bouncing' a fault isn't one too reliable.

Getting A Vintage 1970s 240v To 100v Step Down Transformer.
These are Vintage Items, not made new, We'd not trust those small 2000W ones probably working on Switch Mode Transistors. The Unit to buy is one lilke the typical Black Plastic Box USA to UK Voltage ones for about £40. 240v to 120v if you read it, just a 50% conversion, depending if you use it on 220v or 240v to get 110v & 120v, based on the idea 117v is the USA Mains Voltage at 60Hz. Step Down Transformer 'Nissyo SDX-600' made by 'Nissyo Industry Co. Ltd, Japan' shows how Unknown Japanese Electronics can be. Metal Cased shows it's Vintage. Nissyo founded 1967 & still going on searching online. Having asked ebay sellers what to use 240v to 100v, they won't tell or even suggest you look for Vintage ones. This sort of Secrecy & Lack of Selling Techniques is why the Fist Japanese Hifi in UK had no UK Distributors & wasn't trusted, until Trio-Kenwood & Pioneer got UK Distributors capable of offering Service & Guarantee work. The unit has an old 'Sainsburys' rubber plug with the L+N pin shielding & no Barcodes anywhere. Probably dates it to about 1978-80. Heavy Unit, like the 240v-USA voltage ones, so it has a proper Transformer inside. Probably was Lab Kit as old tape traces like from a large 'Dymotape' sticker remain & will clean off. The 220v-240v switch underneath was set to 220v so likely a EU used item. These seem Rare & do turn up pn ebay as does most Rare stuff, if not seeing any looking several times then seeing a few. Power Switch lights, reads 101.1v on the 2 Pin Blade Plug Socker. Has a Power Indicator with segments to show 100w-600w if '600w' only told by the SDX-600 model number. 1962 Lux(man) HQ-32 Receiver been waiting 10 months for a 100v supply, we have tested it for Voltages on 120v Mains to check it did at least Power Up if needs a Rebuild for usual aging. Reads 20& over with 120v & it'd probably work if not so well on 120v, things like Valve Heater 6.3v reads too high, but the 20% extra voltage pushes the Output Valves 305v instead of a likely 280v. Over-Voltage isn't Recommended for Use of any 100v item. It will very likely not last too long & a Safety Risk is possible. To Test the HQ-32 but leave it until whatever turned up, rather than try to get it to run on 120v with alterations. No Interest on the Lux HQ-32 on this site or on ebay shows how 'scared' people are of some Hifi. The fact it's the First Luxman Hifi Receiver in Valves from 1962, one so Rare not even one Japanese Hifi site features it. There is an element of 'pathetic' on a Rare & Complete amp getting no interest, probably got about 100 views on ebay over 3 months, did put UK Sale only. Where's the Collector Interest here? Fate wanted Us to Rebuilt it by Giving us a Bargain 240v-100v TX. There really aren't many capable of Rebuilding Valve Receivers, ones we've seen don't do it like we do. The UK buyer we got it from paid under $100 for it on a Japan auction plus about $300 delivery. We've Cleaned it Up, Tested it & Repaired the Front Panel as filler inserts to hold the Fascia metal strip the glue failed, leaving loads of Pieces wonderimg what they were. Fate sold it to Us. Will it be Any Good? Ours was set at 220v underneath, switch to 240v easily, suggesting it was used in Europe & as Lab Gear by Sticker Traces. A Test Sticker dated 2013 shows UK use yet not set to 240v isn't too clever. Reads 101.1v AC on first try. Nissyo SDX-600 & SDX-600U. Search the Model Number & these are online for about £150-£180, ours at £40 delivered a Bargain. No Japan 100v-Amp sellers would tell us of these, but they are around. Looking closer, the Nissyo SDX-600U is actually the one they have, a 110v-120v USA "U" version. The 220v-240v one is Rare. On Searching a while back, to see the 110v-100v version at high Amazon prices, suggesting you'd need a 240v-120v then 110v-120v one meaning Two TX Boxes. This Info, like a lot on this Site, you'll not find elsewhere, but We Research Things. Inside is a large metal Transformer, 600w size like the Yamaha CR-2020 one. One 0.3ohm 7w Resistor & a 10µf 16v capacitor on the Meter, an orange 'Elna' like Pioneer & Marantz used in the mid-late 1970s, Also has an older style Potentiometer more like a 1960s one which dates the unit more to Mid 1970s. Needed Servicing. What Vintage Electronics doersn't? Without anything plugged in, it tripped our Circuit Breaker always on turn-off. Now it's fine & Circuit Breaker stays on. To realise why it was a Bargain & 'No Returns' is the age-old game of 'Seller Knows But Won't Tell'. No problem for us beyond Darkness twice as also the Property Circuit Breakers tripped.

What To Do With The 1962 Luxman HQ-32 Hi-Fi Receiver.
This one has the Circuit Diagram on the Base Lid, Scan it up to make it readable as it's very tiny. A more Used amp could have this Incomplete & the Model Number Badge on the rear could easily be Missing as just glued on with the glue drying out. Odds Onwith ours to know Model & Diagram. No Components Numbered so it's Your Skills in Working Out what is what. To be able to Check Voltages on a 62 year old Valve Amp is probably Rare, as the Capacitors will be long dried out & certainly not to trust to use, but up to you if you trust it to Test. To find out "What Doesn't Work" & replace parts to at least get it Running. Ours now with a few parts replaced shows a decent HT & the Bias reads, without the Outputt valves in yet. To now put the Valves in, are they any good will be found out in the usual ways & to put our Headphone Box on the Speaker Outputs to make up for no Headphone. Going Blind into any Amplifier needs care. You might be lucky & get it playing Music & Tuner on first try, if usually one this old will show it's age with Hum & Vagueness. In Switching On with all Valves in, the gassed 12AX7 (ECC83) replaced, only some Heaters work, 2 of the 4 output ones don't & not all the Tuner Valves do if the Tuner Front End ones with bigger valves do. The Output Valve that glowed Red is one of the Working ones, so to find Heater problems. Get all 4 outputs Heaters going eventually. Headphones in, one channel Hums. Sound is 'there' on both Channels, the Left side with the Hum no Music, if we get FM playing set in the 88-90 range which is Radio 2. Dial shows 76-90 for Japan, it could be adjusted to fit UK use perhaps. It's Rough on Valves, needs more Servicing & Use at least. The Input Sockets take modern cables. But It Works. To Read Voltages now it plays to understand it further. How Many Years left unused until the Japanese seller tried it? Smoker's amp shows inside top lid blackening, probaby used it 2-3 years (or less) until t he Sansui Valve Range appeared 1963-1964 or the first Sansii transistor ranges by 1965-1966. So that's likely 58 years not used, not used that much & both front Bulbs work. One meter dosn't move if we know why to fix it. More Servicing gets it playing aux input, Left side low volume if Right side louder. Always good to hear it "as near original". It still needs much more done, to hear it plays Music well enough to bother doimg more. Treble & Midrange, mostly from the Right channel, seems of a Hifi Nature like the 1964 Sansui 1000A was. Hum quite loud on the L if the Phase switch quietens it a bit. Appealing looking amp, just One Torch Bulb in each Tuner window is a bit dingy & no meters light. To get it to this point more Luck from one not much used. To get it to 'Use Daily' is probably likely, but the Amount of Work involved. 473mm wide amp allows the two Tuners & it not being cramped inside. 1962 Tuners without extra features & pre MPX Stereo in one unit. To try to find the fault on the Low & Hum Left channel, instead of just rebuilding. To find what actually fails. The Valve glowing Red doesn't seem to have damaged it, only recently found bad & not used so it survives. Next day the Fault Found, it uses the 1959 'Mullard' Power Amp design.. Keep it playing & it's still aged with a bit of variance to settle as it 'wakes up', For a 1962 Japanese Amp, one of their Earliest, it takes much of what the USA Stereo Receivers use from 1959-60 with some strange design & "why did they put that there" thoughts. To hear it 'Near Original' matters. The "MFB" circuit, claiming to be 'Motional Feedback' from a Speaker, is really a sort of Loudness feature cutting the Output Volume & allowing the rear pot 'Boost' control to increase the Lower Bass within the Gain Loss. Gimmicky, but the 1968-70 Sony STR-6120 uses a similar Speaker Boos switch as do some McIntosh. Plays L+R with L side louder, Hum quite obvious playing both Channels, so main caps need the rebuild, the Multicap Cans. To order more parts therefore.

Headphones Compare. Audio-Technica ATH-M50 (2013) -vs- ATH-M50x (2023).
Bought the M50X a while back as Blogged Aug 2023. Not played them since as the 2013 M50 managed to solder the Wires. Did By New Bits to recondition, but never bothered as thety worked & replacement Ear Pads gets them better useable if Headband tatty & the Fixed Wire goes hard over time. On playing the M50 for a session, try the New M50X, in Feb 2025. The Test took only a Few Seconds, the sound was Not Good. Basically the Same Bass & Treble, but the Midrange very reduced making it sound Unpleasant. Much Nicer as New & more solid with the A-T real earpads. Tped this & try it again. Bass back -3 sounds better but the Upper Midrange is still Recessed as in not Flat & Neutral, when the Amp being played sounds right on Tannoys so it's the Headphone. The Bass is increased as the Amp Background has a More Bassy Hum with nothing playing. The old M50s the amp's background noise is one of the quieter ones & isn't a problem. Not to want to Upset Hearing by playing a Very Unnatural 'Created' sound, back to the old M50 & they sound right again. Reading Reviews of the M50X a few years back, others said the M50X was different to the M50. To think it's a Case of Running Them in as the M50 needed it, the large Reduction in Midrange that sounds like the 1kHz are is about 10dB down, rolling from 500Hz to 2kHz, a large difference. Usual comment is "What Idiot Thought This Was Better", to realise it's what they are using. The Mobile Phone 'sound' is limited & a more Midrange sound so it sounds like it's Made For Mobile Phones which is Severe Dumbing Down. The Difference in 1992 Tannoy 609 to 1967 Tannoy 15" Lancaster Golds is not so dissimilar. The 1967 Sony TA-1120 sounded lousy on 1992 speakers as on the Loudspeakers page. The Dynamite in the M50s is the Driver & a well used one in good condition. But they look Glued Into the plastic frames. Precious Parts could be reused, but the very fine Enamelled Wire is a tricky one. To take both apart more & try further, another time. But risk of things not being quite the same, the previous TiVo has the same power ratng if the plug on the end is different. Be sure the older one is better quality, the current TiVo keeps messing up when 2 or more shows record, the start takes more power & makes the earlier show still recording 'Stop' as it can't play through the Bad Part. A Little Strange In Use?. Brings up slight amp noises on the Left Channel on some amps. Turns out 'a little servicing' needed. In swapping around a few week's later, the M50X is a more upfront sound, leavi g the M50 a little 'soft' on Lower Treble-Upper Midrange. M50X suits the Tannoys better. Started playing up again & further needed, these are 2022 dated, why does it need any work? Beware these microscrews innards are to trip you up & break things, to note how (cleverly?) it fits together. Of course you'll have a wire come loose. Ours works fine now. If yours is in Guarantee, take it back, opening the Can & fiddling witrh the Earpad is not easy, maybe Mobile Phone repair shops don't see these to know the Pitfalls.

Later Trio-Kenwood Before & After They Used ICs: KR-7070 & KR-7400
One of the Better Hifi Brands, their TK-140X is their First Higher quality one, the earlier Transistor ones were not quite there yet. Their ranges go KR-x200, then KR-x400 then KR-x600. By the 1974 era KR-7400 at 63w the Power Amp is still All Transistors if the Phono & Pre-Tone are ICs. A 'RC4558T' is an Op-amp still findable on ebay, 8 Pin one with 'JRC' on usually & very cheap to buy. To look at the Spec Sheets, these crappy things are just General Purpose, not Hifi ones as some like 'Burr-Brown' claim to be. Says they are Stable so will be tamed if seeing the Transistor Equivalent is Why We Hate ICs: It's a Double Differential & Class B Amplifier with 14 transistors, 1 FET & 1 Diode plus Resistors & 2 Capacitors. The KR-7400 Tone-Pre needs Three of these awful ICs, used as L+R making the 6 (half) ICs on the Diagram. The Power Rating for both sides of the IC is 60-200mW & uses just 2-6.6mA which is a little Jaw Dropping compared to what a Trio Preamp with 4-6 real Transistors can use. It's little better than the early Germaniums used, needing 'Creative Circuitry' to compensate. Reality is the Soundcard we use has ICs & runs to Line Level, if not having the extra Tone gain. KR-7400 gives ±10dB Tone & Noise Levels are 70dB on Phono & 90dB on Aux which is like a Transistor pre can do. The Power Amp being the next range to the KR-6200 we have isn't that different, if the Protection Stage is Per Channel, not for Both Channels. Still using some Design going back to the First 1965-66 Trio-Kenwood Transistor designs. KR-7400 Power Amp Good, Preamp as ICs a No-No. The 65w KR-7070 is one we looked at on the 'Other Amps' page if No Clear Circuits then so with the Unusual Numbering, it's got Forgotten if we've had better Manuals since 2018. 1970-71 receiver there is the KR-7070 & a later KR-7070A. KR-7070 is a 65w amp after reading the many Power Variations that mean nothing, 110w at 4ohm one channel driven is no better than 300w at 4ohm Dynamic Power. Has Auto Tune Tuner to compete with a few 1968-69 Receivers (Fisher & Pioneer) & a "Boost Amp" which is a 'Presence' control that Boosts Midrange 1kHz & Upper Bass 400Hz to +6dB which will Sound Awful, why bother? It has Loudness too, be sure some will have used both & Tone and thought it was wonderful. 'Boost Amp' is in Circuit always, adding Two Transistors. Pre Differential input as Capacitor Coupled as are other Trio Amplifiers. Some Cautious Design in places suggests the KR-6170 & KR-5150 were Earlier. Some Doubling & Tripling of Resistors is unusual, 3x10 ohm paralleled instead of a 3.3ohm resistor. Works on 100v HT on a 5000µf 100v main capacitor which is unusual too, a Capacitor is usually given a Tolerance, but here it's 100v on a 100v capacitor. "V + H" on the Rear panel is an Oscilloscope Output for FM Tuner. A few Oddities, the KR-7070 still is of the Pre ICs quality if not an easy one to find. The 80w KR-7070A is a bit different, still Capacitor Coupled. Diagram more like a 1972 style. Changes Protection back to a Single Circuit, now an 80w Amp. Extra Speaker Outputs, 5w Mono Speaker Output, looks quite like the KR-6170 Jumbo at the back. '1971-9' code on the Manual. 80w if still on 100v main capacitor. A Relay on the Power Amp inputs is the Protection Muting, if still a Pre-Differential design. What's Different to make it 65w to 80w if it doesn't look much different to the KR-7070 earlier one. For 100v HT 80w seems more likely than 65w. The 'Presense' is now part of the Tone-Pre Board. A Confused Pair the KR-7070 & KR-7070A. There were no 8080 & 9090, they are Sansui numbers. Later Trio-Kenwood KR-9600 with IC output blocks are best avoided. KR-9400 is All Transistors on the Power Amp, sadly Preamp is ICs as is the KR-7400. 120w on Doubled Outputs with ±55v HT. Interestingly the KR-9400 finally changes what stayed continuous since the 1965-66 amps, values on certain parts. Not to say which as it gets 'amateurs' thinking it's better & go wreck a good amp. A Big Shame about the ICs in later Trio-Kenwood, but they Just Followed Fashion.

Highest Power Transistor Amplifiers & Receivers By Year 1965-70.
This is going by the Hifi Yearbook data as on out Two Pages plus others that were around if not always in the HFYB. A little difficult as they quote 'Music Power' & other confusing ratings, so to Check them via HFE info. Transistor Amps started in 1962 with Germanium 10w-15w ones. In the 1960s the Receiver was The Higher Power item compared to Amplifiers often being much less power as the Top or Only model. So only The Highest Power as Amp or Receiver matters. In the Earlier Valve era, the Amplifiers as a Pre & Power Unit could rate high as with Westrex cinema amps & the Radford ranges. 1965/66 brought the 50w Sony TA-1120 which only was talked of in HFN in 1967 as the 1120A arrived. Sony TA-1080 a 30w version. The Mattes SSP 200 another mentioned in HFN of about 50w rather than 100w as works on ±45v HT. Fisher TX-300 is 36w. In Receivers the Sansui TR-707A is rated 25w but oddly hides a higher power, perhaps by design. 1966/67 brings the Akai AA-5000 that's around 35w & later the Akai AA-7000 receiver of 40w. Sansui 3000 receiver is 45w. Pioneer SX-600T is 25w. Braun CSV1000 is 55w. James B. Lansing with a 40w power amp SE400SE. Sherwood S-900 40w. Fisher have a few Higher Power Receivers based on updated 1964 ones. Pioneer SX-1000T, SX-1000TA both 40w if rated differently. 1967/68 has Coral A707 at 35w which may not be a real 35w one. Dynaco Stereo 120 35w power amp. Vortexion pro amps range 40w to 200w of some type of rating not RMS. 1968/69 has the 'beloved' Quad 33/303 pair at £45. Knight Kit has 34w ones. Leak Stereo 70 35w a big seller. Quad & Leak were stocked by All The Shops as HFN ads showed. Nikko TRM 120 45w. Radford SCA 30 30w. Sansui AU-777 25w. Trio-Kenwood TK-140X 45w receiver out but not listed if the earlier TK-140E/U is, the white switches one as on our Gallery. Sanyo DC-60 30w receiver. 1970 HFYB named as just '1970' now. Several UK & Budget brands into Higher Power, but not ones that are our interest. Sony brings the 50w TA-3120 Power Amp. HH Scott 240-B 40w. Trio-Kenwood KA-4000 & KA-6000 30w & 45w. Luxman HQ 555 50w. Sansui 5000 50w, first of three versions. Sony belatedly arrive in HFYB with STR-6060FW from 1967 45w & STR-6120 at 50w, the most expensive receiver then.

TV's 'Salvage Kings' With An Altec-Lansing 9440A Power Amplifier.
This is an interesting show from 2020 onto it's 3rd series with quite a few changes, if Ted Finch is the Leader here. He's a real person & you can find him on 'LinkedIn' showing his job is real. The gear people leave behind in Demolition is quite amazing, they don't realise it has value or know where & how to sell larger Industrial items usually of High quality. To see S1 E2 they find one of these large Pro Power Amps just left behind, so to see what it is as it's beyond Domestic Hifi. The fascia says 800w, it's 200w Stereo if an 800w Bridged Monobloc with an additional unit says HFE. 56.5lbs from 1975. Clearly a PA Pro Amp & a little exciting for sure, but to wonder how "Hi-Fi" it is knowing cheaper PA amps are not of much quality. The Rear Panel in the Service Manual shows how Meaty it is, as many as 8x TO3 output transistors per channel with 6x TO66 driver transistors & cooling fans. For the Huge Power, the Circuits show it's designed to not cause Bother, as in it's Kept Tamed. Differential Input, Balanced or Unbalanced Inputs. Can't see any Relay & the Circuit would take some learning, but No ICs in this one certainly makes an impressive amp, in a 'Chieftain Tank' sort of way, compared to your Cute Little 20w Domestic amp. The Building it was in was an early Electronic Storage "Bank Data Centre" so this likely their PA Music System cutting no corners. Their huge Generator to cover Power Cuts equally 'Top Of The Range'/ What Speakers they'd use in 1975, they weren't left if again the PA Speaker market would provide. HFE shows Altec-Lansing didn't make much else, some early valve gear, a 44w "714A" receiver that's Capacitor Coupled so likely c.1970 if only one preamp in the 1990s. USA brand, odds are they aren't 220v-240v though as not in UK's HFYB. Prices on HifiShark aren't that much, the TV show sold it's one & 2 other units for $450. The "9440A" on circuits does seem to be 'Well Controlled' as a 200w/800w amp must be, a huge lot of Diodes in the circuit keep it Unconditionally Stable if perhaps Not Very Exciting beyond the High Levels. Seems all Direct Coupled beyond the Input, no Coupling Capacitors in the Audio which can make Repairs tough as Damage can spread. Has an obscure Darlington Transistor & SCR for 'Protection' if no Relay. What Seemed Exciting soon seems just a High Power Workhorse, prices don't rate it's Power in Hifi Prices. Ebay shows the Brand as more popular on Speakers, a non-working 714A only made $99 & is very like the Hitachi as we say below.

Altec-Lansing 714A 44w Receiver. Also 714AX Multivoltage from 1970-71.
Notes on HFE show this is a Multivoltage version too, to find the '714AX' would likely be tough. Front Buttons like the Leak 2000 from 1971. User Manual code suggests 1970. Photos of the inside show a Hitachi Code on the Transformer & it looks like other Japanese amps of the era, not USA built or with EU components. a 'Delta' triangle on the main capacitors seen before. Circuits are x3 Transistors for Phono including a Buffer, Preamp also has a Centre Channel Output not in the Preamp-Tone Circuit. Some unusual design in the Preamp with 5 transistors per channel including the Centre circuit. Power Amp is Capacitor Coupled, 9 transistors in total, design a little unusual. One you'd need to Hear, to wonder why they only made Two Receivers, this & the 30w '710A' that could be 1968-69. The '710A' does look like the 1971 Hitachii SR-1100 especially the back panel. Push buttons like UK Sugden & USA McIntosh Hitachi made two decent Realistic receivers as we've had before. At least Built By Hitachi so to expect a similar Decent Quality receiver, if you can find one. A few on HifiShark not making much, if earlier than their 1973-74 date.

The Huge Benefits In Servicing Electronic Gear.
Most never bother as they See It as a Waste Of Money because the Item still works. True it can still work but can be Way Short of It's Best. Reading what Faults people put up in in Hifi is quite shocking to us, they'll still keep using an Amplfier that Hisses, Hums, Makes Noises or isn't equal Volume both channels. It's like Running a Car into The Ground & scrapping it, ideas that were around before a MOT picked up on far more things, after all a Car is a lot more dangeous as you're sat in the thing driving at high speed. Hifi we use has been Rebuilt & Serviced, so it's not often an Amp can be used as Original on Headphones & much rarer we'd trust it on our Tannoys. To hear amps as Raw & Aged reveals those sort of Rough Far-Gone type issues, if we sort it out before using again, to not want to ruin it & sometimes not to use it again until Rebuilt. Computers Need Servicing Too. For life over the last few years, the 'Big Hoax' has caused long-lasting issues & you can see some people have aged more than Three Years over the last three years. Our Computer by the service dates inside shows it's actually older than we thought, but regularly maintained with New Parts over time, it's kept going. But it's been so slow, Firefox takes ages to start, Click on a .jpeg to open & it can take ages too. This humans can learn to live with as you're busy doing other things. In reality the Computer Needs Servicing Yearly, blowing out the Dust & General Servicing including Hard Drives. The Computer can be on all Day, not into Power Saving Modes as they just make things slow. So to service it & check it to a degree, not takinmg the Motherboard or Processor out, but checkimg visually like Hifi gets. No problems at all phsyically after the last Service Date being Feb 2020, just before all that Nonsense started. Typing this Mid Dec 2023 means it's had nearly 4 years sonce the last Service & was just getting annoying. Timing is the thing, so near to an Xmas few will particularly want, beyond a few weeks rest if they're lucky. Some connections look a bit aged, the Memory boards were all fine as was Sound & Vision. Computer may not be Windows 11 compatible, if who cares really, just more bloated junk & forever messing design around, Start Button in the middle? We still use Quick Launch that's well hidden, don't want anything more than Windows 8.1 gave. So What Happened? Started up quicker, a scan found some 10 year old 'apps' had unwanted things, not used them & that's another Computer issue, keeping Obsolete Junk, though be careful what you Delete as in any Tidying. Open a .jpeg was fast as it should be, Firefox opened much faster than often 1 minute wait. The Taskbar we keep on two layers, most of the last several weeks the thing resets back to one layer. Things like Websites forever nagging for Text Codes & 'Trust This Device' when it's the exact same one on the same IP shows Computer issues. This could be the Battery on the Motherboard, ours read a good voltage if Servicing needed. A BIOS/CMOS battery holds certain data when the Computer is off. To use the Computer more to see how it holds Data, why the Taskbar doesn't keep the height. So Far it's like getting a New Computer for how Fast it is again. Programs open much faster, Internet loads Sites Faster. Servicing is Maintenance, to see Cars on TV shows, nearly 100 years old or 20 years old, kept Serviced & Used is what Cars thrive on. 30 years in a Barn leave Cars often in very poor grade & generally 'dead' unless a huge amount is spent.

Where Upgrading Ideas Come From.
For all the Amps & Receivers we've had, to find some more memorable than others. Some have 'a lot of good' but other sections way short. No Domestic Amplfier will have PA Qualities & Without Any Dumbing Down, so to pick & choose The Best Of The Past in a Cherry Picking Way, of how to Imprive Circuits. To remember the Sound from one we had back in 2012, the 1975 Luxman L-100 & the 1967 JVC 5040U last had in 2019 after first getting in 2015. To see current ideas could better both is showing the amount of Circuit Gazing & Upgrades in other Amps. Trying Upgrades needs good listening & to use on Speakers for a Week to get used to the Upgraded Sound to then Compare back to different Amps then thought to be 'The Best There Can Be'. Of Course the amount of 'Best' gets more & more subtle. That One could fo with Crisper Treble, that one could do with Deeper Bass & to confuse then others could do with a more Precise Midrange. Using Stereo Music & TV to test works best, revealing Stereo Width & Depth Of Soundstage. Is it a bit Dull or is it a little Thin are Questions asked on Playing Music on Headphones or TV sound on Speakers. Play the same TV you watched earlier digging out the TiVo deleted files. Getting Better Sound as Advertisers claim FETs, ICs & all other new ideas is all nonsense when you can hear the Best Sounds from 1969-70 era Hifi, if it took a huge amount to get there. You've read of them before, 1969 Pioneer SX-2500 75w & 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170 Jumbo 33w. Big Difference in Power if in reality both are fine on 95dB Tannoys. In terms of Power Ratings, it's only a Higher Voltage used that increases power, the Doubling of Output Transistors increases Current to make the 1971 Akai AA-8500 a 65w instead of 40w without the Doubled Outputs. Years Of Hi-Fi Circuit Reading reveals that the General Idea is 'Not To Give Them The Best Stuff Ever' like the "Back To The Future" line. Amps can have outstanding design but be Dumbed Down & Tamed to Hide It. Only by Questioning All You See can the Secrets be unravelled. The 'Ideal Sound' is an effortless huge soundstage with wide Stereo & Smooth but not restricted, Extended Treble & a Rich Bass. Imagine if Shop Bought Hifi was Like That, you'd play it Too Loud & cause problems. Generally the 'Sound' of the Amp is made in the Preamp, if the more Power Amps are compared, just reveals the Whole Amp from Power Supply, Preamp & Power Amp affects the sound. The Best Hifi is the Least Restricted, the Least Dumbed Down. Many Great Designs, but Never Just One Perfect Amp. The simple designs of Single Ended Triodes with 1930s Valves brings a wonderful but Very Limited Frequency Range. Those saying certain Amps are good for Rock, Classical or Acoustic Music generally have Substandard Hifi. Rock on rough sounding mid 1970s Pioneer suits some, thin overbright sound suits Classical more & Acoustic Music being so uncomplex sounds decent to some on these 5w-10w efforts that cluttered up Hifi Mags & Shops by the 1969-72 era.

Reviewing The Reviews: Sansui AU-777 Amplifier April 1969 Hi-Fi News Review.
This is the First Sansui Transistor Amplifier, the 30w AU-777 exists in "A" & "D" versions if "B" and "C" ones don't apparently exist. The first one seems to be 1967 with 2SC281 & 2SC650 early Silicon Transistors. This has the 'Tape Head' input as the HFN review shows, if by 1969 the old style 'Tape Head' input was obsolete as Tape Machines had their own preamp, it was for playing a Tape Head itself direct. The "A" version is simplified from a huge amount of Phono-Tape Head options as is the "D" which seems much the same, both with the 2SC458 transistors that often are hissy. There must be differences if nothing obvious as the AU-777 to AU-777a version shows. The AU-777 version has a strange "Prescence" switch that actually Boosts Bass in the main NFB Power Amp stage, like the 1968 Sony STR-6120 has for a Bass Boost. HFN read it boosts around 200Hz not the usual 'Prescence' boosting upper midrange around 2kHz. HFN says it has the usual L+R Mono output for a seperate Amp & another just for 200Hz bass, both of which were not of much use, if will have been for the USA Market for larger rooms. One design oddity is the Drivers pre the Outputs are both NPN, not the usual NPN-PNP pair. The 1967 Sansui 400 receiver used a Germanium PNP & this design avoids that. Uses a small Inductance on the Output Transistors, an 0.8µH not seen elsewhere as done differently usually. The HFN review by Reginald Williamson, Reg in other reviews mostly reads like the Specifications, telling you what it does. Not for the First time, Reg's Tests manage to Wreck the Amp's Output Stages making the UK's distributor do a long 380 mile journey to see what Reg done. They 'Don't Know' of course, soft lad damaged it somehow. Sansui are a very reliable Brand & we've had many of their 1965-72 models. We can see 'what it lacks' to have likely caused the bother & looking at the AU-777a design they sorted it differently. Beyond the Over-Complex Phono-Tape Head inputs, the rest of the amp is away from the 1965-66 Transformer Coupled TR-707A & 3000(A) designs, nearer to the 1967 Sansui 400 receiver we've had. The HFN review continues the waffling, saying the 'Tape Out' has No Buffer Stage which was the normal idea, though a Buffer on Tape Out we saw as worthy early 2000s making one for our Sony STR-6120. Review mentions the 1969 £110 amp was in the league of only a few Japanese amplifiers, to know they mean the 1967 50w Sony TA-1120A & 1968 48w Trio-Kenwood KA-6000 as well as the 30w TA-1080 & the Luxman SQ-1220 50w amp. You're buying an Amplifier designed for the more Advanced Buyer in North America, the amount of Sansui 3000(A) sold to USA via the Army & Navy Stores shows the market as we've blogged before. To suit as many buyers the Loudness & Filter Stages had to be included. Loudness was never liked by Hifi Magazines or Us past Teenage-early 20s when thick thuddy Bass was considered 'cool', it's not Sophisticated Listening, but it suits when you've heard that sort of sound in Nightclubs & Discos. The Filter for High & Low Frequencies was more a UK thing for gritty grainy UK audio, the 'devotees' trying to filter out Rough Treble & Rumbly Turntable noise seems a bit hopeless now, but a £110 amp could be used with a £12 turntable & £2-£5 cartridge on £16 speakers as was much Advertised in HFN at the time. Buyers hadn't got a Clue. Would This Review Give You A Clue? Highly unlikely it would justify why you'd pay £110 instead of £35 other cheaper amps of 30w could be including UK gear. The Review tells us the Square Waveforms ar 1kHz & especially 10kHz are unusually good, but The Fool wrecking the amp is Laughable to put in a review, but Our Reg likes to trash Hifi thinking he's Testing it, but clearly doing things very wrong. Review makes No Mention of Cleanness of Treble that Sansui do have, a good Bass, a Fast Lively Open Sound or any Subjective Opinion at all. It looks nice but may be a bit harsh looking visually to the Wife is as far as opinion goes. The tests show it puts out 31w at 7.5 ohms, when 8 ohm speakers are used by now. They show Square Waves into the notoriously difficult ELS Electrostatics by Quad, a design that Quad has to compromise it's own amps to play, they always show odd spikes in the waveform as the ELS is a horrible load some amps just won't play into. The HFN reviews until into the 1970s basically just rewrites the user guide & specs plus Oscilloscope tests few will understand without actually having used an Oscilloscope. They at least give a Real RMS Continuous Power Rating, 30w, not the Music Power nonsense that'd call it '120w' when it has no meaning in the real world. Looking At The Circuits. The AU-777 we thought a bit over-complex, the AU-777a with simplified design will be a better buy. Knowing enough Sansui, we'd buy either, if never found one & don't see the need to buy an expensive one from the USA, if it's certainly be a Great Amp. We have had the Very Overpriced 1970 Sansui AU-999 years ago to know the 1967 Sony TA-1120A was a better amp, both being 50w.

'The Repair Shop' Xmas 2023.
A New Episode without the tedious 'Distancing' nonsense & to skip thru Unwanted Slush & twee 'Secret Santa' stuff, the rest of the Show is still worth a watch. Here they have a 1990s-2020s Record Player, those 'Quaint Retro' ones that even 'Pawn Stars' show. These seem to have Sold Well & we've never seen one to know what's inside, if expect 1980s Music Centre-Amstrad style build. Here the likely 12v turntable motor power supply regulator board has failed, regulators & diodes possibly failed, nothing burnt looking, if no circuit diagrams so he gets a replacement different board & thinks it'll be the right voltages. This soon gets passed over suggesting it didn't work, but can't be hard to buy the same full player unit on ebay. Cramped board with several plugs, our Lad cuts one wires piece back to very short cut-off ends & solders them midway with no Heat Shrink even, why not do it properly & wire onto the board? Item shown working, if as with Electronics, be sure not much if it'll be the same one, swapping working innards to a non-worker as beyond repair. The Insane Mechanical-Electronic Cake is quite a find. Made of Meccano to have moving Cake Ornaments on top, it is a joy for How Clever the maker 'Uncle Fred' made it from scratch. They have Film of it from 40-50 years ago showing the delights of it working & certainly a mammoth task to restore. Maybe they've Bitten Off More Than They Can Chew on this one (cake) & how long it took we're not told. A Solenoid draws 10A meaning it's shorted so they fit a new one easy enough. But all the mechanics & drive belts, to melt together a length of Rubber Belt is the way & for Hifi Cassette & Tape, the join bump will never be perfect. It's why we avoided the Thorens Turntables as had enough of Belt Drives in the 1980s & early 1990s when you could still buy belts, today there are no NOS belts as the rubber will have aged. Rubber belts don't last long, they perish, go soft & extend in size, making them useless. When Belts were buyable for the exact size, a New Belt was a Huge Difference in Useability compared to the saggy old belts. Rubber Belts are still in many Vintage Cars, if that Market has a bigger Demand than Cassette Player repairs, to still have them made. Rubber Belts are like Chromed Sections & Bumpers on Older Cars, strictly Retro. Clock Builder Steve, he who sometimes looks like a Giraffe, made a circuit description to understand the cake's workings, to break it into stages to understand is how a Valve Stereo Receiver gets rebuilt, hours of preparation. The Cake works like the old Film showed if the difficulties not shown much as with things Technical, as it doesn't make good TV & hides the 'Magic' in rebuilding, save giving the difficult stuff away.

March 2025 Blog

1965 Pioneer Delights: SX-600T & SX-1000T Receivers & SMT-84 Amplifier.
We have the SX-600T just for wondering what a Germaniums Pioneer would be like. Not to Confuse numbers, the SX-1000T is different to the SX-1000TD, TF & TW & the 1980s SX-1000. To cut the story shorter, to find the SX-600T is the First Design, with the SX-1000T & SMT-84 sharing the same Service Manual & we found one online. The SMT-84 schematic one page is online, if no other info. Assume both are 45w. Design Differences. There are Noticeable Ones in the Preamp-Tone-Power Amp. The Phono-Aux Input we're less botheed with as our SX-600T is a bit noisy, so to use "Tape Monitor" as Aux to avoid the Hiss & Input Resistor, ideas from Valve amps. Comparing both side-by-side to see the SX-1000T adds a Silicon Driver before the Coupling Transformer. Certain values obviously differ as 25w to 45w. To know designs & how they sound to work out the Differences to tell which may be The Best One. Often the First Design is the Best, later Designs tweaking a 'Perfect' design can often lose the Qualities the Original Designer wanted, sometimes as it was Too Good & You Can't Have That. The Design Varies each stage, to see design that gives a Sweeter Sound, a Sound less Precise or a Sound that may be a little Harsher. The Balance of Varying Design might make it sound Better or Not & to not just Guess, to not be able to confirm until hearing both as Recapped with Upgrades. We don't want much do we? The SX-600T is the Earlier Design, codes on Transformers having the 600T one a higher number could be for minor changes. For How Great the SX-600T sounds after much work, to wonder how you can Better That, so we're leaning towards the 25w SX-600T rather than the 45w SX-1000T or SMT-84. The Headphone Socket is different with a Load Resistor the SX-600T doesn't have, it just turns Speaker on or off. A Further Look shows the SX-1000T-SMT84 are earlier perhaps as Boards numbered AM9116 & AM9117 on the SX-1000T-SMT84 & AM9130A & AM9132 on SX-600T Amplifier-Preamp Boards. Mains TX are AT5245 and AT5299. Coupling TX are AT6202 & AT6264 showing the SX-1000T & SMT84 are earlier. The SX-600T seems a little more perfected than the earlier SX-1000T-SMT84. Either will be 1965 Amps & need a Big Rebuild to bring out their best. Looking at the Designs, the SX-600T & playing our SX-600T has just a little extra Smoothness & Focus. Until we find a SX-1000T, there'll be one out there for sure. Bring. A forthcoming Blog tells more.

The Mysterious "Rogers New Cadet" As On Our "Other Amps" Page.
Mar 2025 shows one on ebay!....This info by us has been online for years now, but thinking of it recently, it Does Exist... but more likely as a Home Made Item, not a real Rogers Amp. We thought it was awful with a STK Block power amp. We wrote..."Interesting, but only to sneer at so No. This is a depressingly lousy looking amp, looks 1966-68 perhaps {possibly 1973?} with components used, but remarkably with nasty STK015 IC amp blocks & a very cheap look & not much in it either. Odd how we've never heard of it before as it would have been in our Henry's catalog surely unless it was not rated worthy. DIN speaker plugs, 3 DIN inputs, black front oddly symmetrical with a huge balance knob as it get used so often (?) & input & filter switch rows. The 10w IC you can find the basic 8 transistor circuit equivalent of, for the lack of finesse in it, it's bleak & rather amusingly awful if probably very futuristic using the 15th ever design IC amp block. Looks like it occured before the Ravensbrook & Ravensbourne amps & we finally sold our Ravensbrook receiver we are relieved to say. No, we don't want one. Rarity is a good thing sometimes too. The Large Control Knobs looked 1980s on remembering it. Black front & Rogers Cadet sized to make up a Home Made Amp. No-one has ever Questioned this, it Genuinely was on ebay. Not a Hoax, but some crazy made-up amp from bits & the fascia lettering done convincingly. But we thought it was awful & over ten years later to think on it again. 1967-68 brought in the Rogers Ravensbourne & Ravensbrook transistor amps. Hopefully it's still being used & enjoyed for The Joke it certainly was. Saw a 1973 Sony TA-1150 with it's power amp as an IC block looking similar. To keep a broken amp going no doubt. Later... Mar 2025 actually shows the "New Cadet" on ebay for a ridiculous £2000. It's probably the Same One we saw before. It has large Silver Knobs & Round Push Buttons plus Sliders on a black fascia. The Wood Case looks like the smaller Ampifier one & the rear panel has a Rogers badge & serial number. Not the same back as the Ravensbrook or Ravensbourne. Inside we remember had a STK IC Block or maybe two. It was very cheaply made & as we tgought before it looked a Made Up item, or maybe it was a Prototype but the Wood Case fits too well. The early Ravensbourne has the same 'picture frame' front edge as we had one in the early 1990s. The case size is narrower suggesting the case from a Rogers Tuner. Rear of 'New Cadet' has DIN plugs in & out. Here it has Silver large controls, the other one maybe Black 1980s looking ones. It could be an Export-Only model too, but it just looks strange. The Speaker DIN plugs are marked L+R, usually amps mirror the internals so 'R+L' is typical. It is more Cadet III sized, if only by visually comparing. Prototype or Export is the 2025 opinion having seen two that match pictures to the green text above. The Control knobs are like Ravensbourne. It could have been a real item that was exported to Indian Countries by the seller's name, sell it far from UK to not confuse with the official Rogers. There were Leak amplifiers restyled for the USA so mysterious 'unknowns' can be explained. Rare but not good Quality.

1965 Pioneer SX-1000T Earliest "SX-1000" Model.
This is a "40w into 16 ohm" Germaniu,ms model, around the same time as our 1965 SX-600T. These two are Very Rare, the SX-600T as of typing Mar 2025 is up for sale, if it'll possibly stay. To find a SX-1000T on USA ebay for $90 to jump at it, but a few issues, seller may not post to UK, it has a single clean crack on the Tuner Glass that has 'SX-1000' printed on, the power switch button replaced with a later lever swich & the hole very likely drilled bigger, and the Selector control knob missing which on the SX-600T has an extra finger grip bar. Fascia lettering good, power cord cut no bother to us, 240v-120v version too with Lid Damage at the rear. FM-only so no rear AM antenna. Recycle yeard seller, would they pack it so the glass still stays as pictured. Saw the SX-1000T as the Receiver Version of the SMT-84 & do have the Original printed paper manual, if not scanned it up yet. Amp & Receiver basically similar beyond Tuner. Be Sure it Interests. SX-1000T or SX-600T Came First? The TX on the 1000 is 'AT5245' & the 600T is 'AT 5299B'. Not conclusive, as one maybe started design before the otherm but Circuit Clues tell 1000T is earlier as using ideas likeTrio-Kenwood TK-80U (1st), both being 1965 Germanium receivers. The SX-1000T we'd expect to be a Very Decent one, rebuilt in Soilicon like our SX-600T. To look for a better grade one than the USA one seen, a tatty amp rebuilt to 'perfection' will still be tatty. All Germaniums beyond the last three transistors on the Power Amp which are Silicon as the Driver & Outputs. We changed the SX-600T to Silicon successfully & rate the SX-600T as a good one to have used on Speakers. SX-1000T Circuit is like the SX-600T with Aux into Phono by a large resistor. The "40w into 16 ohm" power rating is as on the Circuit, with ±48v the Power into 8 ohm could be considereably higher, at least 50w based on SX-600T values. Not too clear how Aux gets to Phono input by the Diagram & EQ switching, if the SX-600T is Aux into Phono. Tone-Preamp considered the Stages before 'SL4' the Low Filter, has a Buffer, Passive Tone, Gain Stage, Volume & Loudness then another Gain stage. Power Amp, on a separate board, has Germanium Buffer, Silicon Driver including main NFB, Transformers for Bias & a pair of Silicon Outputs.Variants Amid Three Versions. SMT-84 A,plifier, SX-1000T & SX-600T have differering Coupling Transformers on the Power Amp. AT6202, AT6263 & AT6264 respectively. Similarly Power Transformers AT5245, AT5250 & AT5295B. The SAX-1000T will have the Phono, Pre-Tone & Power Amps underneath. Is It Worth Bothering With? It's a bit different in Design & Higher Power to the SX-600T. It'll have the same problems of Germanium hiss & the Bias stage needs redesign. The Power Rating on the 40w into 8 ohm SX-1000TA runs on 76v HT. The SX-1000T here on 48v+48v is more 96v which the 72w SX-2500 runs on. The SX-1000T could be anything 50w-72w therefore. SX-600T on ±24v HT says 16w into 8 ohms when it's 25w into 8 ohms, so 40w on ±48v HT into 16 ohms is likely to be about 60w up to 72w. If it was a UK buy we'd go for it. Should We Try For This USA Offered One? Unfortunately Broken Glass would need one scanned & remade & today it's too hard getting this done as we found out 10 years ago with the 1963 Trio WX-400U glass. Missing Power Switch & Tuning knob needs a Donor & the SX-600T is a good worker. The SX-1000T could be a great amp, it only took Five Years to get the SX-2500 to a standard. Seller says No Uk Sale & a recycling seller propably wouldn't pack it well, best look for another in 2 months or 10 years, it is a Rare one. The USA one is perhaps best left if unlikely Anyone out there could get it to the standard of our SX-600T based on No Interest on that 1962 valves Luxman HQ-32 that we now have working with a 100v TX. Does look too 'thrown around' recently which may mean inside board damage, recycling yards are bins that get picked through, damage could be just days before it got listed. Playing other recent amps, Sansui 1000A, Trio-Kenwood KR-8340, Trio-Kenwood TK-80U (1st) & then our Sx-600T, the TK-80U is perhaps the sweetest sound of the 3, the TK-66BU at 20w isn't far off it. So the SX-600T, these amps get changes & lter compared back making comments we wrote on the case edge now a different opinion to before & knowing why. Certainly An Interesting One. Be aware the SX-600T needed so much redone as it was rather aged on a lot. Transformers suggest the SX-600T came after the SX-1000 & SDM-84 amplifier version. Power amp has a Thermistor "D1-B" when the SX-600T has "D1-A". Maybe just the Specs suited better, if no info found & ours in the SX-600T were off spec unevenly to what should read 20 ohm resistance. Designs on Preamp-Tone & Power amp are quite different with unusual circuitry on both. Assuming the SX-600T came after the SX-1000T it has design perfected which does show between them. Headphone stage is different on the SX-1000T suggesting it's earlier too. Going through to further see if one is worth getting as it isn't being let go of yet. Seeing the SX-1000T Got Us Keeping The SX-600T Again. It's hard to know what to Sell or Keep. Generally in Comparing one makes another "sound different" to the point one can be let go. It'll be compared to the SX-2500 next just to add another edge to Hifi Comparing. SX-600t is 25w, SX-2500 is 72w. The extra power does bring benefits on fast transients. SX-2500 & SX-600T now not so unlike, which waas the 5 year job on the SX-2500 to get the 1965-66 25w sound on a 72w amp. Forever making small changes, hsear "it" one place & put it in another.

We're Relieved the Rough USA-Sold Pioneer SX-1000T Actually Got Sold.
Unless they want it for Parts, no-one else in the World could rebuild this is fair comment. A £224 buy delivered to us, would it be a pile of broken bits? Sells 15 Mar after 'in basket' by one, 'you buy it mate' idea. Maybe they read our Feb 2025 blog about it. Odds are it'll be for sale once they see it's too much work & read this Blog. Look how much this 2025 blog talks of it, but we have a 'Perfect' SX-600T here that does sound exceptionally good with further ideas. It's a great looker too. The 600T is a later version of the SMT-84 & SX-1000T & it's quite different in circuit design. It's Germaniums of course & the SX-600T took Two Years to really be it's best. Some good circuitry if also the SX-1000T is rather like the 1965 Akai AA-5000(S). We had a 5000S & sold it with the selling page saying it sounnds 'nice but a bit retro' meaning it wasn't with open bass or that crisp treble & had a less smooth sound. Reto it sounded. We bought another earlier AA-5000 to find both are the same if the 5000 has one Germanium PNP driver & two NPN Silicon, unlike the 5000S having all three as Silicon. We've actually started rebuilding the AA-5000 but have it in pieces still since converting other Germanium to Silicon. AA-5000 will be too tricky to keep taking apart so it'll likely just be sold as Germaniums, if initially buying another the day after the Courier collected it as we 'missed it' stood where it was. The SX-1000T missing parts & broken glass & bashed up lid could mean the SX-600T gave parts, which isn't a good idea when the 600T is great now. The SMT-84 one looks rather untidy inside, the 4 main capacitors usually only 2 fitted. No idea what the main boards underneath look like, if probably much like the 600T ones into the SX-1000TA ones. We have our rebuilt 1966 Pioneer SX-1000TA as for sale & gave it a play again. A nice sound & could upgrade more, if having SX-2500 & SX-600T is enough to hold. The 1965 Sansui TR-707A was a great amp after much work, but to decide to sell rather than go further & it sold fast to a Delighted buyer. Design in the SX-1000T seemed a bit 'overcooked' when the SX-600T was spot on & the TR-707A could go further in several ways. TR-707A sold also as similar looking 1964 Sansui 1000A valve amp here, now rebuilt awaiting valves. Another tricky one 1962 Luxman HQ-32 now working if more to do, now a 100v transformer box got. Buying Risky Amps. The Criteria in buying amps is often 'limited'. A recent 1965 Kenwood TK-80U 1st we got from USA, to see lettering issues but nice grade. Asked seller for inside pics & nice too so worth the buy for the interest. It certainly now is a great amp, converted to Silicon. 1962 Luxman HQ-32 a real unknown to buy, but nice grade under dirt & complete, plus showing inside pics to see it was worthy, if not aware it was 100v which is a dodgy seller not saying. To try ir on 120v to see it was 'there' & then get a 100v step down TX as blogged above. 1965 Pioneer SX-600T wasn't such a good buy, amateur repair but much wasn't good on it. Now it is after 2 years on it. Most Amplifiers & Receivers we buy are 50-60 years old & will never be what the seller says, 'Working' means 'Bulbs Light' which is a strong start, as we'd rebuild it anyway. The 1966 Nikko TRM-100 was just too poor to bother with even after much rebuilt, if it provided a good Volume Control for the SX-600T. The SX-1000T in it's Poor & Unknown-inside state would be fine if trade was busy, but it sat as it just seemed a bad buy & we could have it nice inside but still have it wrecked & incomplete on the outside. Another recent Risky Buy was a 1967 Trio-Kenwood TK-140X Black Label early one. Bad Rust on the case but otherwise in good unharmed grade & unusually working beyond the FM tuner. To let it sit & try to fix the Tuner is the idea, these are a Big Rebuild to do, especially having one to rebuild for a customer, what isn't noticed in time gradually, over a shorter time to do a Job, it's a lot more than you'd think. The Buyer of SX-1000T after two weeks leaves no Feedback on ebay. If they'd bought it just for Controls or maybe Fascia, they'd be delighted to complete one. Probably read of it on this site & caught a bad buy, as in it was all smashed up inside. The top lid on the SX-600T is a heavy one to take such damage. If they won't show inside photos on asking, best to walk away. But the seller gets good feedback & offers a 30 day return on the item, so it met their needs in some way & not all leave feedback, so to never know unless they relisrt it. The 1965 Trio-Kenwood TK-80U 1st we got, to see inside photos to see it was in nice grade beyond the fascia lettering so was a good buy & as of March 2025 it's on Speakers sounding extremely good, if for our Rebuild & Upgrades plus some Redesign.

Know Your Subject Before You Get In Deep.
Hifi is like Cars or Human Relationships, odds are what seems 'cool & nice' often is far from it. 'Back in the Day' about 1979 a relative bought a Car at an Auction hoping to tidy it up & sell for a profit, trying to add a Business to their others. Car Auctions are really not for Amateurs & even Pro's can get unstuck as TV shows tell. The relative, in hindsight, bought one of the Worst Cars ever... the 'Austin Allegro'. Not very old but lots of problems, the typist was there as they bought it & to remember it got sold on fast on realising how bad it was, likely at a loss. Traders like you hear Mike on 'Wheeler Dealers' & Derek on 'Bangers & Cash' dealt with cars a lot & knowledge of them both is very high. We have much knowledge on Hifi & some we'd never get again knowing the cheap construction & general averageness of them. There is a reason why we get certain brands more than others. These 'turkeys' still sell online & up to the Buyer to research. Good-Selling items more for Good Sales Talk than Quality & not forgetting Cost Cutting by 1974. To recently buy a 15w 1968 Sony STR-6040 & 12w 1969 Pioneer SX-440 to find both actually pretty good amid the obvious dumbing down, they both upgraded to be a lot better than expected. Both bought for seeing circuits & thinking they're worth a try. To get them Upgraded to a level quite quickly to then not go further & offer for Sale. We've had then on Speakers to hear they are Worthwhile, power limited compared to 40w as you'd expect, but a Nice Sound hidden amid dumbing down.

Do You Listen To The Music Or Just How The Hi-Fi Sounds?
Hifi is for Playing Music. Old Jokes in 1960s HFN magazine shows some are more interested in How Perfect the Sound is. Not having Loudspeakers but Oscilloscopes so he can see the Waveforms. Music isn't Sine Waves so there is little point looking at Music via Waveforms, but it's showing an obsession. We play Records a lot if as we use Earplugs to not hear unwanted noise, the Headphones have got used with Earplugs, the 3M ones in individual pairs in the bag. Never trust unbagged ones as dirty fingers have been touching them to cause you Ear Infections. The Earplug sound is still detailed if without the "Hi-Fi" extra detail so instead of grumbling how rough some Vinyl is, you just Hear The Music with a Richer Sound, a more Bassy sound. This gets you focussing on the Music, just chuck a 45 on & play an unknown until you get tired of it or hear it "With New Ears" which often reminds of how Great that song was when you heard it 30 years ago. A Hifi Site telling you to avoid the Hifi & play it Lo-Fi? Why not. Music is for listening & we play the same Stereo tracks from the Computer over & over for testing Hifi. To concentrate on The Music in a Different Way can get you listening to tracks you've never bothered with before. Of course to hear Hifi sounding so Sweet, Pure & Clean is pleasurable, but to Try Music in a different way is very refereshing. In a similar way our 1932 Pye G/RG radiogram, not used that in quite a while now, it plays Music from Radio or 78 in a very eerie 92 year old way that is quite special. The Earplug Hifi certainly needs a Top Hifi, we'd not suffer poor sound like playing an aged 1970 Monster Receiver that can be Lo-Fi as so aged & tired with that grainy sound many think is Hifi. Earplug Hifi isn't requiring such effort, just Enjoy The Music & bring back the Magic of your Lo-Fi years. This is a genuine blog & we've played Earplug Hifi a few years & currently playing 45s this way to get The Music not just The Fidelity, or lack of it. Earplug listening can reveal some tracks as "a bit crap" yet reminding how Great some are. In terms of Vintage 45s, helps sort out ones to Sell.

Unrepairable: High Powered Amplifiers & Receivers Of The 1980s-1990s.
We get hopeful messages thinking these Overdesigned Amplifiers arte actually Rebuildable. They Rarely Are. 1989 Accuphase E-405 170w Amplifier. Looks the part & to see Working Ones at $2500. But to see one parted out Cheaply as once working days have gone, nobody aware of these amps would ever bother. To buy a Non worker is much like the AV Amps of today, once Faulty they are Worthless beyond parts. This is Harsh & the Owner getting 34 years use done well, but it's time to buy Real Vintage pre 1980 or buy some Hugely Overpriced Modern Unit in the £5000+ range. The Accuphase Brand is one of those that gets Highly Rated to some buyers, if the 170w at 0.02% THD with 150 Damping Factor instantly tells it's Overdesigned & will sound So Boring. But the Hifi Mags tell you these Amps are Better, because they are Paid Advert Reviews. E-405 has no Service Manuals if earlier ons do. There is a User Manual that shows Simplified Circuits, 4 Differential stages & those rubbishy Op-Amps littering the Preamp Board. You are being Heavy Sold on Rubbish that'll not be repairable often as ICs are obsolete. You might get some Success Rebuilding the Amp & then an IC is bad that is obsolete. Power Amp shows 5 Transistors per channel, be sure these are Obsolete, if you'd need a Manual to know what they were, 2SC3519 shows as the NPN ones, these are actually on ebay but dare you trust buying from China on High Power Transistors, you are too likely to get Fakes. Power Amp board shows short but wide Big Capacitors, you'd never get Custom Size ones & need to make some compromise. We've Had These Sort Of Amps to try when New & to try get Working their best, it's just Hit after Hit in Badness with Circuit Boards that are Too Fine on the Track & can't be repaired. Overall Opinion. For The Owner to Repair & Gamble themselves & either find cheap Op-Amps that are still buyable but then get stuck on Obsolete ones. A Nrewbie Repairer who knows beyond Board Swapping of today may optimistically get it working tro a degree, but looking deeper, the Audio Stages are Direct Coupled. Older Amps with Capacitors in Circuit can keep Damage to smaller stages, but knowing one MOSFET 1990s amp, a Fault can knock out a Huge Amount. We told the Customer it was Risky & if they wanted to proceed 'gambling' on it but after finding more & more was Damaged, way beyond what you'd expect, to call it quits only wasting £300 of their money on it, being sure to let them know it might not work out but soon seeing it wasn't going to work out & even construction brought more issues. Hifi of today at £5000 will be Unrepairable E-Waste of a High Class Price kind. But you're not told things are unrepairable until you ask a Tech about certain amps.

The Repair Shop With A 1980s Lee Perry Dub Box.
This an interesting one, Studio Grear away from Hifi, but it was owned in the early 1980s by Lee Perry & maybe used on 'Police & Thieves' his Huge 1980 Hit. But instantly to know that was a 1976 track re-issued to be a hit in 1980 when The Clash covered it on a 1977 LP & times caught up with the Reggae Scene. Owned by a Reggae Legend if a bit later in his career, to look at Music Info sites to show possible Tracks, 1980 Bob Marley long after the Lee Perry era. The owner is Neil Fraser and he's known as Soundsystem DJ 'Mad Professor', Google tells more. Wikipedia says he was involved in the later 1980s, which makes the Repair Shop not having researched him that well. 1990 as his first Lee Perry release takes it into a later Reggae era to what we knew. The Unit is a "Mu-Tron Bi-Phase" sound generator that makes all those wonderful Dub Sounds that started in Reggae by about 1975, moving on from the "Version" B sides. Inside it's a few circuit boards with IC Op-amps & a transformer. All Analog like the 'Sound Generator' in the 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170. It's not unlike the KR-6170 with ICs not Germanium transistors & has small Transformers to create a certain sound. Small Power Supply with Regulator, nothing looks burnt or broken, if there are the usual weaknesses as any Electronics has & the need to Service it. Ebay has them at £600 to £2800 which is a ridiculous high price if one sold for £1699. Would assume they are Rare items. Ebay one has a Footswitch, cards & a 110v one. Design seems to include pre-digital type switching & off-on 'gate' using a LED & resistor of sorts. Some Dub uses the Mellotron tape machines, this seems one used pre Digital & they get a Specialist in who understood the 1960s Organ in an earlier show. How they get onbolete parts is likely NOS as there'll not be much wanted, like 1930s Radio Valves are mostly still buyable from large stocks. Big Cringe as the two Geniuses realise it needs the Footswitch to turn it on! They've not researched it or thought to think what the connector sockets do. KR-6170 has a Footswitch socket too, round style like 9v transformers use. KR-6170 starts the Rhythm Generator if the Lever Switch does the same, the Mu-Tron, without knowing it, must be Foot Switch only to start it. They say it was Modified, but probably it just needed the Foot Switch to work. He plays a backing track with a Melodica Sound & plays it through the Unit giving that Familiar Squelchy Dub Sound that went on to be the Acid House sound too.

Misleading Pricing In 1960s UK Adverts.
In the 1960s, Retailers often used to treat the Customer like they were Stupid, which today would get them Boycotted or Avoided, but in Department Stores it was Common to See Prices in "Guineas", as in "Reduced to 109gns". Now the Guinea was a Gold Coin made for Centuries before the Milled Coinage of George III was introduced in 1817. A Guinea Coin won't have been Legal Tender & as a 22ct Gold coin the metal worth far more than Face Value. So why Was "Guineas" used to Price Goods? A Guinea is 21 shillings £1.05 wheras a Sovereign Coin is 20 shillings £1.00. That 109gns bargain will cost you 109 x £1.05 = £114.55 making other sellers "seem" more expensive offering at £115, but It's a Smoke & Mirrors "Con", just as buying items thinking the Price was a bit high & then be hit with VAT on top. You really should walk away from Hidden Costs, but it still goes on. On Ebay an Auction ends at £95, you pay that amount plus Post depending on the Seller. In Auction Rooms they add a Buyer's Premium & take a Sellers Fee, so Double Dip on fees, getting up to 30%-40% fees on one sale. Having Post 'hidden' as Free Post is just another con, especially buying multiple items as ones even
offering a multibuy discount still make an extra profit, one for £3.50, two for £3.15 when it'll cost no more to post small items. The Guineas Con was ended with Decimalisation in 1971 if again it was used to hike prices to the Public who didn't realise & still today The Cost Of Living Crisis another Con to Overprice by All & there's no cheaper option. The Big Companies report Huge Profits & laugh at us. Today Pricing on Items like a Quality Washing Machine 25 years ago was £750, today £750 buys you one as well, but the Quality will be much less, they don't last long & with Parts not being Available for long, there's the Same Cynical Game again.

We Can Do It Ourselves Cheaper, Why Are You So Expensive?
The Cry of All Who Think they Can Do Skilled Work when they've never even attempted it, let alone be Newbies. Inspired by a Meme seen on the "Dull Old Men" & Technical Trader Memes on Facebooj, it has Memes asking why their £800-$1500 jobs can't be $200. We get this on our Messages, getting Questions about High Power Complex Amps needing a Full Rebuild, the Customer wants our 'Use Daily' Quality, but often totally unaware of the Work Involved. The Meme sounds realistic, from years of being asked these sorts of Questions. They Offer to Teach the Person how do the Thing, one job, not the multitude of Jobs in Recommisioning or Rebuilding Hifi or a Car. But it gets the 'Cheaper' person saying they've Not Got The Tools, so to say to them we'll lend you the Tools for One day for $300. We Can Teach You & Lend you Next Monday, then you'll save your Money! But then the 'Cheap' person realises they haven't got the Time to spend all One Day to sort the problem & they Realise They Have No Skills so, in the typical way Now Realise it'd be Cheaper paying the $800 or $1500 & get the job done Professionally, instead of the Mess they know they'd make of it. On "American Restoration" site aka 'Rick's Restorations' they mocked the 'cheap' theory by Saying The Cheap Job is Always The Most Expensive as you'll mess it up & have to pay more to get the Mess repaired then sort the original problem. On The Other Hand the one who heavily spends to get "The Best", such as these 'Nut & Bolt' Car Rebuilds can lose Heavily on Selling the Item as the Market really doesn't see or understand the Huge Amount of Work put in & the cost of Best Parts & Many Hours trying to Perfect Things. Our few amps that we go further with can get to a point we don't want to do more & to sell to try something else. A £1000 amp bought on ebay that costs £1250 to Rebuild & Upgrade to our 'Use Daily' standard sadly isn't a £2250 amp even if we, the Rebuild Techs, try to sell it. You've Outpriced it on the Resell Market. Once the time comes to decide to sell, leave it a while at a price & then decide you really want it Sold, the "Give It Away" price will get a Quick Sale, but is hardly a good idea. To have 'Had Enough' of certain things that are perfectly useable & sellable, but you've Outpriced Them by the Work Done needs to be looked at for what You've Learnt from your Exploits. To not tell too much how Wonderful It Is & let the Buyer have a much better amp is Underselling Yourself.

Hi-Fi Rubbish. By 1968 A Record Player - Amp - Speakers Set for £60-£100.
Dec 1968 HFN needs to fill some pages so goes on about Budget Systems that you see Advertisers offer for under £50 to over £100. By the Power Ratings, like 5w or 8w Music Power, under £100 for a Turntable & Amplifier in one box plus two cheap speakers, of the £10 each standard is what is around now since 1965 with Philips & Parmeko brand ones. By 1968 the Garrard SP25 Mk II is the standard as it's £11 to buy without a Plinth or Cartridge. These are Basic items still & Rumbly Noisy Bearings until the 1972 era SP25 Mk IV which finally is better quality as found in a Hacker GAR 550. Having Heard many 'Record Players' from these Cheap sets to Radiograms & Music Centres, the Speakers were always the Worst Item as was much said in the Tower Music Centre aka Amstrad days. Not eveyone could afford expensive separates or had the need from them as moving on from the Bluespot (Blaupunkt), HMV or Fidelity Radiograms. Buying Secondhand or what became Vintage Hifi only became viable once the items were Older, to see few 1950s Grams if to see the Bigger Music Centres by the Mid 1970s were of a better quality. But the Budget Gear in Hindsight was a Waste Of Money. Hardly any of it survives, as with Everyday Cars, they were soon thrown out for not worth repairing, or moving onto Better Gear. Beware of Budget Hifi being given Fanciful General Comments, trying to tell you £56 to £84 'Klinger' brand is actually way better than it is, suggesting you are getting huge bargains when common sense should have you realise otherwise. "The concept of the Klinger range achieves outstanding performance coupled with exceptional economy through the application of advanced electronic engineering techniques". That's Brilliant, no need to spend £250-£350 on the Pioneer SX-2500 or Sony STR-6120 when Klinger does the same for a Fraction of the price! In Reality, it's Fluff talk saying nothing, beyond crafty wording suggesting you're getting Great Hifi. How Can You Tell They're Rubbish. HFN actually reviews two & the comments they make clearly show "rubbish" and a severe lack of Quality Control as well as a lack of Simple Thought put into making a System out of other maker's parts. The fact the Brand Names are never heard of again is telling. The reviewer is having a bit of a laugh telling many bad features if saying when the Makers rectify these it could be much better. It seems strange that units & cabinets are made with Jigs & Tooling yet clearly are Poor Quality, but there have always been those after a Quck Buck. By 1972 there are few UK audio Brands, from top quality like SME, Tannoy down to the likes of Goodmans receivers which were acceptable for what they are to the junk Armstrong made until their last range, but Armstrong were always cheap & the pricing tells. Tell Us More! You Rarely get to hear what's Rubbish in Hifi, some is Awesome, good to tell that plenty is Great, much is ok-average, but Rubbish is actually Rare as who'd waste their money trying to sell it, buyers may be into Budget Gear but it needs to be Worth The Money, or they'll take it back. The "English Audio" system EA 2000 is a healthy £91 in Dec 1968, you could get a far superior Trio 13w amp for £32, Wharfedale speakers for £20 each & the typical Garrard SP25 for about £15, which is Less than the EA system. It comprises 10w on a one unit record player & amplifier with two basic speakers. First try of it there is Loud Hum, from the Transformer & from the Record Player as the Cartridge isn't wired correctly, it needs 3 wires not 4 & the reviewer has to alter it, but this still leaves quite a loud Hum that is as-made. To assume this was sent in to HFN by the makers, fly-by-nighters in Hackney Road, London, who never are heard of again. The Cartridge wasn't matched to the Arm so it bounces around & hits the Resonant Frequency. The 'Loud Buzz' on switch on was accepted by the Reviewer & really it should have been rejected, but there's an Agenda here, to show how Rubbish these Cheap systems can be & poor value for money, certainly best avoided. The "Sound" they described as "Having No Real Bass" but lots of thick Colouration, that Boomy Boxy sound cheap speakers make. "Cure the hums - electrical & mechanical, fit a slightly less delicate cartridge, check the Tone control circuit and have another look at the speakers, and you will have a good product". How they can think that is laughable & the point of the review, chuck it out & get a better one. The second system is equally obscure, the "RSC Stereo Package" that also has the poor Bass but has the cheek to say it uses "The Very Latest Transistors" but is still using Germaniums as Armstrong did into 1973 & Truvox lied saying their updated Amplifier was All Silicon when ony a few were swapped o Silicon. More Rubbish. This issue has an article mentioning several of these Budget Systems & the Advertisers are heavy advertising similar Budget product. It's all miserable, 6w "Music Power", 4w & some 10w if 10w of what? HFN often criticised "Which?" magazine for it's poorly written articles, one they mentioned suggested you used a Portable Radio to plug in a Record Player & grow from that. These ideas may have worked on 1950s Mains Valve Radios, but having tried those Sockets as a Kid, they were not suitable for anything other than a Ceramic-Crystal cartridge & were certainly not listenable.

1968 Radford SCA-30 Amplifier: Still No Manuals 10 Years On.
Our "Other Amps" page looked at this & wasn't impressed... "No, too risky. 30w transistor amp from 1968, actually 15w+15w say others, one on ebay Xmas 2014 in awful condition. No circuits findable. The ebay one looks totally trashed with now dried gushing main capacitors, burnt capacitors from red hot resistors as the capacitors sizzled & many axial ones looking ready to pop. A bad over-hot resistor inside somewhere unventilated adds to the badness to burn the case. Remarkably it looked interesting still, but deeper searching shows it's best avoided unless working & even then it's a bad design destined never to work for long, almost like the Leak Delta 75 receiver. Apparently fully complimentary outputs which is early, but it has a strange Thermistor regulated power supply. The unobtania here is it has non polarised output capacitors, nearly all other amps use polarised ones, how you'd overcome that is the unknown & with the rest so trashed, just about worthless. This is where the forums can help as others have them not working either. Truly a parts amp if yours wasn't so wrecked, to get this to repair has too many bads to overcome. Based on how we didn't like the lousy Radford HD-250 this is like race gambling on a deceased three legged mule. For Radford, stick to the valve amps, they appear to be popular, their transistor amps are disappointingly poor. This is why the Japanese product of the 1967-69 era is just so superior & reliable." To see this was advertised a lot in 1968-69 suggests it should have sold & Radford on Valve Amps are popular still, if the HD250 Amplifier with it's way incorrect Headphone Socket made it an awful amp & again circuits were poor to not see the HD250 problems until years later. This Amp is "that awful one too" as Overheating issues & a crazy Thermistor regulated Power Supply, but they still remain obscure without Manuals. One recent site gives inside pictures of a nice grade one. Build Quality is like the HD250, axial capacitors, the 'Thermistor power supply' looks more like Regulators, there are large resistors that will get hot, suggesting it drops voltage on these big resistors rather than have multiple secondary windings. Crude Wiring obvious as twisted unshielded wires which we found gave a large crosstalk from L to R which is very poor for a Stereo amp. No sign of any manuals still suggests very few sold to have Manuals kept. Radford Adverts in HFN give specs, £106 to buy it, 30w RMS into any reactive load, eg 4-16ohms, but why are we seeing 15w+15w? Maybe it's only a 15w amp which mislead & put off buyers. The ad in Nov 1968 HFN waffles on & claims to have Eliminated The Transistor Sound of Crossover Distortion that we've never seen on testing so many amps on our Power Ratings tests, but the typical grainy harsh UK Amp sound found in Ferrograph was from Weak Design & High Ripple Volltages, reading 400mV ripple on the Main Capacitors. Photos show the Power Supply board & to remember more was underneath including 'difficult parts'. The Wiring is remarkable for Twisting Audio Wires together & creating the Crosstalk. Build is Crude like early EU amps can be, reasons why we avoid them for knowing what you find trying to just Recap let alone Upgrade. Ebay shows one for auction & others to Buy at £400. The Output Capacitors being Bipolar, as the silly update to the Sansui 3000(A) suggested, to see other amps using Regular Polarised Output Capacitors & working fine is for a Tech to understand, suggests it's a ±HT having a 0v mid point as Direct Coupled Amps have, but using them as a 'Safety' in a way the 1967 Trio TK-140E early one did. One To Avoid is still the Opinion.

April 2025 Blog

Domestic LED Lightbulbs: How Long Do They Last?
The hype on these used to be "Lasts Up To 20 Years". They don't as found before & with the earlier Twist Fluorescent ones. If the Bulb is Regularly Used you'll get 2 years at best. The Anglepoise lamp one used for Uplighting in the Lounge gets turned on & off twice a day. Yesterday it started flickering a bit & today it flickers more after a while so it's finished. It's working on 240v AC Mains, so it's not a thing to 'hope' or do stupid repairs on as YouTube videos suggest. The bulb itself is rather Hot by the cap end which we've not noticed before. To potentially say it's a Fire Risk? Made in PRC aka China, the cheapest made items ever. We'll open it up & see what was failing once it cools. The Box says 2 Year Warranty which means they know it'll likely last 2 years. How you'd actually Claim a Warranty on a Bulb you bought online & kept proof it was that actual bulb as no Serial Number gives the idea 'warranty' is probably invalid & always was, you need Hard Facts to prove that actual bulb didn't last 2 years. Testing the Temperature of the New Bulb after using, it reaches a high 78°C on the White Plastic bit between the Cap & Light section. The Cap is only 29°C, but the Hot Part isn't great as the Fitting & Shade you use needs Ventilation. We've had amps that are this hot on Poorly Designed Regulators that can reach over 120°C with lids on. This actually is 'Standard Design' so it fails, your Planned Obsolescense. What's Inside? Top Dome off, the ring of LEDs is the typical type now, compared to the early one. The Heat generated here, like Car LEDs to think it'd have a Heatsink, but only shows a small section which has gone crackly finish where it's the hottest area. Cut the raise white edge away, reveals a metal round large piece to which a paint then the LEDs are fixed. Lever that off & it reveals an electronics PCB board like the early one did, if it's not fixed in with Silicon here, the two tabs hold it to the metal part. PCB wired to the Tip as '+@ and the screw-bayonet as '-'. The inside of the base white piece is metal to add to a heatsink, but running that Hot, it's Inadequate. The PCB has a tiny transformer AC to DC & 2 small Electrolytic Capacitors marked +130°C max working temperature which is adequate, if really should be explained better to make sure they are aired. LED Bulbs fitted where ventilation is limited may cause a problem. The Capacitors rated 400v & do get hot as the plastic covering cracks away & may be why it flickered as the Smoothing Effect was failing. Soldering is Poor as the smaller one pulls ot easily 1µf 400v, the 3.9µf 400v bigger one pulls out fairly easily, one wire breaks off, one pulls out of the solder. Lead-Free Solder we don't use on Vintage Hifi as it flows poorly & looks like a Dry Joint. Rest of the board is a bigger Resistor from the end cap, it is loose very easily. Rubbish Solderimng the issue here. Has a Rectifier & IC plus a few Surface Mount resistors. Nothing looks bad, but just the Weak Solder that looks ok but ages with the heat, as in the Flux Dries Out for the heat. There is No Excuse for Poor Soldering, weakly done to 'only last so long'. Board has a 'VR1' showing a Dimmer is fitted in some. Technology that looks good but just doesn't last too long with Heat & Solder issues. *** UPDATE just a Month Later (Apr 2025). We bought a Batch of Bayonet & Screw Bulbs for Domestic & Anglepoise Use. The Anglepoise ones get used most, one in the Lounge for TV use as an Uplighter mostly & then the Computer Desk one. The Lounge one failed & just a Monthlater the Desk one fails. Saw it Flicker so checked it was tight but within a few minutes it just Failed & went dark. Swapped it for a new one & light again. This Bulb just looking at the next day, what's going on here? It seems to have 'Blown Up' inside as there is a Solder Blob deep in the middle of the plastic top cover, a Hole just further round & a heat mark further round again. Take the top globe part off & see one of the Yellow LED rectangles has a dark blob & the othera are a bit darkened midway showing the Heatsink is inadequate. Brand is just a generic one, 'lowenergie' ™ showing Made in PRC' which is poor quality China rubbish. You can see why Trump is Tariffing this junk from floodingf the USA but what else is there. LED bulbs last less than the Curly Fluorsecent ones, which weren't great either. To see the Soldering on this one hadn't aged, Capacitors etc looked fine still. But the poor Heatsinking is clearly the issue. LEDs it is possible to trash one by putiing +/- voltages the wromng way or not adding the Resistor in series. For them to Overheat & Fail or the Soldering to fail from Heat. Built in Obsolescense to again just get 2 Years as Warranty offers. Disposable Junk, like most Modern Electronics. How Upset people will be when Electric Cars soon end up unrepairable. Further Comment isn't really for a Hifi & Records site... Verdict. Bulb used Upwards, the Soldering & Capacitors get Overheated. Bulb used Downwards, the LED yellow rectangles get overheated. We Are Being Conned. to look on our ebay purchases, items bought, to see we bought 6 LED screw bulbs for £19.68 delivered & 6 Bayonet LED bulbs for £12.99 delivered. The Date surprised us. It was only in Jan 2024, bought 12 Jan, delivered 16 Jan & first used that day. These LED bulbs, two cases here prove they only last 15 months if Used Daily. You are Buying Unreliable Goods & there is no 'Highe Quality' version.

The High Street Shops We Loved & Lost.
March 2025 repeat of this on C5, making one 2 hour show instead of 2 single ones. 'Back In The Day' sentimentality that is Heart Warming & Reminds of a More Sociable Time. These shops are Companies that come & go, not all get Bought Out & continue in a very different way, eg Cadburys isn't anything like it used to be after the sell our. Brands of Ago are often now owned by Faceless Corporations that try to catch you on The Old Name which has little meaning to the original owner's values. The TV Show Itself had Old Clips really badly Monitored on those Rubbishy 'BBC Monitors' as blogged on earlier. Not being sure if our 'latest idea' is at fault for it being Very Harsh on the Midrange & Lower Treble. Put on the Trio-Kenwood TK-80U instead & it was much the same, the TV Sound yet again was poor. Since we last watched that 2-Parter, amps have changed & swapped around. What was acceptable now it "Too Hi-Fi" which is a bit of a worry if The Source is substandrd. Playing through some cheaper 45s we never listed & forgot about, to hear 1960s 45s often could be Rather Poor in sound. Beatles 'She Loves You' sounded decent, if playing 'I'll Get You' to hear it was rather Lo-Fi played on Very High Hi-Fi, the same Amp the YouTube tracks get done on. Poor Quality makes some Music hard to listen to, the Lo-Fi sound of Reggae & Ska 45s if some are in very nice sound, the roughly Dubbed from the Jamaican 45 on the cheapest record player is often just not good enough. We actualloy had a batch of Jamaican mid 1960s 45s with stickers on telling they were the actual 45s used to make some "Ska-Beat" 45s. The Jamaican 45s sounded nice, the UK ones were poor sound, muddy & lacking any precision. Hi-Fi Shops. The 'Not The 9'Oclock News' sketch about Hi-Fi shops is well observed. The TV clip sound was way over-processed giving that Harsh TV Sound. Hi-Fi shops did intimidate, sold you overpriced End-Of-Line gear & tricked you with "Deals" when you could buy it at a price maybe £50 less from other places. The 'Price High' & 'Deal' way still overcharging you. They weren't your Friends even if you visited often & bought often, like we did in the VHS & DVD-R days for TV related items. The Hi-Fi News reported that 'Marantz' we giving back-handers to promote sales which is why so much Marantz gear is around. It was offered first to customers & as it sounded Nice if Rather Tame, it sold well. Buying Hi-Fi is a total mystery to most & often you're better off going for "The Green One" as in a Car TV joke. The Day of 'The Next One Is Better' is what many fell for, purting Great Amps in the loft to buy Stack Systems of dubious quality which carried on well into the 1990s until the 'i'Pod' era arrived.

1978 Pioneer SX-1980 270w 35kg Monster Amp.
One of the Highest Power Huge Size & Weight Receivers, only 'bettered' in power by Marantz. We've looked at these online a lot, Forums showing Inside Photos are useful. We don't see these as 'Well Made' & there are a lot of Problems. To think by 1978, Pioneer is at it's Most Cost Cut & they offer this? We've Blogged on these before as well as the 'Other Amps' page. To see 'stupid prices' up to £15,000 for one of these shows how deluded the market is. A 55 year old amp will have lots of issues. No-one actually buys them. A Marantz 2385 in poor condition sold for £1000 recently, rusty & missing controls, we blogged on this & they finally sold it. The price we got for our Rebuilt 2385 showed the reality, buyers don't appreciate the work done or understand it deeply, or don't see the Value in it. To now have got one asking if we can Rebuild it. These later Pioneers 1975-79 were going Bad 10 years ago. For a start, the thing is Massive, 560 x 211 x 497mm it'll just about fit our Big Desk & it looks like it comes apart into Pre & Power like the Rotel RX-1603 did. But it is just so Poorly Made Inside, the Power Supply overheating & far too much Overdesign like all these Monster Receivers are. We've had that Rotel & the Marantz 2385 to not find them all that & a recent 1974 Pioneer SX-1010 was rather surprising how Compromised the design was. You see Hifi Groups on Facebook, we get lots of them on our Feed which shows these are mostly used as Ornaments, the need to have all the Same Brand & Open Reel Tape as well as Cassette, Graphic EQ, Tuner & often a Pre & Power version as well as the Receiver. There is no way these are getting used, especially Tape. Some like the 1978-79 Rack Mount Boy Racer amps that really do Sum up the Disco Era & do have a Charm in a Cheesy Way. By 1980, all the Big Brands gave up on Monster Receivers & were selling them off Very Cheaply as sales will have been low. To see 1980 Receipt for a Yamaha CR-2020 being given away very cheap in Singapore is how these 'unwanteds' were sold off. The Reality Of A Rebuild. The Rotel RX-1603 was a Customer's Amp, the Marantz 2385 was ours. The Rotel was frustrating in 'how crap' it was made, but to keep quiet as it was the Original Owner's Pride & Joy, we met the Relatives who brought it to us & the Customer who bought it. Rotel are not one of the Best Brands to us. Not used much since New & it had Bad Main Capacitors as left in Sunlight, suggesting not used in 30+ years. Hardly one we could spend Years getting the Best, it probably wasn't worth doing a Big Extended Upgrade on. To get the Best out of it to a Price is how Hifi rebuilds work. The SX-1980 we could tackle, but only if it was Ours. To have a Customers Amp with all the Issues & to give a price would be asking for trouble as the Amp doesn't seem one to tackle, after the big Marantz & Rotel. It's taken 5 years to get sense from the 1969 Pioneer SX-2500, so much was wrong & covered over. It really takes a certain attitude to go way further & now it sounds awesome. We've listed it a few times on the Road to the Success as we had got tired of it. Imagine how Bad the SX-1980 will be based on the SX-1010 limits on a 1974 Pioneer. The one asking for the SX-1980 rebuild has probably asked many who often won't touch over 100w. We get messages about these sort of Extreme Rebuild amps to get the idea they are just doing the Rounds to see who will try it. The Risk is a less experienced Tech could make a mess & ruin it, we've seen the results of that before. Also, as we've found often, you quote a price into Four Figures they run away, not really thinking on realites. The Best Thing to do is keep these Amps as Ornaments. Similarly how many can tackle the early Transistor Amps from 1965-66.

The Many Ages Of Hi-Fi. Going Mainstream By Autumn 1968.
Having Read the Hi-Fi News Magazine 1956-1980 it becomes clear how Audio & Hifi progressed over the years, in a way only Living It could tell similarly, if in reality changes can be more Subtle to only realise in Hindsight, such as to us Chart Music dipped heavily past 1982, was just about finished by 1985 'Live Aid' if a brief 'Britpop' revival in the early 1990s got back some of the pre 1982 spirit to a degree. 1956-1962 the First Hifi Era was a very specialist era with not much beyond Garrard & Thorens record players, SME arms & Tannoy speakers as items you'd still want to use fifty years later. 1963-1967 is The Second Age Of Hifi for the advancements in Transistor Amplfiers & Receivers, by 1966 Silicon had overtaken Germanium, except by cheapskate UK & EU manufacturers such as Armstrong who used them in their '500' range into 1973. 1968 continues much as 1967. Readng the HFN mag yet again, this time readimg issues backwards in time, starting with Dec 1969 & going back into 1968 as of typing. This gives a different aspect on things, to see a sharp change after Sept 1968 that keeps the Autumn 1968 era much the same into 1972 when the 'Comet' discounters get big & go too far making manufacturers cost cut heavily as they are being Forced To by the Trade & the Greed of Customers expecting too much for their money. See the Quality dip from 1970 to 1972, but 1973 to 1975 continues killing off many UK brands that started to vanish into 1970. What Shows? To see 'The Rubbish' suddenly go by Autumn 1968 when it was there by Winter 1968, such as the poor quality 'English Audio' systems a few blogs above. HFN mag taking ads for any old Rubbish, "High Quality" 3w-10w amplifiers into £10 10w speakers. This 'Rubbish' continued into 1971-72 if by then 'Comet' were selling better gear to finish that Breed of Rubbish Audio. The adverts for these low power low quality items showed HFN selling out, it carried "Quad" adverts facing the Editorial page for many years as did the Hifi Yearbook. The amount of shops offering Budget Audio like 'Teleton' & 'Eagle', most ads just listed the same UK made brands & UK budget like 'Dulci', 'Tripletone' & others that soon vanished. By 1969 you start to see earlier 'failed' models of 1966-67 vintage being offered in the UK shops, the 1966 Germaniums 'Sanyo DC60E' was heavily advertised & not cheaply as at over £100. We have one, it looks smart, but the innards as Germanium are not worth rebuilding for what it'd sell for & it may not be that good despite sounding decent amid high noise & aged sound, the Germaniums will likely be too noisy still, to have it sellable. A huge rebuild that doesn't give sellable results isn't one to rebuild. Going Mainstream is where Cheapness is all that matters. HFN editorial used to mock "Which?" magazine & it's crude reviews & thinking Radiograms were Hifi, but then they take Adverts for 'The Rubbish'?

1966 Teac AS-60 Receiver: Hi-Fi Unknowns.
Saw this in a July 1968 Teac Advert in HFN, amid an ad for their tape machines was this, but not even showing details. It's on HFE site if they don't know the age if there is a Manual. To find one with No Case & a bit Damaged on ebay shows otherwise it's a nice unit with looks like the Sansui TR-707A & 3000 from 1965-66. To date it as 1966 as Silicon Transistors, it's 40w into 4 ohm says the manual, likely 30w-35w into 8 ohm. Teac better known for their 1969-71 range using a Differential & Direct Coupled Power Amp, this AS-60 is much earlier. Circuit shows it works on +70v DC with Silicon Transistors 2SC374, 2SC373, 2SC486 & 2SC493 outputs. Autobias Design on the Power Amp. These 1965-66 Amps can often sound great as with the similar if Germanium 1965 Pioneer SX-600T if they can need redesign to be Biasing correctly. USA seller, so if you could get them to post it'd likely double the cost, $300 for a no-case or base amp, as people often built them into Consoles without thinking to keep the case, leaving it open to break off a few AM Coils that you'd never replace, if AM is so lo-fi it's more a case of it working. Parts Amp really, to buy £100 if in the UK worth a try, but not from USA. The Teac ads in other 1968 HFN showed Tape Only ads before & after July 1968, unlikely to have been an error. So UK 240v ones should exist if any sold, sometimes these can be Special Order from Japan.

Hi-Fi Spare Parts: Wake Up Hi-Fi Scene.
Seeing the Car Shows UK & USA to realise the USA Custom Scene on Cars & Motorbikes was established enough by 1955 for the huge Hershey Car & Bike Parts Fair in Pennsylvania, USA. After WW2 the Army-Navy guys were after Thrills so started Modifying & Building Cars & Bikes leading into the Motorbile Chopper Scene & the Hot Rod Car Scene that was popular enough for "The Munsters" yo have a Hot-Rod Car in 1964, a George Barris creation. To learn of these Exciting Scenes mostly from "American Pickers", before that show was on UK TV we had no idea about the USA Scene of Collectables, not even 'Schwinn' bicycles were known in UK. Hifi Restoration Scene Is Not Very Old. Audio & Amplifiers moving on from Crystal Radio Sets was always an Enthusiast driven scene from the 1920s. To read of Early Amp Builders in the late 1940s Home Made Amplifiers & Kits. This slowly grew by 1956 that 'Hi-Fi News' first started covering the very small range of UK made Amplifiers, Turntables & Speakers. The market was so small that commenters reckoned HFN would tun out of Things To Write About, if having read the full set 1956-80 beyons about 3 early ones, things grew into 1957 & then it exploded with Stereo in mid 1958. Commenters at the time said Early Stereo wasn't very good in Hifi & Cartridge Terms if by 1962 it has Matured into something much more Professional as seeing a USA Hifi Book on what was around then. USA & UK Hifi to two very different markets stayed apart until about 1963 when Importing became easier. Much growth 1963-69 in Technical Quality if by 1972 the Greedy Discounters especially 'Comet' cheapened the scene. None of the 'Future Look' at Hifi articles realised about Digital being so important by the 1983 CD scene. Hifi Buying In The UK. This was a strange scene, where 'New' was always thought 'Better' by the adverts. They didn't see the decline in quality or over-reliance on Specs as the Musicality went way off. This generally meant older equipment was put in the Attic or away somewhere, as in Throwing It Away as it was never reused, but keeping it, but it was seen as 'Worthless' by the majority. The Rise Of Vintage. In the early 1990s any amp was £20 we found, Shops or Boot Sales, £20 got you what are now Treasures. In 2011 we decided to buy a 1971 Trio KA-4002A amplifier, just to see if it was better than the 1970 Hacker GAR 500 we had at the time. We'd bought Vintage since thge mid 1980s with two Hacker record players GAR 500 & 550. These were considered Better than the general Audio Gear & only a 1962 Pye Black Box Stereo Coffee Table size & then a big Dynatron radiogram, not the repro styled one, were considered better sounding. Cheap Ultrea, Fidelity & HMV grams were not liked, to remember being annoyed when the Family Shop sold those two, used to bring Record to play. By then we were selling Records so seeing the Hacker, to have control over Our Music Player. In Vintage we'd tried Sony TA-1130 & STR-6120 if prices by the mid 1990s were still very low. The Trio KA-4002A impressed, so as they were cheap to buy, why not keep buying Amps & Receivers to see what others are like. Prices often under £50 made buying to try, clean & service to resell an ineresting one. There were customers for Vintage & they liked they were Serviced & Ready to use, prices seem low now, but a Market needs to grow. What Changed? There'll always be a type to take advantage of Seerrviced & Recapped amps, with ebay & Paypal easy refunds when people try it on, stay away from ebay. Age Started Catching Up. It became clear that some amps already were 'Too Aged' to sell under our Standards. Now in 2024 for any Amp, to fully Recap with Upgrades is needed, to sell a Reliable Product. Upgrades Became Needed as Like-For-Like recapping soon found to leave amps too Bright & Lacking Bass that as Aged wasn't as noticeable. This all makes an Amp more expensive. To see in 2024 there are many selling Vintage that is now 40-60 years old yet is said to be 'Working' yet it'll be way past it's best. What's The Point Of This Blog. We digress to explain the Scene that we've helped along a lot, but it needs Big Inventories of Spares or Parts Amps to keep the lucky few amps alive that get the Big Rebuilds.

Hifi Lies: Untold Real Distortion vs Harmonic Distortion.
We've said this for years. Our 'Front Intro Page' with If they were more honest they'd rate it as "Percentage Of The Real Sound we actually Lost in search of High Specifications. But they Lie & tell you of Harmonic Distortion. The Amp could be 25% Distorted yet Harmonics are Very Low Level 'echoes' of the Sound the amp plays. Some amps are so bad sounding they could easily be 50% Distorted, but you're not being told that. To Only Know of Distortion by Hearing & Upgrading. To only know when you Hear Better to know that what was once great is now not nice to listen to. To have Test Tracks to always play when Trying Amps. To know when it sounds a bit Rough or it Very Clean & Precise without Smeary Blurry "Sludgey" sound. Playing one amp after using the Germaniums 1965 Sansui TR-707A, that amp now sounded smeary & not so nice. It's the 1965 Sansui 3000 early one pre 3000A. Thought lots about the 3000 & 3000A since getting the '3000A' in 2014 & the current '3000' as long ago as 2018 & it's sat for years hiding a fault that seems to have occured early on after it's long sleep on recapping it. The thing is the '3000' preamp is rather dumbed down to 'not sound to good'. Only hearimg what it should be sounding like with the TR707A, to decide now to tackle it. Only 11 changes & 3 removed per channel. Doing half of it to check the level matched, the sound was hideous, it revealed that overbright smeary treble like bad 1980s amps have. Fully done it's very different, but The Distortion on Treble was High we'd say. But what Percentage was it 'Off True' as in clean smooth & not hard to listen to knowing The Better Sound? Iy has to be 20% Distorted on Treble for how it sounds now. The '3000' claims 0.8% distortion on THD Harmonics, utterly worthless to know that when we hear it seems 20% distorted. A Trained Ear Can Only Tell and having Good References to compare to. Your References are only as Good as what you've heard before. Be sure it's not in any 'Shop Bought Amp' as the idea was to get you Tired of the Distorted Sound & Believe New Was Better. New was only Different & Rarely Better, we're using 1965 amps here. They had it Right that early & gradually Dumbed Down Hifi more & more. The THD 'low distortion' is The Biggest Lie in Hifi.

Hi-Fi Stack Systems & Facebook 'Hi-Fi Beauty' Pages.
As Vintage Hifi has grown a lot since 'The Wilderness Years' before we revealed how Great the pre 1977 stuff is, very slowly other sites arrived showing more Vintage Hifi. In 2011 you only had 'Silver Pioneer', 'McIntosh' & 'Marantz' pages. 'The Vintage Knob' site showed their interest went back further on some items if many we like don't get a mention. Facebook has Glamourous Pages of the 1977 era Hifi all piled up. A lot of this is beyond our interest & to see Awful Multidriver speakers with 3 Bass, 4 Midrange & still needs a Tweeter on top. The over-complex crossovers will steal the Midrange, but sadly Hifi Mags 'told you' this was better. Anything 1970s Hifi is Retro now, even Music Centres. The Stack Systems that grew by about 1979 according to HFN-RR adverts soon became the cheap Amstrad one piece fake items looking like seperates, you don't see these dribbled over. What is Missing is the 1965-1974 era before Comet cost cut Hifi too much. These items are often too Old & need a full rebuild & with the High Costs involved, not many are finding out these Early Ones are Better. Tall Stacks Of 1977 Hifi. These do look impressive, but what have you got here? Preamp, Several Power Amps, Record Player-Turntable, Tuner, Graphic Equaliser, Peak Music Display in LED form, Open Reel Tape Machines, Cassette Deck often a Double one. Other sorts of Sound Processor if before CD so nothing Digital. A Bloke's Dream at the Time, but 40+ years later the Amount of Servicing these will need now & the Amps & Preamps are heading into Recap & Upgrade territory as they age. It's like a Music Centre that more will have bought, 1 big stack sold for 1000 music centres sold. All the Work to even Service a Music Centre. To have the Lights On showing the Displays, these often Fade away as the Glass Tube Display loses quality, saw a VHS player fade to dark after only about 10 years & these parts are long gone. Look at these pictures, the Amplifier or Power Amp is always at the bottom as the heaviest. But little ventilation so it'll not cool properly & this just ages them more. It's Not Really The Best Stuff. Like a lot of Vintage-Retro it's Ones People Remember. A lot of Mass Market Gear is very tamed by 1977 if it's All People Know. A lot of the Stack System era is a bit lacking in Intelligence, such as the need for Graphic EQs & Double Tape. A lot of Boy Racer-Go Faster Stripes sort of Amps that those who Really Know the 1965-73 era would know to stay away from. Like in Cars, the 1980-84 era Mass Market Cars are so Ugly & Ordinary, but they Mean Things to those who must pay £15K for a rather ordinary car tjat is Rare as most got scrapped. Pay £15K for a Big Engine Performance Car like a Ford Sierra Cosworth that are impressive tech cars, but really if the Mediocre Car in High Grade makes the Buyer Happy, then all for the good. In Hifi Amps with IC Output Blocks, IC Tone Stages & flashing lights are seen as popular & they do have a certain look for sure, but the Circuitry & Overdesign doesn't bring the best sound. The 1976 big Marantz 2385 185w thing we tried a certain amount with. To escape the Dull & Muddy soumd took a lot more than Servicing, the disappointingly Muddy FM tuner was far from how good the 1971 Sony STR 6065 or STR 6055 one was. 185w should be punchy & with a confident power, far from it. The Best Sound will be in 40w-50w amps with a few under or at 100w having that sound too. Retro Can Be Cheap Stuff Too, look how popular the 1950s-1960s Dansette type portable players are. Even Radiograms of very cheap quality are now wanted if the Earlier Stuff looks better, they'll often be long unused & not Working. But as one Radio Collector said on 'American Pickers' that he doesn't get them working, if he wanted to play a Radio a $20 'Radio Shack' one would do. Of couse many of the old portables aren't repairable as is our 1964 Decca one. To have things All Working Is Good. A 1965 Receiver with working FM but no AM is stiill useable, but if AM working but no FM it'd be a harder sell as a Tuner-Amplifier Receiver is a Tuner based thing. Stylish But Rubbish. Seeing ebay Hifi, some Vintage has great looks, but sadly isn't as good as you'd hope. If you want it for Display it's worth havimg, if to us to Recap & Upgrade it's not for us, the same with otherwise decent amps with DIN plugs on input & speakers. DIN plugs are still buyable, if beyond 'Bang & Olufsen' we found it put buyers off.

UK Hi-Fi Advertising In The 1960s
Having read the Hifi News Set 1956-1980, the 1960s era isn't still as well known for the Goodies it has. To see Gacebook pages with big stacks of 1977-79 Hifi rated as Hifi Beauty" is interesting, the very tall rack mount Pioneer etc with Open Reel Tape as blogged just above. The 1960s gear was way more advanced in a 1960 USA Hifi Book we've mentioned before, Valve Receivers aka Tuner-Amplifiers were already around. In the UK, despite Import Restrictions being Removed about 1963-64, UK only really saw Open Reel Tape machines by Non UK Brands. Their quality & styling way ahead of the UK who still made these Tape Machines like suitcase. Brands like Akai & Sony were way ahead, advertising often, but not the other Hifi they made past 1965. The Sony TA-1120 only gets a review late 1967 when the TA-1120A would be the current version. Trio-Kenwood & Sansui advertise a lot, but what they have in style, they spoil with silly 'Music Power Ratings' that means nothing to UK buyers. 130w Music Power on a Trio TK-140E is 45w RMS to us. "A Full 200w Of Music Power" must have turned buyers off as it's Not Honest. By 1968 the advertisers wise up to put UK Type Power Ratings like 220w continuous" which is the same as a 20w RMS rating. The first Receivers UK got were Pioneer with their pre Multiplex Stereo dual tuner ideas, when Trio offered proper Multiplex. UK 1960s Hifi. The HFN mag seems to have an affiliation with Quad-Acoustical as these are always mentioned in a 'perfection' way. Adverts always opposite the Contents-Editorial page with their old fashioned Pre & Power Amp valve amps advertised into lae 1967 when the Quad 33/303 arrived, still looking unappealing like lab gear. These are often on ebay, even ones recapped not going for more than £600 a set tells they don't have much cred & probably the same ones up for sale over & over. Looking through 1960s HFN adverts, only by 1968-69 do you see mobing away from the same UK Brands that we have tried but wouldn't bother with now. Rogers & Leak are the Best of Uk, with Armstrong, Quad, Brennel & other small vrands forever advertised with little choice. UK still built Amps & Tuners into ugly cabinets, Quad especially as they are ugly & can't be used free-standing. Leak with the 1963 'Stereo 30' Germaniums one wisely made then in a cabinet to sit on a sdeboard & not fly around when buttons pressed like the Quad 22/II valve set did. Rogers with the Cadet & HG88 were similarly ahead thinking to offer a case or chassis model, explaining why Leak & Rogers are found with no case, they were often only bought to 'build in' to a cabinet.

May 2025 Blog

The Ending Of Two Big TV Shows on 'History' Channel.
To read late April 2025 that both "Pawn Stars" and "American Pickers" have filmed their Last Episodes. 23 series of 'Pawn Stars' & 26 Series of 'American Pickers'. Both Rick & Mike are now 60. Corey of 'Pawn Stars' has moved to Mexico & at 41 tires of being a 23 year old on TV with Chumlee & his rather odd ways with that Dog of his. Mike of 'American Pickers' closing the Nashville Shop both prove 'ends' to the Shows. The sad Frank story is one of those Reality Kicks that gets change. To wonder how the stuff they Buy actually sells is an issue, to get Great Collections & buy all that they want, but is the Market so good? In the UK, BBC carries the Antiques Market with it's ridiculous amount of Antiques-Auction shows that can be very boring to watch. The amount of shops 'Antiques Road Trip' visits that have huge collections of Furniture & Ceramics that have Nose Dived in Collectability over the last 20 years as 'Dickinson's Real Deal' shows, another show ended with David himself over 80 keeping it going a little too long if he did get his 'Cool' back on the last ones, maybe to prove he could. The USA shows again, 'Pawn Stars' clearly hires Actors to act as Sellers & the Expert provides the items. Reality TV often Faked if it's watchable. 'American Pickers' with an endless supply of great stuff is probably flooding the Market & fewer buyers. The Records Market is weak, even on £20-£50 items that sold well for decades, since Dealers like us & others helped Build the Record Scene from the era started by 'Record Collector' in the late 1970s. Records were getting Established through the 1990s then the Internet arrived which grew the Scene. Also Vintage Hi-Fi you can see by 2005 forum posts wasn't into anything much beyond Monster Receivers, Marantz & Silver Pioneer, if we certainly have grown the Hifi Scene together with other Hifi Info sites. The Hifi Scene as evidenced by online Facebook sites seems more into Looks than Sound, the 1977-80 era certainly isn't the best sounding, but they love the Ugly Amps with Rack handles, Graphic equalisers & Cassette-Tape. Be sure most are just Ornaments. This scene seems more in USA & you can find this sort of 77-80 stuff on USA ebay at quite crazy prices for Aged Gear. TV shows end, what will replace them? They'll be repeated for 10 years as seems typical. The History Channel sold to Sky & just doesn't make new shows like this. Golden Ages of Things come in Waves, Music 1947-1982, Cartoons 1930-1938, Hifi 1963-1974 & Cars late 1940s to about 2002. Money is made & then Quality Dips as 'Too Much' average stuff appears. Cars had a long run as big money to be made. Today more Money in Computer Games than Movies or Music as recently seen, Gaming is a massive business in comparison.

1963 Pye HFS 30T 'Brahms' Amplifier: Circuits Found.
This was advertised by several shops in HFN but it's rare & not any Service Manuals. We blogged on it before in May 2023 saying similar... Pye HFS 30 TC aka 'Brahms' has a Japanese look & of it's era does look appealing. Germanium Transistors amp, with UK obscure ones like NKT227. They show it's Power Ratings as 18w RMS into before Distortion gets too high. But to see the Output rolls off from about 4kHz, with a right slant down to the 1kHz Square Wave & the 10kHz one being fully rounded shows this Amp is certainly lacking. The era of using Filters to cover for Shortcomings might not mind that too much, to up the Treble tone. Between 40Hz & 4kHz it's steady at 14w-16w, if 10kHz is down to 8w & 15kHz down to 5w. Looking Online in hope of a Manual, nothing beyond a Museum having pics that could suggest it was a Prototype only as nothing else. Perhaps the £71 price meant none sold, but no info out there beyond the HFN review where they had a sample. A Prototype was shown at a 1963 Audio Fair & buyable by December 1963. Further reading HFN shows April 1964 HFN with a full page ad as Pye Brahms HFS 30 TC & Pye featured it at the 1964 Audio Fair that month. It was regularly advertised into 1966 but clearly not selling. The Trouble is Leak launched their 'Stereo 30' first version that was priced better & a brand more known. To find HFN from July 1967 has some of the Circuit Design used in a 'Hi-Fi Circuits' article which we'll put on the site as it's 'Unknown' online. To see the market they aimed for 'Brahms' & 'Mozart' after the valve HFS 20 was 'Mozart' probably didn't help sales being Elitist. This is a Germanium Transistor Amp & clearly a failure being offered Discounted by later 1967-68 as Germaniums were considered Obsolete & for the Hiss. They could have aimed it at a different market, why not 'The Dylan', if the price seems to have put Buyers off. The Design is a little overdone, it will sound a bit Hard or Harsh with Germanium noise likely high & why it didn't sell. The designer still using Valve design which doesn't suit Transistors if you see it used often. Circuits show Input for Aux & Radio via a 150K resistor into the Phono stage which was still a common design, hardly the best though. First Transistor has the Inputs-Phono EQ then straight onto the Tone Stage with a NFB design Tone with the usual Filters. No Transformer Coupling in the Output stage if is Capacitor Coupled. Seems to be Autobias as no Bias adjusting. Pot R30 is the Bias control, as the write-up explains. It's PNP Germaniums on all except a PNP 'D451 Texas' PP Driver. NKT226 x3, NKT224, NKT227 x2, with NKT401 10A 50w outputs. No Protection, the Bias Diode OA5 said to offer Temperature Compensation. Works on -48v as PNPs. 117v-240v. 18w probably into 15 ohm so probavly 25w into 8 ohm. An interesting one, if the UK-EU Germaniums could be with their usual issues, unlike the Japanese Germaniums. 50w 10A Germanium Outputs is a rare one, Outputs as Germanium usually 15w, here they will need good Heatsinks not to fail as Germaniums known to be Heat Sensitive. Probably all explains even the few that Sold the amount surviving will be minimal. A Historical Piece, more than one to Use Daily. Pye didn't do Hifi Amplifiers again until a few early 1970s Music Centres & a MS9 midi system. The 1957 era 'Pye Black Box' square cased record player, not the later Coffee Table one of the same name, soon became a transistor version of 4w as c.1967 adverts show. Some of the early Valve ones amusingly had a Hi-Fi badge on, if later changed it to 'Black Box' as the Hifi Press were laughing at them. Online finds the 'Black Box' name was also a Portable Radiogram, not heard of that before. That HFN Circuit is Here.

Valves Sansui 1000A & Sansui 500A: A Fresh Look.
This Blog helped us decide to get a Sansui 1000A.... To see these looking through the HFN magazine once again. they were getting Discounted to Clear by 1967-68 as Sansui had a wide range of Transistor receivers like the TR707A, TR707E with LW, 3000 & various 15w-20w nes all of a higher quality than the Valves. Sansui 500A. We had one of these in 2013. To try what we knew at the time, 11 years ago had us just calling it quits & selling it on. Saw it on ebay later if they sold it on cheaply. The Big Problem was the 500A used a Much Too High HT Voltage on the 7189A outputs, same as EL84. Wikipedia shows that EL84s often get pushed over 400v for 17w RMS output. Even the 7189A uprared versions were difficult. By that, we found they Arced Over & Trashed several of them. The problem was the Output not having a Fixed Load Resistor, but even switched to Headphone adding an 8 ohm load it still trashed. 6AQ8 preamp-Tone not ideal. The 'High Filter' was a hopeless design that just Switched Tone Treble out. The Conical Sockets are fine on our TR707A & 3000 as we have the correct four-finger type cables, if they don't suit later cables that are more solid. 500A Circuits are Transistors for Phono which seems a bit of a cheat in a Valve Amp, you buy Valves to have it all Valves. Volume & Loudness before the First Valve, then the next for Tone with the 'Filter' just switching out the Treble Gain capacitor. "Rubbish Circuitry" on that Filter for sure. Power Amp has a 6BL8 which is a Triode-Pentode, the Pentode is the Gain & Triode the Splitter. Fixed Bias on a -17v voltage. It's not great with the 6BL8 instead of just using ECC83, but the 420v & rubbish Filter, plus the cheap plastic control knobs meant it's taken 11 years to look at again, from finding later Sansui so good. Sansui 1000A we've not had one & heard of issues it has, but oddly never looked deeper after 500A put us off. Rated 40w/40w each channel f that'll mean 35w RMS. Reading Forums is a risky game, a Sansui 5000 & 'the bad diodes' nonsense long ago told. Forums are useful for obscure info, if the Tech doing this as a Job isn't the writer, it's often Amateurs with half-ideas. 1000A Circuits. Phono same two Transistors if Germanium suggesting the 1000A is earlier. TR1-4 aren't noted, if PNP so will be Germanium. Parts list shows 2SB381 which are the black Sony ones the Sansui TR-707A uses. Tone uses 12AX7-ECC83 unlike the 6AQ8 (ECC85) of the 500A. Has a Low Filter, High Filter & 'Prescence' switch that is a 50Hz boost, not a 2KHz one you'd expect from the name. Filter Switches done in a more typical way, not labelled on the Circuit, if before the Volume & after the 2nd half of the first valve. Looks like one of those Ceramic blocks that Fisher & McIntosh used is here. Power Amp input the 6AN8 again with 'SS7' switch the 50Hz boost one. Outputs are 7591 on 470v. 7591 is a 19w Beam Tetrode looking like an EL34 but isn't, they are still made to buy new. 400v as Push-Pull on a pair of 7591 can make 32w, so to use 470v will be pushing the valve hard, as the 'Valve Museum' puts 400v max from info they have. Sansui 1000A Verdict. Again pushing too hard on HT & those 6AN8 valves aren't the best. Think we'll pass. On both.

1967 Audio Fair Arrivals: Akai AA-5000 & Akai AA-7000.
These arrive at the April 1967 Audio Fair at The Hotel Russell, London from 30 Mar - 2 April 1967. In Bloomsbbury, London, it's now called the "Kimpton Fitzroy". Hotels taken over on many Floors by Hifi Brands doing Displays & Demos. These were busy but many complained of Poor Sound & Much Shoving Around. This rather amateurish way had run for several years if suddenly ended by 1968/1969. Then Earls Court, London took over which leads to the sort of Trade Fairs of today. The early fairs show how small Hifi was in the days before it got much more popular into 1968-1969. Akai were best known for High quality Open Reel Tape Machines & their later ones are much prized by the $3000 paid for one on 'Pawn Stars'. These have to be working & a 1980 one now being 44 years old means the units will need work. Tje Akai AA-5000 amplifier first out in 1965 by the Germanium Transistors & the Akai AA-7000 receiver out in 1966 as it has Silicon Transistors, Nuvistor Tuner Front End if still the Transformer Coupled Power Amp that the AA-5000 doesn't have. HFN Apr 1967 pictures the AA-7000 & the AA-5000 is shown on a UTS ad further in, but not saying what it is. No mention of the Designer Styling on these or who even designed the casework which certainly is the Best Styled Vintage Hifi on both, ones by Fisher, Pioneer, Sansui etc are not far off. Both with Wood Sides, the AA-7000 has a large top grille, the AA-5000 has a flat metal lid & designed to stand a Tape Machine on. Power Ratings mentioned later in the Review write-up say AA-5000 is 35w RMS & AA-7000 is 30w. Never too sure on Power Ratings on these. Both later got sold as AA-5000S & AA-7000S without actually any redesign on the AA-5000 Germaniums & the AA-7000 was all Silicon always. AA-7000 has Three Versions. First is a Solid Wood Ends with Grey Tuner background, Second adds two thin Grilles to the Wood Sides. The Third is the AA-7000S version with a Red Tuner background. Whether either Sold many in UK after over 55 years is hard to know, we've had 2x AA-5000(S) & 3x AA-7000 with one the grille version. All were very aged to not be useable, especially the Hot Running AA-7000.

Rebuilding The 1965 Akai AA-5000 Amplifier.
We had one of these before, the AA-5000S version. There's barely any differences between AA-5000 & AA-5000S, the Smaller Transistors are always 2SB440 Germamiums as it's designed for Germaniums. We tried Silcons but it Oscillated Wildly. So Germaniums it must stay & they are Good Spec ones. We sold that AA-5000S but decided to buy another the day it went by Courier as it looked good as an ornamenr, to get the AA-5000 one & a much earlier insidesif still a later 1967 build by the original Bendix output transistors "6738" means 38th week of 1967. Still has early capacitors with "+" marked not "-", these were changed in 1967 as Sony TA-1120A early one still had them. Having Redone one before to know it's limits, to just unsolder the 30 wires per channel & rebuild it. Wires of the same colour a few times needs planning. It was too cramped to work on with the wires on, so just undo the lot. This has a NPN Silicon driver with a PNP Germanium which is very mismatched. One board all unsoldered from the 30 connections, to consider redoing the Resistors as these early amps can benefit. Seems there are 130 resistors to do which is a huge job, then to see some are marked Old Values like 4K & 20K, some less important but some in EQ stages. As the amp is in nice grade & clean inside, to decide not to do the Resistors, but to Recap & tidy the Drivers. Despite the looks, the last one wasn't a great seller, so to not overdo it seems the best option. Still worth unsoldering the 30 wires to be easier to work on. There is no Board Diagram to be sure which Resistor is Which without Board tracing, to do the 1965 Sansui TR-707A with new Resistors was far more involved than expected, no board layout on that either. Have it Sat on the Desk to look at, yes, a big job to redo the resistors, but why not as it's Our Amp. The job in this is an Advanced one, make a board layout as there isn't one on the Manuals. Did this on the 1965 Sansui TR-707A, but to do it an easier way as is the deal when one way was even harder. The Board does have values and +/- of capacitors marked, but you need an easier readable one than thin dark blue text on a dark brown board. To check all items are not alterations means you've got quite a job getting your diagram right. To do one takes the long job & checking all is right. The Second Board do just the same way & it's far quicker as a duplicate. To do the Second Board soon after the first to keep in the mindset as a week or month later you'll have forgotten it. To do it to a level where you need to order in a few bits & then resolder all 60 wires. Here the 500µf 50v output capacitor is small in more ways than one & thought needed plus research to see what's buyable. To do these boards is going to be realistically in the 20 hours range, to think few would try this as a paid job as 20x Skilled Labour at £50 an hour works out a hefty job. Skilled Labour means they'll not mess up on a complex job & for you to decide if it's worth paying the Cost. We heard the AA-5000 sound crisper than the AA-5000S ever got so we are gambling on a Week's work that it gives good results. To say to a Customer it's worth redoing to this level, probably not if we've redone several 1965-67 amplifiers & receivers this way & it does make a better item. The 500µf output capacitors were dry & crusty inside. As of May 2025 we never did anymore to it, fibding other Germanium Receivers gave great results & were easier to work on, so AA5000 sits for another day.

Beware Buying 'Messed With' Amplifiers That Don't Work.
Of Course you'd never know until you take the lid off. The Seller Never Says "I've played around with this & it works even less than it did when I started. I've messed it up". To look at an amp this way. The Price. Is it worth buying for Parts with the visuals decent & the bits all there, unless you have a piece it lacks. Buying Missing Parts can be done on USA ebay but the VAT & Shipping plus buying a part could mean £40 just to get one part. Sometimes it works out if looking at The Amp in Selling Terms once all 'Use Daily'. Vintage Hifi is a Gambling Game & we certainly don't win them all, if do get Parts that come in useful & let us buy Amps Missing Bits which is Nice. Messed With Amps have had the Soldering Iron in. They take things apart as they don't know what they're doing. One Amp the Tone sounds odd, so Mr Messer took the wires off, unsoldered the Tone Control & unpicked the Tabs to look inside. That is Really Clueless, do they have no idea what they are doing. No. On putting it back they messed up badly twice more so the Amp made no sound, if the Power Amp could be heard on Turn on & Headphones in. Power Amp works therefore, if to find what they messed up. To find the first one & get the amp going, to find their Tone mess up, so more Fault Finding. all this takes a lot of time, it wastes time as you 'hoped' it just needed a Recap & the Usual Work, but to undo The Mess left by another. As with any Faulty Amp, to stick with it knowing what it could sell for. But some amps aren't good enough to sell so get Parted for bits useable. This amp is worth saving, so to learn it more from the Circuits to test things. Fault Finding is a Dark Art & what you think is the cause often isn't leaving tests showing another amp here works fine, so the Fault must be elsewhere. To Find That Fault. The usual way is to try things, if it solves it then move on to Recap & Upgrade it. If not, put it away & think on it for another try. Never to force a Repair or Hurry on Hifi. To try for a few years sometimes, if to find the fault is a part not findable can mean you can try other things, if always the Use Daily standard & once it drops into a status where you've gone far enough, then the end. The idea to just rip out groups of things & replace the lot generally won't solve a non-working fault. On one faulty amp to sort it & now it works fine. Bad messing caused damage & errors they made are what happens when an Amateur messes & gets it wrong. But it's up to the Gambler who dares buy 'Dead' Electrical items.

Return Of The 1973 Trio-Kenwood KR-8340 4ch Bridgeable Receiver.
This is one we found early 2024, the UK 'Trio' version & with the 'KCD-2' Phobo 4ch Decoder box. This must be a very rare item to be the UK version & as sold in 1973, not one of the Clearance ones sold past 1975 when Quadraphonic had failed. Must have sat around unused since 1975-76 & the owner had used it on the 2ch Bridged mode by the Rear Button if inside shows it was causing bother to be a bit of a dry oil mess on that board. For the chance for others to save the amp, to take the top relay board to hinge up & 6 screws hold the BTL switch board, it doesn't fit on any back screws. Beware this is a Huge Job to even Service let alone Recap, as shown by our seller who must have been very overwhelmed with it & did very little, wisely giving up & letting another try it. Having had one in 2019 for a Customer, our 2019 Review tells we were impressed with it & to buy another of the same amp means we liked it. The Design has us seeing the 4ch Power Amp is almost the same as the Trio-Kenwood KA-6200 we have still as of writing. It's later than the KA-6200 & has a better way of connecting boards, multi pin plugs & sockets like Computers still used to use in the 2000 era. a 51 year old Receiver not expected to still be around & the innards have aged & there's a lot to do. Size is the same as the 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170 Jumbo with the 8340 5cm less deep if 19.5kg weight tells how solidly it's made. Manual is dated '9-1973' wth the "Two-Four Receiver" as 4ch & 2ch bridgeable to what we read into the 100w range on the review. Seeing the KR-6200 power amp design, less the Relay-Protection stages is the same as the KR-8340 shows it has a very decent power amp as the KR-6200 was a good one, if that's only after Recap & Upgrades. To hear it as Original after some work is interesting. Sound As Original. The 1973 user may have been a little disappointed with it, it doesn't play as loud until at '4' instead of a usual '3' on most amps. The KR-6200 was silent, the 8340 has a bit of background hiss if not bad & it's not fully serviced yet. The Sound has little to bother Bass as it's very light on Bass as the review told. Treble is a bit soft, needing +2 (one notch up) to sound right. A case of hearing it has 'A Good Sound In There' as did the KR-6200 that we've now sold. To play the KR-6200 it has a proper bass & sounds clean for our Upgrades, the KR-8340 has a way to go to sound right. This was £285 in 1975 & went up to £345 by 1976 if after then will have been Discounted to Clear. Styling Looks. It's certainly a more Classy Looker than Trio usually did, the KR-6170 is a crazy looking thing with all the Buttons, the KR-8340 has the KA-6004 styling with wood effect side panels & the metal lid like the Amplifiers used, not a wood top lid here. Looks very smart lit up & 4 level meters plus the Tuner one. Adds more controls to the KR-6340, more push buttons & Tone as Front & Rear. Underside cover has holes to fit the feet, like a Marantz does on bigger models, the feet fixed to the chassis. The Rear Decoder box just plugs in & inside it's a complex unit like a Tuner with two early Can ICs & lots of adjust pots. A Quadraphonic Record buyer had several formats that companies used making a confusing scene. The 4ch Signal is on 30kHz requiring a suitable Cartridge to go to a Higher Frequency to read the Record. Second Try. It has woken up to sound more lively, but spitty on Treble reveals it needs a lot of work doing beyond Recapping. Trying the buttons, the Loudness we never use shows the sound is more distorted on Bass too, if Midrange is less loud & smoother. More of the Trio-KR-6200 sound in here. Just before this we were playing the 1973 JVC 4VN-990 that sounds Great if still not as Quiet on the Background though the SEA Noise has been sorted. So it'll be a battle of a 4ch Receiver & Amp. Third Try it now plays without Distortion with nothing done. Looking at it how to take apart, not had since late 2019 which seems a long time ago. The front boards need the Tuner Cord taking off part of it, don't remember any difficulties & only kept 4 pics of the inside. Needs a big Service as the Treble gets a bit spitty again. No 4ch amps are much good after 51 years & you'd not expect any amp to be. To wonder if many are able to tackle amps like this. Ones on ebay USA also just try it & give up selling as 'Spares & Repairs". The one we did in 2019 was a far bigger job than expected, meaning the Rebuild Cost didn't really cover the job, but that's the Game of Estimating on Hifi. To service it bit by bit to see what ages most. The many plug-in blocks in this amp move on from the rather tatty earlier Trio-Kenwood long board connector blocks with overlong pins. This Receiver Shows Us How Limited Relay Amps Must Be. It can Upgrade very well, with Subtle Redesign, but that causes the Relay Circuit to Oscillate On & Off continually. The Relay Sensing Circuit isn't good. It can be Dealt with to Play Normally, but still makes quite a Loud Click when turning off which is a Task for another day.

Badly Built Hi-Fi That's Not Repairable Or Even Takes Apart Sensibly.
The Big Issue with Electronics is once it's not working right, it's E-Waste. It's not worth fixing & often isn't offering any Ease Of Servicing. We've encountered this with Surface Mount type PCBs that are so fine you can't remove a capacitor even, the Big ££££ 1995 Spectral Pre-Power was like that on most boards. Havi g tried to Repair Computer Motherboards etc, there is No Way to do this reliably. Snipping Capacitor wires above the board & soldering on is just a bodge job, as it doesn't last. E-Waste. We've had 1979 Amps & Receivers before, they can appear well made in their 1978-79 way but can be hard goimng. In terms of Hifi Jobs & Our Own Amps, to decide on an Unknown to try has turned up one that is really not worth the Huge Job to get an amp that might not sell for much as 110v. 1979 Harman-Kardon HK-560 initially we were impressed as the Sound was not thib & grainy like usual 1979 amps. To see the design was 'Tuned' to sound good we've seen in Marantz lower models by 1978. Had hopes to fix it with having the Rare output Transistors, but it always had a 4v on the Speaker & nothing wrong on the Power Amp. So to decide to get further into it. This we put on The Review we did... The Reality Of Working On This. The Preamp is on a thin section of the large board right at the front by the controls. It's totally hidden by wires. The power amp stage is very small too & that was hard to get fingers into with the tall heatsink. To get to the Preamp board to need to take the Tuner Cord off & undo a lot of casework. Tuner Cords can drive you crazy for even following the loops it's never right & it's too cramped up. Ours a 110v one on a 1979 40w amp, it may sound decent, but ours still has 4v on the Speaker outputs, a fault that could be anywhere. If it's in the Preamp how can you test it easily with the Amp in bits. Sadly this one goes 'Unrepairable' a 110v one recapped won't do the £500-£600 price a 240v one should, it might do £450 or it could sit & only go for £300, making it not worth the job & the job it's already had. The last 110v amp we had was the smart KLH 27 & that only sold for a small & too-cheap price. Take It Apart Anyway. Just to see what needed doing. Tuner Cord off, all front panel parts off, unscrew the main board & leaving a loose mess. To know what to undo is The Guess & see what you break in trying. Really not worth bothering even if it was a UK 240v Mint one, it's designed not to be repaired, which is early for 1979. Harman-Kardon can be seen as a Poor Brand for not even making it easily Serviced. The Preamp transistors were a bit hissy here so you need it apart. This Is A Difficult Situation. If it was a Customer's Amp, we'd not know it was Unrepairable, but now know the signs. The 1978 Yamaha CR-2020 is a very involved one to do the preamp & having done this before, to decide not to offer Recapping the Preamp as the job is too big & outprices the job. But the CR-2020 is a quality amp that readily sells for a strong price, a 110w attractive amp readily sells, we've had several. Now The HK560 is In Bits. It's not too much to Redo the board itself, but with all the wires & controls in a messy lump plus the Tuner Cord it just isn't one that's Repairable, or even to find another now we took it apart. Too many problems means Unrepairable. It was only £30, we did get it working, but no good for Speakers with the high DC Offset Fault. We tried it for Three Months & we've been working on other Amps so it's had a good try. But it's a Fail if can be broken for bits to reuse. Unrepairable Amps Waste Your Time & Money. The HK560 could be repaired if firstly you knew how to take it apart & secondly if you wanted to end up with a Huge Jiob that in terms of a Rebuild would be 3-4 times the work than it would be to Restore at the Right Price to sell. For a 110v 40w amp, the Resell Price makes it 'Unrepairable' at a reasonable cost. Broken up, most goes in the Bin, if there is always a good amount of 'bits' that do get used, the rarest ones here are the Speaker Output push button blocks, these are tough to find & often a bit rough on some amps to make them best avoided, unless you have spares to replace.

June 2025 Blog

Vintage Hi-Fi Is 'Popular' But Paying For Proper Rebuilds Isn't.
To see other Techs views online, the YouTube Hifi Video scene is telling & matching what we've found. Even those just Rebui;ding Like-for-Like, which doesn't give Good Results as it leaves Vintage sounding Too Bright & Lacking Richness & Bass. They need The Upgrades we Uniquely offer to give a Worthwhile Product. See Rebuilt Amps with ghastly Capacitor Stuffing & other Amateur Ideas done, why are they For Sale? They are Disappointing so Don't Get Used & are Sold off Cheaply. There are Techs "Giving Up" on doing rebuilds, we're not offering Hi-Fi work currently. Others saying they get a Poor Condition Aged Amp with lots of issues & Customers still think the price should be "$100" like a quick repair was back in the day. There used to be a pride in saying 'the amp's in for repair" because the repair job was just to get it going, regardless of how tired the whole amp was. 30 years on from the 1990s-2000s era Hifi does age a lot. Us selling Serviced Hifi over 10 years ago, they are now often "Too Aged" to now need a proper rebuild. A foolish scene where the Big Monster Receivers Pioneer SX-1980 offered at $15,000 & similary crazy prices on big Marantz, with all Marantz way overpriced when they aren't so Rare. Marantz gave Shops a "Bonus" for getting Customers to consider Marantz first & in HFN there was a big uproar about it leading to John Crabbe, the Editor, actually Naming Marantz for their selling techniques. Costs In Hifi Rebuilds. We've done a lot more Vintage, especially 1960s, than Anyone Else with us developing very cool Upgrades that give a Great Sound & Reliabilirty. We offered a Quality of Rebuild & Upgrade that no-one else offered. To go much further in Upgrading Our Own Amplifiers & Receivers just to see what can be done. Some of those have Years of Upgrades in & involve ones "We couldn't give away" like the 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170 & 1965 Pioneer ER-420 valves receiver. A level of Disappointmrent for the work in these as were for sale once, yet Zero Interest shows they are Too Early & Too Obscure perhaps, to easily sell Yamaha, a brand We made wanted for our Efforts & earlier Pioneer as well as Marantz. The Customer seems more confident with Post 1973 when we find the 1964-1967 ranges the Best Sounding. How Fast we sold the 1965 Sansui TR-707A, with lots of upgrades, if having other Sansui to let one go. This site shows us finding that a Great Receiver, if after a huge amount of work, really is The Best There Is. Selling Prices are one thing, but Price Of Work done rarely gets covered. "Bangers & Cash" with their Restorations of Vintage Cars has World Class work done, but often they Lose a huge amount, if that is covered in TV Production costs. The Reality Of Wanting The Best isn't really in Hifi together with 2025 Finances & 'them' still trying to 'demise' you. Optimists keep saying "It'll Return" but seeing the Low Prices Quality Records make on ebay now, the 'modboy' character is just giving good stuff away at a fraction of the price they should be worth. BBC TV auctions see most items not selling well if now they fake up low buying prices to give big profits. What Will Happen In Vintage Hifi. Beyond Hype & Silly prices, look at actual Sale prices, beware of Fake Sales to try to fool you it's worth that. If things do recover which History shows as 'Boom & Bust' since the Early 1970s, the thing is these Hifi Delights will be even older & need even more work. Watch the Vintage Cars scene where $16 Million for one car, what will it be worth to later Generations?

History TV Shows Maybe Not So Cancelled?
News is 'Work In Progress' & often Poorly Researched. Early June 2025 to find both "Pawn Stars" & "American Pickers" are indeed on Hiatus, but Hints they could return. "Storage Wars" debuts a One Hour episode series early June (in USA) & brings back Dave Hester, if no Mary or Darryl. Horrible show from 3 Series with Masks & Forced Jollity, the unfunny scripts are unlikely to improve, caution needed. What you Believe Online isn't so Easy, if There Is So Little New TV since the 2020 nonsense. Having to watch the often very boring 'Bargain Hunt' to eat Dinner to is How Bad TV is, there really is Very Little else to watch. Being of an Age as these 1970s TV Shows remind you, there was just so much more to Interest a much wider Audience than today, on just 3 channels. Music was of all styles from Kids Pop to Adults Rock & then lots of Soul & Reggae. Today the Top 75 is "Unknowns" with disposable Streaming, like a Radio you choose what to Play on. What the Charts use as Data is MP3 sales plus Streaming, as Google's AI tells. Sales on Vinyl, CD, Cassette & 78 will count too. So a little Respite in the Despair of How Little Fresh TV remains. All the TV Zoo shows finished too is another 2020 problem, as is Life generally today. Watching TV on any channels, lots of Better Shows but All Repeats. Online to hear about 'Wheeler Dealers' those awful Clickbait YouTube Videos 24 min of nothing. If Edd was so upset about the Format, then why did the S14-S16 with Ant include so much Technical stuff? There are only so many times you want to watch Similar things & the Mundane done over & over, like Banging Out Dents & Resprays isn't what you want to watch. S13 showed Edd getting bored & only the 1980s Electric Car made him interested. Life needs Change, but the TV Lies as Clickbait is best avoided. The Reality is probably Both Shows have finished if they may do 'Specials' & they will be repeated for 10 years still.

Stupid Review of the 1965 Bang & Olufsen Beomaster 1000.
HFN Feb 1966 has A.W. Wayne of 'Shirley Labs-Electronics' who made their own UK 1960s Hi-Fi as 'Shirley' brand. There really is no other word than 'Stupid' how they review it & it's telling B&O never send anything else to Hi-Fi News magazine to review, perhaps until the 1977 B&O Beomaster 1900 from memory of the later 1970-80 magazines. July 1965 'Gramophone' magazine gives it a glowing review as is shown in a Dec 1965 advert by shop 'Studio 99' who from their ads seem a quality shop selling only 'better' gear & agree with the 1965 review. Bang & Olufsen soon use the line "For those who put Quality before Price". Having been into B+O gear in our earlier Hifi selling years, to get tired of it as construction was not so great if they were reliable once sorted & the tricky bulbs soon started to be unfindable. HFN 1966 Review. To see they clearly got one that had been damaged, the piano keys wouldn't stay down a little obvious, but Mr Wayne keeps on picking at it for wires & parts near to touching, further proving what a hard drop can do with Amps as we've seen the 'dropped' issues & know these type of controls if not in the right adjustment, can not work well as the click part of the switch isn't being reached. To say they'd have returned it unreviewed if it didn't sound decent is just very poor in reviewing when the Amp has damage & not even trying to get another one sent as does happen in later reviews. No criticism of the review by anyone. The Game of Reviewing in HFN as said in a later issue was they only reviewed what they were sent. Not to go out to buy items to review like "Which?" did. To not annoy manufacturers, not to review to give a bad review & put the makers off getting HFN reviews, which B&O clearly did avoid doing despite adverts appearing. Not being Wised Up to the scene clearly the problem here, not realising a Damaged amp won't work right & not thinking a stupid unfair review would just about finish any sales. B&O's next effort was the Beomaster Tuner & Beolab Amplifier by 1967.

Thermistors In Hi-Fi.
You find these Temperature-Sensitive Resistor devices in early Hifi. It's a 'Protection Circuit' of sorts. A Thermistor may start at 22 ohms & when it's 'hot', the one we're looking at starts to change resistance over 60°C which means the Amp getting issues wIil make the Resistance Decrease, making the 22 ohms less. In Amps these Thermistors are usually Parallel with a Resistor creating about 10 ohms in the required place. In some early amps, this is a bit of a nuisance as the Resistance isn't precise as you'd want, on the D-1A it can range from 22 ohms to 28 ohms which isn't very accurate. As a Thermistor is used in a Bias Circuit, the reducing resistance when Hot will apparently 'turn off' the amp, but to see it'll upset Bias to sound wrong, to alert you. This is hopelessly crude, if you Damage the amp it'll not work & if it fails due to old age of components, it needs a rebuild. On this amp, 1965 Pioneer SX-600T, the Fixed Bias relies on the Thermistor & the Bias isn't accurate so DC offset on a Direct Coupled Amp can be 1v which isn't ideal to use on speakers, if 1v isn't much, it's not a good idea, as a Relay Circuit will cut out at 1v usually. Thermistors can be bypassed if Heat isn't a known problem, they are in Home Heating & more It'd invalidate any Warranty & could be a Fire Risk. But in Hifi, it doesn't appear an accurate way of designing. What Do Poorly Matched Thermistors Do? Probably way beyond most, it's about Design. But we're typing this as the Want to Understand why the DC offset isn't so great. L has 0.157v DC offset currently with the Thermistor circuit 1.9 ohms apart. R has 1.1 ohms apart & a 0.5v DC offset. Ideally to disconnect the useless Thermistors & use tightly matched Resistors to have DC offset very low. DC offset affects Direct Coupled amps, but not the Capacitor Coupled ones. DC offset in Transistor Amps often has a Rotary Pot to adjust, but on early amps no Pot exists at such low values & ones in some amps don't adjust too well or keep reliable. Knowing the amp, heat isn't any issue as Rebuilt. Thermistors Age & Do Nothing. A look on Google says this happens & one of our Amps used to run Hot with Thermistors right by the Output transistors. This showed they do nothing, if to buy New Ones to know the Specs is always the issue. The ones on the amp just above has the Thermistors of uneven values, to see they've aged if still read as working with more variance. If Heat was a problem, to try to find new ones & probably have no chance. Protection Circuits in earlier amps pre Relays are often of little use, they only cut out or alter the sound to sound 'wrong'. The better option really is to use more precise resistors, if to keep the thermistors in the amp but disconnect, to keep the original looks. It seems the earliest Transistor amps try these items, but to see a Thermistor in a Bias stage clearly isn't a good idea. Thermistors not to be confused with the STV-3 type Bias diodes & similar, a Thermistor in 1960s Hifi is a round disc looking like a ceramic capacitor. Farnell have 22 ohm thermistors made by Epcos, but USA buy for £0.61 but to buy 1000.

Power Amplifier Designs By Name.
A 1965 Sherwood S-9900 amplifier, an early Silicon Transistor one of 18w RMS, is described in a 1965 HFN as of the "Lin" 1956 GE design. This design is perhaps the most used in Hifi. It has the varied input stages, but always into a Driver, the Bias Diode(s) then the NPN-PNP Push Pull Stage then the Various types of Output ranging from One HT with Capacitor Coupling to the +/- HT with Direct Coupling using Semi or Full Complimentary outputs as in 2x NPN or NPN-PNP. The PNP output driver was less easy to make until generally 1973 when the Differential Input, "Lin" circuit then Fully Complimentary NPN-PNP outputs. Makes no difference if 2x NPN or NPN-PNP if they are wired differently. The "Sharma" design is mentioned in 1965-66 for the 'Mattes' 100w amplifier that is ahead of it's time, but has too many Diodes in the design & the rarity of the amp to try it. In Preamps the "Baxandall" NFB Tone Circuit is much used with less having the 'Passive' design. The 1965-66 amps & receivers use the 'Transformer Coupled' Power Amp as in a Transformer takes the place of the "Lin" Bias & NPN-PNP drivers & surely is more precise using the Transformer as a 'Splitter' to drive the Outputs. What this circuit is called remains obscure & only reading 1956-80 HFN magazine do you find info that's forgotten now & not even Wikipedia tells.

Germanium Transistor Tuners.
For the short life of the Germanium in Hifi, there really are very few Germanium Tuners. There will be UK & EU Germanium gear if they are generally not the Quality of the Japanese product, being more 'Radiogram' innards quality. The 1966 Sony ST-5000W Tuner as on our 'Solds Gallery' with the five brown lever switches is one & this one came from a Professional used seller & so it had been kept working & serviced for some time, if maybe not since the 1980s. As it worked we left it as original for the Rarity. It had a nice sound if we sold it & the TA-1120 early one in 2018. Another Germanium Receiver & as far as we know only it & the later 40w version have Germaniums. These are the 1965 Pioneer SX-600T receiver that we have & the 1965 Pioneer SX-1000T (Earliest one, not TA, TDF, TW). We have the printed manual for the SX-1000 & it shows Germaniums in the tuner like the SX-600T does. The SX-600T & SX-1000T have a Nuvistor Front End with 4 of them, plus a Relay to switch FM Mono to Stereo. Ours works, the Relay click into Stereo is unusual, the 1968 Sony STR-6120 uses a different type of Relay on the MPX board. Getting our SX-600T to be useable on Speakers, time to try the Nuvistor-Germanium Tuner to see what it sounds like. Pioneer SX-600T Tuner works, but rather aged sounding & stereo uneven. Needs a recap to be it's best, the Boards in the amp & Manual have totally different numbers. IF Board 'AM9127B' if 'AM0123U' on the manual etc. Once recapped nice clean sound, FM Stereo with ease, the Relay clicks are an odd one. Valve or Nuvistor Tuners are often the best sound. Nuvistors & Germaniums are certainly a special sound. The Pioneer SX-1000TA has a Valve, two Nuvistors & the rest is Silicon transistors. Tuner Glass says "Solid State AM/FM Multiplex Receiver" when it has the Valve & Nuvistors. This is a very decent tuner, pity the Autotuned Garbage 'Music'. Crisp & Rich sound finding Stereo easily.

July 2025 Blog

The Game Of Sending a Better Item For Review Yet Selling a Poor Quality One.
From having read the 1956-80 & 1987-93 era Hi-Fi News magazine, to see the items reviewed do have problems to the point one Manufacturer in the 1960s reviews is seen to travel 300 miles to see what went wrong the Dynaco Amplifier, the quality 'Stereo 120' one we've had years ago. A part was wired wrongly & the reviewer found it by trashing it unexpectedly. Cynical minds may think the Manufacturer purposely selects a well tested & tried machine, but this isn't the case, the Quality Control was of a high standard. But there's always one & this was a really unfair situation. Re-reading the 1963-69 HFN set backwards in date to see how things Changed going back in time reveals one Cartridge by the Budget Japanese brand "Eagle" certainly seemed to not be selling what it reviewed & the HFN magazine prints a retraction of the Sept 1965 review of the 'Eagle M1007 Gold Stereo Cartridge' as several had bought it & complained to HFN that it was way short of the reviewed one. We've seen Early Run amplifiers with better quality components, like expensive Silvered Mica capacitors later replaced with cheap ceramic capacitors that have No Place in Hifi beyond a Tuner Front End. The Eagle M.1007 cartridge looks like the Decca square cartridge headshell of earlier years, priced at £5 11s for a Moving Magnet design when a Shure was £8 11s so clearly a midprice version. The graphs show the response is decent & the reviewer is clearly pleased with it saying 'go buy it' in effect. Who knows what happened, Eagle's UK Distributors had faith in it to send in for Review. To wonder if they sent in a Prototype or different model is a positive aspect if would they be so foolish to try boost their name with the review & only sell a mediocre product? Eagle amplifiers are the budget end of Hifi into the 1970s. Who knows?

More Difficulty With Traditional Light Bulbs In Hifi.
Some amps you can't fit LEDs in as the space just isn't right without doing surgery. The 'ideal' bulb is the 29mm-30mm fuse type bulb as you can get AC LED ones that don't flicker. But one amp, the 1972 Akai AA-8080 decided to use wire ended 8v glass bulbs, to solder the wires to the PCB fitment. 'RS' site calls these "Axial Indicator Lights" available on 6.3v or 12v. But not the 8v ones the AA-8080 needs. Fit the 12v ones & they are way too dim, they barely light. Tuner Window Not Always Lit? The AA-8080 only uses the Tuner lights on 'Tuner' so for Aux & Phono it's a drab look only with the Input Word bulbs, more bulbs to mess with, if ours work. LEDs can replace these. Some receivers use this 'Black Out' design & it loses Retro Appeal by not showing the Tuner lit, which is an attractive Green one on the AA-8080. It uses 4x bulbs, at 12v you need to 'find anotjer voltage source' as we did doing the meter LEDs on the 1973 JVC 4VN990. This is a Design Issue & to do it right to look nice & be safe in use is your challenge, design it to look readable if not very bright in Daylight, so when in a darker room it's the right brightness. Overbright will wear the bulbs out very fast. If you're going to design a new voltage for it, choose bulbs that are still buyable & fit design to voltage & brightness. For the AA-8080, this is our third one, the others had good bulbs, but two out on this one. This Redesign on Bulbs will bring issues that can be sorted, to make sure it runs cool & safely is the issue. Never actually tried the redesign bulbs one before, there will be a few amps that need this & it is worthwhile doing. With Filament Bulbs, you need a Voltage & enough Current to drive the bulbs. We've done the AA-8080 to be always lit, on Tuner mode the two Meters light a little brighter, it depends how many Tuner bulbs are used. Worth doing if you know how.

Are Today's Buyers Scared Of Valves-Tubes?
The biggest issue with Valves is now the Age of these Amps & Receivers. There is still a healthy market for Valves themselves & Guitar Amp users seem to be more willing to try Valves for the Rock Sound. In Hifi, the Valve Amp is now long past it's best on 1950s & 1960s ones, they are usually too far gone to even try. The second wave of valve amps in 1979-1982 are getting older too if still useable once Serviced, but High Voltage Capacitors age far more than a 25v Transistor one. Pioneer items usually fly out, but despite the tone of the world 2023-2024, we still have the 1966 Pioneer SX-1000TA with a Valve & Nuvistors in the Tuner, the rest is Silicon Transistors like the 1967 ranges. The 1965 Pioneer ER-420 is a huge job to rebuild. To try the market on it, if the idea was to keep a Valve Receiver. On the site from Aug 2023 to Mar 2024, not one bit of interest. The idea was to Upgrade it more, but Let's See The Market on Valve Amps. Even to Discount in for Jan 2024, nothing. Are Buyers Mad Ignoring It? It takes time to study Amp Circuits & get the Best from them. Getting Great Results with very difficult Transistor amps, to have them Sellable, try the 'Magic' on the ER-420. To get far better results on this 18w into 8 ohms receiver, improving gain & making the sound far more solid, it sounds awesome. But Buyers seem Scared of Valves for the fact they Need Maintenance. ER-420 is Fixed Bias, so no adjusting. Valves last a long time as long as you don't get Crackly Valves which is more a Preamp issue. Output Valves in the days our 100w Tube Technology Genesis Monoblocs were in use all day every day, to get 2 years from a set of 8x EL34. Use them less & you'll get 10 years until the Bias goes off spec. Those were reliable in use. Preamps you can still use Vintage Mullard valves if we prefer New Ones as older valves can be 'Soft' & they've long Burnt In to their original circuit & can severely lack Bass if they've only used the small coupling capacitor values. What's To Be Scared Of? Mainly it's the fact these Vintage Valve amps need a Big Rebuild which is Not Cheap & It Shouldn't Be if you want Use Daily Amps. The ER-420 we used over Xmas 2022 for TV sound & it behaved so well. Capacitors & Aged Design needs updating, if generally Resistors can be good still if not worn out from being too Hot & tired looking. To meter test each resistor in the ER-420 to see some were very precise values of low tolerance more like 1% than the usual 10%-20%. Valves do run Hot, as they have a Heater inside to work. Expect a Valve Amp to warm the room by 2°C which is usually beneficial, if in Hot Summer it can be a bit much. Give the Amp full ventilation, no building in cupboards or cabinets or putting on a shelf with little open air. They're designed to deal with Heat & the casework will be ventilated if the valves aren't open to see. Don't put anything on top as your LPs will quickly warp. The Problem Is that few can deal with Valve amps & not many are getting recapped & rebuilt these days. There used to be a World of the Early Pre-Power Amps making upto £3000, if they are far too old to use, making us wonder what the High Value is for? There is PX4 & Single Ended Triode Valve World too & a Glut of cheap Chinese Valve Amps around. These Chinese amps are not a good buy as Buyers think a 6w amp will be Loud enough on 86dB speakers, these need 100dB+ to even give a reasonable level.

Tuner Not Working Devalues A Receiver Tuner-Amplifier.
The point of a Stereo Receiver aka Tuner Amplifier is the Tuner Works. Based on Selling, if the FM-VHF works this matters most. AM-MW isn't much good anymore with hardly anything beyond Sport Talk in our area. But FM needs to Work. Some need a slight Realigning to get the MPX Stereo to work. You need the Tools to adjust else you can get into bother with the Hex hole Ferrite screws breaking. We have had Success with some. If the FM tuner is dead then generally that's it, tests to a degree can be done. If voltages are right then the Tuner is generally bad & the Trio-Kenwood tuners 1967-69 are most prone to go silent on the Front End. 1966 Pioneer ER-420 we've just fixed it's issue & plays FM in Stereo on the full 88-108 range. Of course it took taking it apart more to understand & find what it lacked. Repaired it plays. How much does this add to the Value now? Stereo light used to be always on, now FM Stereo plays & the Stereo light isn't right. If a Tuner doesn't fully work right, the Wise Opinion is leave it be, the adjust Ferrites are rarely the issue. Here we've looked for the 6C9 valve to only find USA sellers with £35 postage. To try it again recently had the Tuner work better than ever before briefly then fade. This says the Valve wasn't the issue, so dig deeper. Success is a good one to get. Tuner FM not perfect. Eventually finding a NOS tuner valve & it works fine now. Limited use for certain valves & they do eventually turn up at the right price.

Valve-Tube Bases: Broken Socket Pins.
Valve Amps can get broken socket pins from trying to unsolder old components & other reasons. If you're Unlucky, the Pin breaks off flush with the Valve Holder Base leaving nothing to Solder to. You could undo all the components & fit a new Valve Base of the same type, but generally you'll not find a new one that fits from underneath without surgery. We had a Broken Valve Socket Pin, it was fixed but you're never sure on it & it'll never be as strong as a good pin. To find a Valve Holder on ebay with the same sort of fitting, vintage amps often use the "D" shaped hole ones. Break the new one to get a pin socket out & they should be the same size. A bit of fitting and ours is as good as new still using the components making an unusually easy job. One Pin replaced in the B9A socket for ECC83 etc. Looks the same as only the Pin Socket replaced, instead of taking out the whole holder & having it not fit or match. All adds Confidence to an Amp to fix properly rather than just make do a repair.

Amp Makers Use Obsolete Parts To Use Them Up & Cause Trouble.
The Worst One is UK's budget brand "Armstrong" using the poor UK Germaniums into 1973 before the '600' range arrived. They will have worked when New, but as Armstrong closed after 1978, there will have been reasons why the brand that was once heavily advertised suddenly fails. These 'AD140' type transistors were poorly made by Mullard & air gets in the 'sealed' package, causing metal to grow, such as the "Tin Whiskers" that was known of in the early 1960s, yet they kept using them until 1967 when Silicon was more affordable. Not to be confused with Japanese Germaniums that age fine, beyond the odd very Hissy or Leaky one, in a way Valves go noisy. But the Blog here is we're finding a 1972 Akai receiver still using Germanium Diodes. As with ebay, there are still plenty around of the '1S188' one if at £6-£12 each you'll be buying them for not knowing easier ways. The 1969 Pioneer still use Germaniums on the Power Amp.

August 2025 Blog

"Unknown" 1965 Pioneer Valve Receiver SX-410.
Certainly Unknown to us, if info is on HFE site, Not in a familiar series to look at, so only noticed on a Aug 2025 ebay ad. Looks quite like the 1965 Pioneer ER-420 if the Tuner window is different with 3x SW plus AM & FM. On 115v-230-v so for USA & UK. 10w rated. Theirs shows a 'Cape Town' shop stamp on a booklet, so a South Africa sale baxk in the 1960s. Very bright condition, has no AM antenna on the rear as made. Seller thinks it's 1977 & 113w RMS output, that's the VA Power Rating as in Mains Draw power. They still want £499 for it which based on Rarity, perhaps, but it's still a 1965 Valve amp & probably very aged soundsing if playing. ECL82 outputs with 260v HT. 11w into 16ohm says the Service manual circuit. No FM MPX as this see,s a more Budget version of the ER-420 if really not so unlike the ER-420 circuit-wise. The ER-420 has AT6123 output Transformers & SX-410 has AT 6132 so just slightly later. The 11w into 16 ohms is each channel so to assume with ECL82 & 260v HT it'll really only be about 10w which might not be Loud Enough even on 95dB speakers,To look beyond what the Seller says, they might have cleaned it up, but it'll certainly not be one to trust or use more than a few times before it shows it's age more. They're selling with a 14 day Warranty no less, a little amateur on early gear like this, selling later stuff usually, but if it was a Rare One that We Wanted, to be better aware of what it'll be like. Our Lux(man) HQ32 from 1962 uses ECL82-6BM8 outputs & we only saw that as a 10w with a slightly highter HT.

Vintage Hi-Fi & Tuner Valves: Getting Them Working Right.
We're trying to get the 1965 Pioneer ER-420 working right, as of typing (over a year ago) this & have done since. Some receivers & tuners you can align by ear & adjust easily, others the Hex Hole ferrite adjusters need careful handling & plastic tools not to crumble them. These Hex Ferrites you can't buy, if we've collected them from Parts Amps to at least have some. The Hard Bit is getting Valves. A Japanese Tuner will specify USA numbers. The '6BA6' in the ER-420 is the same as the UK 'EF93' which makes them findable in the UK. Obsolete Valves going back to the 1930s can still be found NOS in boxes as few will ever be needed, especially old tuner ones. The '6AU6' is the same as the 'EF94' one was already replaced & one we bought as the Heater had failed. The '6C9' valve in ther front end has no Direct Equivalent, there are UK made ones, but these are larger 1940s 8 pin valves, not the ECC83-size 9 pin one needed. Since first looking, there are now lots of '6C9' on ebay USA but it means a £30-£40 delivered lot as ebay forces a '12oz shipping rate' on Global Shipping as told by one seller. A case of shop around, buy NOS if possible & realise it adds much more value to the Receiver-Tuner if it solves the problem. "If" being the word. the ER420 we've had apart, deeper tested it & managed to align it to still find '100-108' on the FM tuner is fine if below as '87-98' it's silent. But it actually sat here playing on '92' for a while but never again. To assume valves aren't their best so just to Buy new ones. The game of Valve Testers we tried long ago, had two of the big AVO testers, but after looking inside, to see how old these 1950s & 1960s units are, as in how reliable are they, how to Test a Tester. Just sold them on. As 1960s HFN Hints & Tips guy says, the best way to test a valve is to swap it with a new one. If it's no different, rebox the new one & keep the old one. Also you'll end up with a collection of Valves, but in the mid 1960s there were a lot of Valves being used & still valve units being made into 1966 with some like the 1959 Lowther amps, being sold & listed in HFYB until 1971. Some valves do 'grow' into old circuits. ones with limited Bass can't play recapped amps well, sounding very rough & distorted. But then others can still be fine on their original amps if not used much, the ER420 we still have the 'Made In Japan' ones on Outputs, Driver-Splitter & Preamp-Phono. This is unusual, the 1963 Trio WX-400U & 1963 Trio W-41 needed new valves on all audio stages, if the WX-400U tuner ones were fine. The ER-420 has the full Tuner circuits including MPX, the Pioneer SX-800A (SX-2000) one doesn't show the full details leaving that one an unknown on the Front End that has a Valve & Nuvistor like the 1966 Pioneer SX-1000TA does, as with Switching & MPX sections unless you get the full manual & to understand why it has Transistors possibly on the MPX stage.

Amplifiers Making Noises On Turn-On & Turn-Off -- 1
Some amps are totally silent in On-Off use, going back to 1965 ones. The Relay you may hope removes any Noises, but Not So. On relay Turn-On they'll be quiet, but some early ones can make a Click on Turn-Off that isn't what you want to hear. Turn-On Noises can range from a 'Boing!' on the Early 1965-66 Amps. It's not Loud & is sort of reassuring. The Noise is always the same & to us, it's part of Vintage. One Amp designed not so well put a Loud Click on turn on. It was because the Speakers switch was the Power Switch too & connecting both Speaker & Power created 'disturbance'. In the original design it was Dumbed Down not to emphasise this noise, but further Upgrades found it was putting out a big Click. Relays started to be used more by 1971-1973. On amps we've had, the Relay is quiet in use, such as on Marantz & Trio-Kenwood. One 1973 receiver has the turn-off click as does it's amplifier version. Care with it can keep the click minimal. One 1972 receiver we're finding puts out a loud click that we're trying to solve. The Relay is just a switch on-off, it adds nothing to the audio Signal. But turning off an amp causes voltages to fade & go unstable. The 1973 receiver clumsily tried to add parts to silence the click, but it affects the sound, so better off without it & deal with a small noise. Other amps can leave the Sound Muted on Turn-Off if most just leave it fade away, obvious solution os Zero the Volume so next time you turn it on, it's not playing music unexpectedly. The Relay Turn-Off click is a tough one, reading what happens it's 'as designed' if later Relay amps use the Marantz-Trio one which isn't giving a click. Looking at their designs, a more advanced Protection-Relay circuit is why they are Quiet in use.

The Benefits Of Germanium Transistors.
Today the Germanium Transistor gets more interest from Guitar Amp users, for Amp & Effect Boxes that give an Authentic 1960s Sound. The track 'Badge' by Cream, on the original UK 1969 Polydor 45, has a typical Germanium broad Hiss heard on the intro, be sure CD issues removed the 'noise', so you need the old 45 to hear it. The Germanium has a smoother sound, if try to find "Why" online, you'll not find info. The HFN magazines, being 'of the era' talk about the Germanium transistor which was swiftly replaced by the Silicon transistor by 1967, if the 1965 Sony TA-1120 has All Silicons. To read 'why' in techical terms that explain it sensibly is hard to find for much these days. So July 1967 Hi-Fi News on p.149 says..."Germanium has advantages in terms of lower saturation voltages, and as lower saturation voltage can be important in high power amplifiers, germanium is still sometimes considered desirable for output transistors in spite of the temperature advantage of silicon. Germanium devices also have better Linearity generally speaking. They can give lower distortion, and on the whole they require less drive than their silicon counterparts". Yes they do waffle & pad out articles, leaving you needing to simplify things assuming you understood the waffle version. Linearity is the clear 'Smoother Sound' a Germanium has on all frequencies, if you can hear beyond the Hiss. This adds up to lower Distortion on a Germanium. Less Drive means the Germanium circuitry is less critical to get a crisp clean sound when Silicon can be left Sounding Blurry if not designed well, see the Phono Stages Blog below. Having designed the 1965 Sansui TR-707A & 1966 Sansui 3000 (not 3000A). The Germanium TR-707A is smoother & more extended sounding than the Silicon 3000. The Problems With Germanium Transistors are Too Hissy for today's Hifi user, Instability with heat altering parameters, low power & unavailabilty. For Hifi, we don't use Germanium Transistors now, if the Circuits are more what makes these 1965 era amps interesting.

Amplifiers Making Noises On Turn-On & Turn-Off -- 2
Relay Amps means the Differential Amps, not the Capacitor Coupled or Transformer taking place of Splitter Circuits. The 1965 Sony TA-1120 has a Relay, if it's much hidden amid the Turn on Delay circuitry & is Capacitor Coupled. The 1965 Pioneer SX-600T has a relay if it's MPX tuner switching into Stereo. 'The Click' is when you turn off, the voltages start to fade, if with a very brief 'Peak' that is the instant the Relay goes off. You can read the Voltage varying on Turn off to see it then fade. With Differential Amps the ±HT is a + Voltage & a - Voltage which will never be perfectly matched. Some brands like Marantz & Trio-Kenwood use relays to have No Noise on Turn Off. Sony only started using Relays by 1975 on their Differential Amps. Lower Power Amps don't use a Relay if higher power & more expensive ones do. Notice Relay amps by 1977 are without clicks, if one Brand on a 1973 receiver were aware of this & tried clumsily to cover it. Their 1977 range, having More Circuitry manages to have No Click. There is a Price To Pay, the Circuits are much more Tamed to stop the Click Noise. Capacitor Coupled Amps have 0v on the Outputs so any 'issues' are hidden by that capacitor. Some of the early 1965-66 do have a turn-on 'bounce' which managed to be sorted by 1967 models. Sony TA-1130. We have this amp not started on it so it's Original. To Test what it does on Turn-On & Turn-Off to see why Sony avoided relays after the TA-1120. On Turn-On DC offset varies only by about 30mV to settle. On Turn-Off it varies only by 12mV. With a Relay, it'd Not Click. The other channel has verylow DC offset, the first channel with 60mV DC offset varies more. That channel needs adjusting therefore. What Causes The Click & DC Offset? There can be many causes, the Imbalance of +/- HT. But looking at the TA-1130 it has a 'DC Balance' to equal the Differential Pair. The Sony Pair TA-2000F/TA-3200F had similar so no Turn Off Noise there. Could be the Answer, the STR-6065 & STR-6055 have the Balance adjust, but the TA-1140 amplifier doesn't & we had no issues, if none have The Relay. What Causes is still an Indefinite, but seeing the amount of Diodes later amps have, they are clearly to tame things down. The Capacitor Coupled Amp is still King to us as the Capacitor blocks any DC, if you can still damage a Speaker with Highly Clipped Audio, such as a Treble Shriek will Fry a Tweeter on a Speaker, the input audio to the Dynaco amplifier trashed a Fane Bullet tweeter as the cable got pulled out. Later amps do use sifferent circuitry to stop this Relay 'Bounce' plus the fact they are More Limited stops problems. If the Relay 'Bounces' generally you have to put up with ir, as in it wasn't solved in these 1973 amps/.

Getting Annoyed At Crappy Hi-Fi Design.
After getting deeper into Transistor Amps, after some years, to Get Annoyed At Crappy Hi-Fi Design. Yes. Why is this Crappy-Why is that Crappy. All Hi-Fi is just Another Person's Idea, some are Brilliant & Not Crappy. These sort of "First Design In A New Idea" amps just get it right on many things. But as with any Back Seat Driver, in come the Idiots who take great design & mess it up. To make it 'Not So Good' that you'd never buy another & to make things of a much lesser quality to what we've found we can upgrade to. Our upgrades are Subtle as No-One would buy a Valve Amp stuffed into a Midprice 1980s Transistor case as one crazy ebayer thought would sell, blogged on that one before. The Crappiest thing in Amps sadly is Lighting. Poorly lit Tuner windows & today the difficulty of Bulbs of ratings long obsolete. Some amps actually turn off the Tuner window light leaving just the input 'word' shining to show it's on. The Akai AA-8080 is like this. It uses 8v axial bulbs that need soldering in, a LED 30mm fuse type bulb is too big as the bulb holder unit has smaller holes. The only bulbs of the size we can get & had some from the 1980s 'Heat Pipe' Amplifiers & the bulbs are still buyable, more from NOS that currently made. But they are 12v & gitted in they barely show they are lit as the voltages are wrong. That's just Rubbish so to get annoyed at it but deal with it in a different way, pull a different voltage & now it looks great at the right brightness & the tuner dial light is always on giving the full retro appeal of lights in amps.

High Prices On Aged Vintage Hi-Fi. Unrestored & Unserviced.
As with Cars, certain Hifi in poor grade will always find a buyer. These are the Rarer & High Power Models & be sure it can take 2-3 parts grade amps to make one good one, as we found out long ago with the 1977 B&O Beomaster 1900 as weakly made parts break. The Pricing on ebay & other sites is usually Very Optimistic based on 'Working' ones even if the amp has no sign of life. A "Working" amp from nearly 50 years ago is going to be aged & tired, some do still work but they always benefit from a Service which is often Money Wasted when the amp needs a Recap for the age. Ebayers optimistically wanting £250 for amps missing front control parts or the control spline broken off. Of little value unless you have the same amp to cobble one good one from. Valve Receivers that are nearly 60 years old & the seller thinks £300 is a fair price. To who? Those who like the looks & get it Rebuilt are a Rare Breed as the Rebuild Costs are high. Seeing the lack of interest in our rebuilt & upgraded 1965 Pioneer ER-420 receiver is not good, do people want Valve Amps to Use or is it a Dream of 'oh we'll do it sometime'. We bought that ER-420 for £200, a proper rebuild & upgrade is going to be at least £1500 & having decided to keep it, to have spend far more time on it trying to get the Tuner right & upgrading it to sound far better. Wise Man doesn't buy a Valve Receiver to make a profit on it. To try the Market even discounted & no interest, just to test the Market. So Who is buying these Faulty Aged amps for High Prices? You'll find there are Nobody, beware the Fake Sales to give the impression there is a Sale & see it relisted again. We've heard of very poor grade amps listed as 'Nice' & turn up in awful condition, to the point they seem too far gone, but we like a Challenge. After the Shock & Overwhelming feeling of a bad or highly complicated amp, to understand & simplify it to know there's much to do, but It's Our Game & We Can Do It. The basically working Trio-Kenwood KR-8340 to us knowing it from a previous one was a Huge Bargain at £175, it had sat 4 days unsold as Who'd Dare Try. To see similiar 4ch ones that will be as aged being offered £500-£1000+ shows they are forever relisted, the seller knows it's a good amp, but totally unaware of the work involved. We see these Overpriced amps, £175 one wants on one, worth £75 to us perhaps. We'd try haggle a deal after it goes unsold, if probably not. At the other end, to pay £600 delivered from USA for the 1969 Pioneer SX-2500 & find it hissy, noisy with hum despite as sold as 'Good Working' tells the Reality of Vintage Amps. We'd have thought after doing this Site for a number of years, more would Copy what we do & make Vintage Rebuilt Amps, even to a basic Like-For-Like. But we're just not seeing it & to Wonder where Vintage Hifi will go over the next 10 years. As with Cars again, some do excellent work, but it's Specialist Work. Why do people want Vintage anything? Because it's far better than anything Modern, but at a cost. In 11 years, the 1965 Pioneer ER-420 will be 70 years old. Vintage Valve Amps & Receivers Do Sell On Ebay. To see a 1965-66 Pioneer SCX-34B, a 11w Valve Receiver, sell for £375 at the end of Marck 2024 was interesting. Sold as "In Good Working Order" with 4mm Speaker Sockets. The metal casework was unusually bright & clean. But not a word if it was eveb basically Recapped, no Inside Photos, nothing. Sold quickly, but what do you really get? a 1965-66 Valve Receiver of Unknown Quality. Looking at the Seller's other items, they put high prices on Vintage Valves you can buy new ones of. their solds page shows the exact same amp 'sold' in Jan 2024 yet it's relisted. Maybe sold & unpaid, returned or not really sold just 'Sold' to create an interest. 'No Longer Available' on that listing says they decided not to sell, so, as we do often, change your mind & later relist. But ebay shows 'Sold'? These Valve Receivers, to us, are best bought as Original & Untouched, be they working or not. There are no layout diagrams so need working out from the original parts. Some stages more easily understood. Bad Buys On Ebay. You can bet this is the general standard, not for ebayers trying it on, but the age of the items. The Rogers HG88 III on the Solds pages we got after a buyer paid £350 for it from one of the ebay Hifi Sellers. He couldn't make any sense of it so relisted it & only got £175 for it, what we paid. The internal condition was 'disapppinting' for a supposedly Pro Seller who claims to have checked it. The £375 buyer of that Pioneer may get a high grade case one, but these 1960s Valve amps are long past their best. To wonder what that buyer gets, will we get offered it to rebuild or will we see it relisted cheaply by the Buyer as often happens?

The Availability Of Electronics Components Forever Changes.
Manufacturers today only keep making parts if there is a Market. Over the last 10 years, Panasonic have stopped making their larger Power Supply main capacitors, the Red Film smaller value Capacitors used to be around in many sizes beyond the few they still make. Even a 1µf electrolytic is no longer made by some. Look on the RS or Farnell sites & see Surface Mount items are growing in ranges. Lookimg at Small & Mid size Transistors the ones they list of the 1970-80s type are 1970-80s ones that have proved popular o keep making them. But to see ones "No Longer Manufactured" suddenly if you could order 900 of them & they'd make more. One resistor in the series we use, the 8200 ohm (8.2K) one is not buyable, if you could order the 900 batch. 8.2k is an obscure value if we've used it in 1960s amps, it's a value of little use to have a tiny demand. Just get a different range to at least have an 8.2k. Panasonic are now becoming harder to find on over 1000uf Electrolytic capacitors. These needed using different range ones on recapping the 1971 Sony STR-6065 recently. Less choice means more work finding the right values & sizes. Even the Silvered Mica capacitors are only buyable from USA at a $16 premium. To find the ebay seller with NOS ones that could be 50 years old, but they aren't always the Voltage as stated, some '300v' ones turned out to be 100v or less as they went noisy in our Valve Amp. You're Dealing with an Electronics Marketplace that doesn't use certain parts anymore. To see Car Shows where they can still buy obscure parts is likely a lot as New Old Stock NOS if some parts are remade on popular cars. Demand means Supply. To find certain Transistors aren't around, to search what else they have & stock up makes sense, knowing what parts get used more often.

September 2025 Blog

What Buying An Original Raw Untouched 1960s Valve Receiver Can Bring.
On first receiving such a thing, Generally "It's Knackered & Needs A Full Rebuild" is the Opinion, if some can still work to at least Understand what is Good or Bad by Testing Voltages or even Listening if you're Lucky. Be Aware Luck Can Run Out & things can go wrong, High Voltage Capacitors can explode & Small Faults can grow into Big Faults & Damage more. The Most Important Thing is the Transformers are good, Mains & the Output ones. If these are clearly damaged then to find similar ones without getting another of the same amp is pretty much impossible. The Lux (Luxman) HQ32 from 1962 is one of the First Stereo Receivers with FM Stereo capability, if not a fitted Decoder. Why anyone who could not be aware of the Work & Cost involved to get any Valve Amp useable shows a naivety thinking their Bargain would be useable after 62 years. It Just Won't. Get one who can properly Rebuild Valve Amps to Advise you. There are Amateurs who just Recap Like-For-Like who may get it going, but often there are many other problems that will be Way Beyond an Amateur. The HQ32 being 100v isn't ideal, until we get it useable with the Output Valves in, to not know the Voltage using 110v on a 100v amp can bring. The TXs read fine, clearly several major issues to Repair & Upgrade, there is No Bias as that's been knocked out by one fault. But with the Output Valves taken out, we can test it & find the Main Capacitors still read a good voltage, Nichicon ones from 1962 are not leaky if only a Fool would trust 62 year old 300v capacitors beyond testing. To see what's wrong, but to keep it Powered Up briefly & use a Circuit Breaker for Safety. After Testing, it Needs A Full Rebuild with some Repairs. The Output Valves may be no good as with any Valve. The HQ32 may not be as complex underneath as other Valve Amps, but we're familar with them. The Rat's Nest of stuff underneath you rarely see shown in Sales Ads as it'll scare most off. But it is Logical & with the Trio WX-400U to learn it & that was before we got the Circuit Diagram. Who Knpows what the HQ32 will need to get it 'Use Daily' quality as we've got with other valve receivers & amps. As we found getting the 1965 Pioneer ER-420 tuner now workinmg right, Valve Amps to forget about the Money & Time to get it right & decide if you want such a thing as a Project or Rebuild Job from the Tiny Few who can do this. It's like Vintage Cars, the Job can be Huge & really go too far. Also on amps like this, a Rebuild in a Few Months is too rushed, it takes 2-3 years using an amp & deeply learning the Design to get the Best from it, be it Transistor or Valve. As of Oct 2025 we have the Luxman HQ32 working on our 240v-100v Transformer.

Vintage Pre 1967 Hi-Fi Ratings Can Be Confusing & Misleading.
Beyond the 'Music Power' & similar ratings you see in 1960s HFN magaxine, there is the problem of Speaker Ohm Ratings. Tannoy changed to 8 ohm in late 1967 with the 'Tannoy Gold' range. The 'Tannoy Silvers' which were never actually called that in the Adverts, these were 15 ohm & suited to Valve Amps. Rogers Cadet III first out in 1963 as a two part or Integrated. Here the Output Transformer has an option of 3-5 ohm or 10-16 ohm. Which one do you put the 8 ohm speaker on. We'd say the 10-16 ohm as the other is more mismatched. To see one who connected to them both but not Ground shows a confusion, it'd still work though. Early Power Ratings. The 1965 Sansui TR-707A in the Manual says 18w RMS but 23w Continuous for Left or Right. The adverts put 23w. Valve Amps from the 1960s are last made as New Models in 1965-66. These are rated 10w, 15w etc, but into 8 or 15 ohm? Many Used To Say "Valve Power Ratings Are Less Than It Sounds". To see why, a 10w amp into 15 ohm could be 18w into 8 ohm. The Specifications of pre 1967 Hi-Fi can often rate as 15 ohm as this was the Standard. In 1966 Tannoy brought in a new 'Audio Metric' speaker, but as it was 15 ohm it quickly disappeared as the Transistor is better on 8 ohms with 4 ohms being common on European gear. "The Valve Museum" helpful site gives Power Ratings on Valves. Often using original Datasheets, for the Age of the Valve Design, it's likely still using 15 ohm ratings. How To Work Out Power Ratings For Valves. The Valve can be designed to Any Power, but the Maximum Dissipation is the one that matters. Some Data Sheets play it safe saying the ECL82 is 200v, but others say 300v with 900v Surge Peak. A Valve has a Set Of Curves showing it's Characteristics, if you exceed these the Volume Output will be Less or Nothing. To see the Data Sheets, the Philips or Brimar ones give different data & limits. For Push-Pull the Ratings differ too, you'll find 3.5w, 7w & 10.5w quoted looking at both versions. But no mention of 4ohm, 8ohm or 15ohm. Much online about Power Ratings, Watts, Voltage, Current & Resistance. You'll Find Nothing in a straight-forward way but "around 10w" but not saying into what Resistance. Old Unthought Ideas just repeated over & over. The Volume of a Valve Amp is defined in the Preamp. Our Sine Wave Tests tell the 1963 Trio WX-400U put out 17.5w, call it 18v for ease. It's Rated a 10w amp, sold as a 20w 'Music Power' amp but again Never The Speaker Resistance. If a Transistor Amp puts out 18v then it's rated up to 18w-20w as our Power Ratings page tells. This makes the WX-400U an 18w into 8 ohms item. They're using 15 ohm ratings, we are interested in 8 ohm ratings. There needs to be an Online Calculator for this, but they're all still using 15 Ohm ratings, because they're not thinking or seeing the WX-400U output Sine voltage. Some Valve Power Ratings. Rogers HG88 III 15v = 15w into 8 ohm. Trio WX-400U & Pioneer ER-420 18v = 18w into 8 ohm. The Pioneer SX-800A we didn't note the Sine Output Voltage if the Circuit Diagram says 23.7v into 15 ohm, on 445v HT, the Sine reading would be higher without the Load. Luxman LX33 is 24v output, rated 30w as a 1979 item on EL34. A Push-Pull pair of EL34 as Doubled in the Tube Technology Genesi was rated 100w. Others rate EL34 P-P pair as 25w, does anyone actually know for sure, it all seems far too vague. Just as our Power Ratings page says, why we started to keep note of Real Sine Output Voltage.

Should You Be Plugging Vintage Hi-Fi Into The Mains As Your First Try?
The Thing Is items you Buy Online will Always have been Pliugged In. The Person who Discovers an item sat 20-50 years will naturally put a Plug on it & Plug It In. Hopefully making sure the Fuse isn't a 13A one as that won't Save You or It. Non Tech people haven't got a clue, so will Blindly just Plug It In. Selling an Item if you can show it Powers Up, it's a Huge step on from not knowing any Electrical Status. That usually shows Bulbs lit up. To see a Poor Grade amp internally but see someone has Plugged It In to take a Photo is Their Risk but to know it Powers Up. Of Course just Plugging any item in without a thought is what Circuit Breakers & Fuses are for, to Save The Unaware. If you buy from a Shop, not just a Private Seller, the PAT test is required, which tells you nothing beyond it powered up. Depending on the skills of the PAT tester, they aren't checking it much. Do Not Plug Gear In Without A Visual Check inside is our advice, which will be ignored & things plugged in. The Trouble is Time Marches On & things are getting older. Our 1962 Luxman Valve Receiver was 20 years old in 1982 & fine to plug in. But now it's 62 years old. From our Tests, to see the Initial Plug In caused several problems, as in Caused Damage. Some use a Variac to slowly bring up Voltage, but the trouble is Amps with Regulators need Full Voltage & Valves do too to get the Heater working. Makes you wonder in another 40 years will items Electrical still get plugged in so Casually? Our 1932 Pye Radiogram is 92 years old, we've not plugged it in for a while & all is original beyond the HT capacitors. How Else Would You Tell Beyond Plugging In? This is the problem. If there is an Issue, a Circuit Breaker used on tne Mains Plug or the Household Circuit Breaker will save big problems, if not really tell you what is wrong. In our Property, the Household Circuit Breaker is even faster than the Plug-In one. We visually check, use Circuit Breakers & keep your finger on the Power Switch to quickly turn off. To be sure the Amp is Grounded to Earth in some way is important too, to avoid touching Live casing. But generally, amateur seller will just put a Plug on a Single-Inlated Two-Core wire & plug it in.

The Problem of "She Won't Let Him Have It" Or "You Must Sell It".
Most Hifi Buyers are Men usually of an Age 40-70. They've Worked Hard to Buy Nice Things, so How Dare Anyone say they Can't Have it or they Must Sell It. To "Sell" one amp recently, they paid Half & Half Next Month is fine. But the day after receiving half payment a Short But Sad message saying just that. You can see Men of Today on 'Bargain Hunt' often "Boring Hunt" as it's so tame, but suits to watch to Eat Dinner & skip through the rest if it's a Boring one. The Tame Men who say "She's The Boss", well that's their choice. They get their Dinner each night & the rest maybe not so regularly. Men often have Hobbies, some like Beer & Women, some like Model Aircraft & Railways. Others Collect Stamps & a million other things. "Dull Men" is what they're called on Facebook, if we see them as Happy People enjoying what they like. See "Bangers & Cash" to see many happy older men with their Cars. 'She' knows he's behaving himself & you can clearly see they enjoy their Hobby past age 80 even, nice to see. An Interest keeps them Alert & Alive. You see some of the Older Ones selling off their Lovely Cars, they're still healthy, why not just keep it if you can afford it. They will be upset after it's gone & probably fade away without the Hobby. If She Says 'Get Rid' perhaps you're getting rid of the wrong thing. Beyond Financial Needs, they don't care if you're Happy to have the nerve to deny your fun, yet be sure the older ones will have Clothers & Shoes etc decades out of date, but they'd never sell. A Quiet Life is the sad reason why She Wins. It's not a balanced life & to see this when things have to go. The Grand Children don't want them. They've probably never made any interest in their middle-aged Kids to have them want things either. If you Want That Thing, get it & keep it. Again on "Bangers & Cash" the wife ends up liking the thing, interest grew in them. In a World where we see sickly comments "With The Deepest Respect I Upload A Better Photo" on a certain Record Info Site. Weak minded Men again, personally we'd put "Here's Our Picture, It's Far Better Than xyz's so enjoy it". Would anyone be offended they were Outdone & Bettered? Respect is not needed at all, but the Weak Man talks that way.

FM Stereo In 1963 In The UK.
In 1961 in the USA the GE Zenith MPX system was allowed to Broadcast FM Stereo by the MPX method still valid today. There will have needed to be FM MPX Tuners to reeive this. To look through the 1963 Ho-Fi News magazine to see what was going on. BBC did experimental FM Broadcasts starting late 1962 by comments made. BBC only offered a small amount of Test Stereo oddly in Daytime making is hard for UK Workers who still worked the 9-5 hours to listen. The tests will have been more for Manufacturers to hear FM MPX Stereo. The 1963 Audio Fair had USA company 'Lafayette' have their own FM Broadcasts by having a FM Transmitter near the Audio Fair so could Demostrate FM to many. This all got a lot of interest, but BBC wasn't that Commited to FM & HFN readers were getting Frustrated. Our 1962 Lux (Luxman) HQ receiver released Sept 1962 was their first one with others following soon after. These were Japan-only 100v models so got no UK coverage. The Brands having FM Tuners were Pioneer & Trio with the early Two AM tuners as AM Stereo was Broadcast, if absolutely nothing about these Dual AM/MW broadcasts, Left on one MW & Right on another MW frequency. Stereo is more about Higher Frequencies to show the Stereo effect, MW Stereo must have been a bit pointless. As 1963 goes on, UK makers Quad & Armstrong offer FM Stereo Tuners, with a MPX output for a decoder. The only FM MPX decoder we see mentioned is a Bang & Olufsen one. It's all a bit Secretive what you could buy to get FM Stereo, likely USA was far more into FM Stereo if they will have been 110v only so no UK mentions apart from Sherwood who advertised in HFN. There is an Excitement in the Audio World as Transistors are starting to grow in use so FM Stereo & Transistors are out there, but it seems to fade away on both as There Isn't Much Buyable on either. The first FM MPX Stereo Receiver with built-in MPX is the 1963 Trio WX-400U we've had. Adverets for Trio introduce it late 1963 if give it the wrong model number twice. Previously the Trio W-38 was the first of these FM Stereo receivers to be reviewed in HFN in Dec 1963, no mention of why 2x AM/MW tuners at all, the WX-400U didn't get a review until 1965. Only the Trio ads say that AM/MW Stereo could be received, clearly ideas before MPX was made the main system. Over the next few years, moaning about FM Stereo until BBC make Radio 1-4, with only 2-4 in Stereo as the 'Pops' on Radio 1 were deemed unnecessary for the masses in the patronising wat the Hifi Press treated anyone not into Classical Music. Radio 1 in the early 1980s only got FM for the Sunday Top 40 on the Radio 2 frequency & some shows that followed, but back to AM only, Radio 1 in Stereo always was only a 1988 idea, 21 years after Radio 1 started.

Earliest Trio-Kenwood 1965-66 Transistor Receivers: TK-80 Two Versions & TK-60.
We know the 1963-65 Trio valve range including the WX-400U. But the Transistor Receivers are not so easy to find, if we've had two of the ones pre the TK-140E, early version of TK-140X. Our Receivers Page shows... "New range all SS if 1966 first range with Germaniums very likely in part: TK-40E '35w music power' 32w continuous, TK-60BE '60w music power', also TK-50BE & TK-80BE exist as does TK-88U, 1967 model TK-140E 50w RMS no prices" An early looking TK-60 aka 60BU with a 'Kenwood' badge seems earlier, with less coarse lines in the control knobs. A sign to look for therefore. HFE shows several, KW-1100 another 1966 looking one with the centre raised line design, valves. KW-33L different to the KR-33 we've had, a 14w one with the wood feature on the fascia. KW-55 is a Valve Receiver, don't know this late one. KW-60 is an early Double Tuner 1961-62 styled Valve Receiver, before the WX-400U as the HFE write-up from the original info mentions the 'new' 1961 FM MPX. KW-70 another Valve Receiver 1963 looks. KW seem to be Valves. TK range with TK-40 as 40U, 40L, 40SW & 40U versions, 16w with 1967 styling. TK-50 a 20w from 1966 probably USA only as FM only version of TK-60, TK-55 is 1967 styled 20w, TK-60 a 20w from 1966. TK-66 a 1967 20w one we've had. The TK-80 seemingly with Valve or Transistor Tuner at 32w appears to be one of their First Transistor Receivers, TK-80U is Multivoltage. Some Trio-Kenwood can be 117v only, the "U" means it's 240v Multivoltage. TK-60 marked as "60 BU" with a "B" stamp underneath, a sticker claiming it's Multivoltage looks a bit modern? Looking at our WX-400U there is a similar sticker in gold tape, so it's real. The Multivoltage Switch is inside at the back, here the switch is on the right by the TX, looking from the back. We see the Switch & the label on another one has the same font if a different shape. To find one 'needing some help' for £70 delivered is ours. Gambling as always, but not had the First 1966 Trio Transistor ones before. TK-60BU we later notice it's 80-108, to assume T-K had more than one design department working at the same time as 60BU has the 'UA' board codes. Which Came First? TK-60 or TK-80? TK-60 has a Germanium Tuner, no Valves or Nuvistors. Boards in FM numbered "815-816-818". Other boards numbered "819-820-821" TK-80 similar Germanium Tuner, one is numbered "811" if others UA 11023C which is a later numbering code style. This "UA" code is on other boards. TK-50 needs the Circuit, if only a User Manual is found. TK-80 exists with a Valve Tuner & mostly Germanium Preamp with boards numbered "803" on the preamp, so the Valve version of the TK-80 with Germanium Amplifier beyond Outputs is first, TK-60 with Silicon Preamp second & the TK-80 with Transistor Tuner came later. TK-80 Germanium Transistors are interesting, in Phono, Pre-Tone & Power Amp except the Silicon Outputs. Much like the 1965 Pioneer SX-600T has, so the First TK-80 will be 1965. Phono 2SB440 & 2SB439. Tone-Pre one 2SB439. Power Amp has two 2SB439 on the Input, Driver is 2SB439, Q3-Q4 Drivers are 2SB421 and 2SC292 as a P-P pair all much like the Akai AA-5000 has in days before Silicon PNP were more available & Output Pair are 2SD46 as seen in other 1965-66 Amps. Decent Germaniums used. TK-80 Versions. The Early Valve-Germaniums one has 'Muting' control top left & small Meter numbers, the Manual of both versions we have. The Silicon one has 'Volume' at top left, swapped with 'Muting' & larger meter numbers. The later one, like the TK-60BE, has embossed & printed fascia text, the more interesting one has Printed letters that wear off. Considering how Rare this one is, you takes your choice. But the Manual of the 'early' one shows both Valve & Germanium as a cobbled together pdf of User Guide & Circuits. Rear panel shows 2 grilles on early one & the TX shows on the later, based on a YouTube video to confirm the insides.

1967 Sony STR-6060 FW Receiver. Shall We Get One?
Blogged on this before, it's an Interesting Receiver & the one before the STR-6120 from 1968. The size is smaller than the STR-6120, but the same Width as the STR-6050, STR-6055 & STR-6065 etc. We have the Correct Wood Case as it came with a STR-6055, the 6060FW is a deeper unit so the case is too big for the STR-6055. Always wonderinmg on it, but only seeing Tatty Ones, loose flap, worn lettering & very messy inside. To see a Nice One with No Issues, to consider it. Seller in USA has it photoed well, but it's not shown Powered Up. Barely anything on Description apart from 'as pictured' if we asked to see the Multivoltage Plug inside, the Rear is incorrectly marked "117v" when it has the usual 4 options on these Black Plug Blocks. It'd cost just about £500 delivered & VAT paid, by Global Shipping. Seller Feedback suggests 'not as careful' on things like Packing or Describing. It leaves you feeling a bit 'lost' as without any Powered On pictures, you're really Buying Blind. The Top Lid a bit marked if the Wood Case would hide that. But remembering the STR-6120, there are things to go wrong & nothing is said about Working Status. It's an Early Version of the far more Expensive STR-6120, £187 to £387 in the 1970 HFYB, if 45w to 50w. The Circuits aren't so unlike the STR-6120, Phono is two Transistors, not three, Tone-Pre is a Buffer & two Gain Stages with NFB like the TA-1120(A) has. Tone is Passive as sounded good on other Sony including the Stepped Control ones. Power Amp a first Transistor taking in the NFB stage. Bias stage, a Driver Stage then the P-P Drivers & Outputs. Design is rather Bass Light & some things aren't quite right based on knowing other Sony. Having to Redesign another Amp to get it our way knowing much of what it'd sound like could get good results, but Another Outpriced Amp when it comes to Sell. We do have the 1971 TA-1130 here that is FETs & a better design on there as 3 FETs not 6 of the Sony Pair Preamp TA-2000F. A case of 'Been There, Done That' does lose Interest in an Amp that's had much time spend on ones of the same Brand. The Looks of the STR-6060FW with that Flap would grate a little, it puts Tone behind the Flap, wih Headphone oddly on the Right when Left is the usual place. It has those strange 3mm sockets that take Bare Wire another one that is less useful. To Find a Nice One & Not Want it was The Verdict. One to Like to Rebuild for a Customer to Try it & Review, as with many amps, especially ones after 1974.

Lower Grade On Quality Amps.
This is becoming more Normal. There are still High Grade One Owner Amps out there, generally way Overpriced. For the 1965-73 era we're mainly into, as time goes on, more of the Rough Grade ones appear. Missing Control Knobs & Buttons is often, good if you have a stash of spares but generally you'll not have the right ones. On reselling, it knocks the price into Bargain Buy & for us Rebuilding Amps, not a good item to buy. To try Good Amps in Bad Condition, that 1965 Kenwood TK-80 on USA ebay with Dymotape lettering for all the Functions is as the Printed Text easily wore off. The next range of Trio-Kenwood wisely did Embossed & Printed Text. So you buy the TK-80 & take all the Tape off, you'll remove the last remains of the Printed Text & it'll have No Markings. It will be a Rare one, but it'll look awful, unlikely anyone has made a Printed Plastic Sheet of the Graphics as some brands get. It may be a Great one or Too Far Gone as it's not even shown Powered Up. Selling Price is Cheap, but no takers in 6 or 18 months, listed since October could mean either. To Resist The Temptation to end up with an Ugly Amp that wouldn't be sellable. £180 delivery & £25 VAT on top of a £90 buy is Not A Wise Buy even if it's One You Want. To buy it for £90 if a UK sale, is that any better? £200 cheaper but ultimately it'll still be in poor grade. We've bypassed Sony STR-6060FW & Sony STR-6200 for low grade & missing parts. The 1962 Luxman HQ32 was in good condition beyond the Dirt, all parts complete & lettering all good. But from lack of info, to see it was a 100v Japan-only one is the problem there as Blogs above tell. To get Graphics done is possible, but to find a clear source to copy from needs Original Parts, such as the 1963 Trio WX-400U when the one who nearly ruined it send it to us & arrived glass broken. Getting a Fascia Screen Printed even if you had a Mint one to copy, to find anyone capable & willing to do a One-Off will be a bigger challenge. TK-80 you'll unlikely see another early Valve-Germanium one is the thing. Is £290 such a lot to pay to try their First Transistor Receiver? Then think of it sat there Ugly with no Fascia Text. Stay Away!

October 2025 Blog

More On LED Bulbs For Hifi.
The 29mm Fuse Size Bulbs available in AC versions, on taking one apart they have a tiny Surface Mount Transistor on each end that Regulates the AC not to Flicker. Most Amps use AC for Bulbs & you can still catch the "DC" LED bulb slightly flicker out of the side of your eye when not focussing on it. The Bayonet Bulbs as LED just don't seem to work beyond a small Dot of light, it depends how they are used for how they are designed, they probably are for a Car use & yet to find Wide Angle ones despite what one seller describes them as. E10 Screw Bulbs we first bought years ago for the Sony TA-3200F bulb, the rather silly 2.5v Glass Bulb didn't last long so to buy a 12v of the type with various Colours, as shown by a white plastic band. These are a bit wider in light, got one in the 1965 Pioneer SX-600T to try it, it shows enough light. In 6v or 12v ones so buy some of each. There are also the usual Yellow Square element ones, these will only give a narrow light beam that wouldn't really suit Hifi. Beware E10 Bulb sellers putting "LED" on the Filament Glass Bulbs to mislead. There are E10 LED ones with a flat top that is Concave to spread the light wider, suitable for a Torch, if 3v & 4.5v ones only for 2 or 3 of the 1.5v batteries. A Case of Keep Looking, if perhaps by now the LED market is to Modern Needs & it takes Custom ones to be made. E10 6v & 12v Bulbs. The large LED globe & white ring, comes in many colours. 2 of 10 bought were No Good, the LED globe part not fixed right so try to tighten & they just break. Inside it's just a typical resistor & wire. In the 1965 Pioneer SX-600T they flicker slightly looking at the raw LED bulb, but in the SX-600T they look good & aren't flickery, giving proper White Light showing the Blue & White of the Pioneer glass, instead of the murky Brown light that is not good for us used to ES & LED White Light bulbs. The Quality of these Bulbs isn't good to have 2 of 10 bad, you need to put pressure to screw the bulb in but it breaks, this shows as Not Lighting but touch it & it does, but Wires Broken inside. Bayonet LEDs of the same Anon Brand are buyable & as the 1965 Pioneer ER-420 uses Bayonet BA9S instead of E10 Screw, to try some. Pioneer fit exactly the same way with Light Reflected so these will work right. The dingy Brown Lighting on the ER-420 is not a good look in a ES-LED lit room. For the 1966 Akai AA-7000 the bulbs are too visible so would flicker unless redesigned as DC Bulb Voltage. The 6v BA9S ones fit the Pioneer ER-420 & other Pioneer, the slight flicker is cancelled out by the direct reflection. To finally lose the dreary brown light to show the White & Blue text on the Fascia Glass really transforms it & at the same Brightness level. Years ago, the Fluorescent Kitchen Long Lights were the only source of White Light, to work by the Orange-Brown Filament bulbs is a World we're glad to be Rid Off, like Cassettes & Boil In The Bag ready meals.

Germanium Amplifiers & Receivers.
These we're interested in are the 1965-66 Japan made ones. There are Germanium 10w amps by UK makers if these always considered 'Best Avoided' for the poor UK-EU AD140 type Germanium Transistors. The Japan made ones are much more reliable. There really aren't many in the 20w RMS Rating & they do take Searching Out to find them. Here's Our List of Multivoltage ones to suit 240v. The Aim is to Get Them All.

Akai AA-5000 or AA-5000S. 35w. Both are Germaniums in the preamp, they vary on the Power Amp Drivers if both have Silicon Outputs. (Got)

Pioneer SX-600T, SX-1000T & SMT-84 Amplifier. The SX-600t a 25w receiver, SX-1000T a 40w receiver with SMT-84 the Amplifier version of SX-1000T sharing the same manual. Not to be confused with other SX-1000 models (Got)

Fisher 600-T. 45w. All Germaniums including the Doubled Power Output Transistors. Probably are other early Fisher as Germanium. We had the 600-T before knowing the Germanium era more. The 240v version is a later run version. (Had)

Sansui TR-707A. 25w. All Germaniums if the last Driver & Outputs are Silicon. Designed as 25w if an odd error hides it's a 45w one, if needing some redesign. (Got)

Sanyo DC-60E. 25w. All Germanium with Silicon Outputs. One we have but see it needs such a lot doing & improving the weal Transistors, it stays an ornament. (Got)

Trio-Kenwood TK-80 1st Version 32w. A Recent Find, the Early Germaniums one with Silicon Outputs & one of the P-P Drivers as Germanium, like the AA-5000. This one has the two rear grilles without the Transformer visible, the Muting as the Top Left front control, not later Volume & Meter Numbers small. Has a Nuvistor & 2 Valves on the FM Tuner front end. Below finds the TK-400E amplifier is All Germaniums including Outputs, has an NPN Germanium Driver & 32w like the receiver version, TK-80. These are clearly Rare. The TW-30 is All Germanium rated 10w on a 40v HT. Another obscure 17w All Germanium Receiver from 1965 including the 2SB26A outputs is the Kenwood KT-10, what's the Odds of Finding One? HifiShark shows one did the rounds 2020-2023 in Poland if not since. Rare Rare amp as is the TK-80U first version. But read the Blog below for more. 1965 Trio-Kenwood Brochure shows it & both seem the First Trio-Kenwood Germanium Receivers. But TK-80 is the Highest Power One. (Got)

As far as we know there are No Germanium amps for JVC, Sony, National-Panasonic, Luxman, KLH, Toshiba & Teac. The rather Secretive World of Japan Audio could find more, but they'll be 100v non-Export versions. There will be USA Brands that are 110v only too. There will be lower power models, the 1965 Rotel 100AMP is Germaniums if a poor one. Not all Japanese Hifi are the quality of the Big Brands & a Rare 10w-15w Germanium could easily be a lousy one. Exception. The 1966 JVC MCA-104E is all Silicon but Germanium Outputs & one P-P driver.

1965 Trio-Kenwood KT-10 All Germanium Receiver.
This one shows in their 1965 Brochure on HFE. To see o HifiShark site that one in Poland stayed around 3 years if not seen snce 2023 suggesting it Sold. The thing with these Germanium amps is few know what to do & it'll likely end up with a "Project"inside it of some Digital Nature. We'd buy it if we'd have known, but you can't have them all. It's an Interesting one as All Germaniumf frm Driver, P-P Drivers to Outputs. We're pleased with our 32w Kenwood TK-80 Germniums receiver, but this one needs some looking at. Power Amp inputs are 2SB346 of good spec, Driver is 2SB56A a liitle lacking, P-P Drivers are 2SB43A & 2SD43A unusually a matching NPN-PNP pair if again not the spec. Outputs TO3 size are 2SB26A just 20w 3A. The Spec on some is a bit low, not as the 1965 Sanyo DC60, but not in the league of the TR-707A or SX-600T. It work on -40v HT making -20v in P-P terms. It has items like Protection & a Tuner Power Supply as the TK-80 has plus the Stereo light circuit. It actually has a 2SC281 in the Tuner MPX that's Silicon. Pre Amp-Tone, there are No Transistoras, it's all Passive from Aux. Phono is 3 Transistors typically named as 'Preamp'. One board the same as on TK-80, the '887' power supply board. But Tuner isn't Valves or Nuvistors it has 2SA239 & 2SA240 Germaniums so will actually be A Later Model. Probaby Why it's called "All Transistor" on the Schematic. It still has '80-108' on the FM Tuner scale. To see Trio-Kenwood made a lot of similar models, maybe having two departments make amps to fit various price ranged. Interesting it is, but Not For Us, having the 32w TK-80. Research makes us realise what it is better. The TK-60BU being the same as the TK-66 sort of loses interest as we've done that one before, one in the Box on Solds Gallery from 2016 after getting one in 2011 but it was too messed with. Makes us wonder why the KT-10 was in the 1965 Brochure, but not the Superior TK-80, perhaps 32w was more for the USA market, if all seem Multivoltage, if the 1963 Valve W-41 we had for a customer was USA voltage only. TK-80 with the Valve-Nuvistor Tuner Front End seems a low run version, the later one seen more.

What Really Does "Rare" Mean?
This means "Commercially Made Items", not Prototypes or items made as a Sample or Test Recordlike an Acetatevrecord. In Coin Terms, a Rare Coin could have had 20 Million made, but Rare also means 'Rare In Good Grade" & many 1880s Silver Dollars are worn out so are Genuinnely Rare in High Grade. Uk Silver Coins like 1840s Groats (4d) and Three Pence coims can be Rare with 25,000 made. In Book Terms, less certain, but in our Comic-Cartoon Annual buying years, a Very Rare book could turn up but you could find low grade ones. A Rare Book is one none of the Big Sellers have ever had up for Sale, the Rarest Cartoon Book we had was "Eb & Flo" Annual, if we found two, the "Flip The Frog" & "Mickey 1930" similarly. In Car Terms, there are Specialist Cars with very limited runs, these will be Rare but only ever made in tiny amounts so less of a Comercially Made Item, many were Handmade even. Watchimg 'Bangers & Cash' tells how Rare some Cars are, if certain Big Money cars like Aston-Martin, they say there are lots out there. In Hifi Terms there will need to have been a certain amount made, the intensive tooling & circuit boards even by Big Brands surely would need 100. Serial Numbers can tell the Trio-Kenwood KR-6170 Jumbo probably only got 100 made, if for what it is, a better quality unit, they will survive. The 1966 Akai AA-7000 is a Rare One, we've had three & see others on Google, but nothing on HifiShark. The Kenwood TK-80 Early One there are a few online, as in possibly 3-5, not the later version. In Hifi, Rare can mean a Limited Run, like the Early TK-80 as Technology on Tuners changed a lot 1965-69, the KT-10 blogged above makes a point of being 'All Transistor' so soon after the TK-80, they'd have made only a small run of these before realising the TK-80 was Out Of Date. Rare Doesn't always Mean "Valuable" or "Wanted", Rare things need understanding & recognising. "Rare" on ebay is Meaningless, it's used on Mainstream late 1970s Budet Amps in which case if it was Rare, it's probably as it wasn't very good. The 'Amstrad' 1970s Audio Gear is Rare as are Radiograms & Music Centres, as they've long since been Thrown Away. Rare But A Few Around helps get Rare Things known, as TV Shows with Unique Items show, there is no knowledge of them if Too Rare & even if of Quality, they may not make the Money hoped, or what a similar one made.

Hi-Fi News Rated & Recommended: 1970 Alba UA700 amplifier.
Has the matching UA800 Tuner. Looks best in the earlier silver fascia, the UA800A in black fascia loses much appeal. Some Brands have little Credibility in the Hifi World, often based on their Ultra Budget Status or Poor Quality. UK sadly has several 'Never Buy' brands, such as Armstrong, Amstrad even on their earlier 1960s & 1970s gear. The Goodmans receivers are lacking a quality as we found with the Module 80. Armstrong only the 600 series is better having had the 625, but not one we'd Upgrade. Alba are a very sniffed-at Brand for the Supermarket quality of their Audio & TV items of the 1990s, Mass Market needs cheap goods that get used & thrown away when they fail. Amstrad used to be Buy Saturday In To Return Monday as we've read. Their 1979 'Executive' range has the Japanese looks but very mediocre insides. Alba UA700 was Well Reviewed & Recommended in 1971 Hi-Fi News. By 1971 a lot of cheap brands taking over from other UK brands that faded away. Gear like 'Alpha by Highgate' were advertised but just too cheap to bother with. The first Alba was reviewed well in HFN & they actually recommended it in Buying Reviews. These are Rare as the Brand soon lost their way with the Amstrad-looking UA900. They did make a UA700A with a black fascia & a 1500 receiver also in black. Circuits show UA700 is all Transistors. Typically DIN inputs & Speakers, but this was 1971 & a standard way. Budget UK amps can be of varying quality, if it looks Cheap then it Usually Is. Top lid is Leather effect vinyl, Wood Veneer sides, Amp has a metal back panel, tuner has a card one like 1950s Radios. A.J. Balcome of London SW2 hence the 'Alba' name, like Amstrad & Ekco names. Looks stylish as a pair with Solid Aluminium controls. The Circuits. The Aux in via a 470K resistor & Tuner into 100K resistor. Phono 'Pick Up' as MM or Ceramic, to try which is best for Aux in Use. Inputs all to the same Preamp so Phono level. Two PNP transistors, if it needs the amp here to understand it better. Uses BD131 & BD132 small Output Transistors for 15w, these type often used as Drivers. Others BC148, BC149, BC158 & BC159. Some Unusual design if overall the Power Amp looks decent. Verdict. One was on ebay with the tuner, but decided not to buy it or the Ferguson 206STA 1967 7w receiver either. They may look Retro, but for us to see they need Recapping, would anyone buy Alba, a Brand of No Cred. Back in 2013, Yamaha weren't rated for their 1990s ranges, but we Kick-Started interest with the Brand. The Alba could be pretty decent for what we see, but 15w & DIN sockets means we'll leave it be. The Ferguson had an info sheet findable showing not only 7w RMS but the poor UK AD140 type Germaniums. The Seller said Volume was low, it's what happens with the UK-EU Germaniums if the Japanese ones are hugely better. Hifi Selling is Brand Dependent, Looks Dependent & Credibilty Dependent. Seems 'Sound Quality' by the gear sold since 1980 isn't so important, Sound Bars for TV is telling.

Some Amps Can Cause Big Problems On First Turn On.
With any Electrical Item, the first thing done is Plug It In. This is not a good idea. We first check the Amp for the Usual issues, but realistically You Must Plug It In to know the Status. You keep your finger over the Circuit Breaker to shut it off, don't touch the Amp at all, try it with 'Power Switch On' to not risk. One ap we got sold as "Not Powering Up". To us, the amp looked good condition & a visual check showed it good. It had been Plugged In before, so beyond spebding Hours checking an Amp that'd get Rebuilt, to Plug It In Again. The Fuse was Blown softly, just a gentle break rather than heavy blackening. It gave Quiye A Performance, knocked out the Property Circuit Breaker, our Pluf Circuit Breaker, the 5A Fuse in the USA 2 pin adaptor yet the Fuse in the amp was unaffected. The thing is to see The Outcome then check further. Fault Found, check more but see no issues so Plug It In again. This time the Lights are workimg so that issue solved. Fault probably caused on First Turn On & it Tripped their Circuit Breakers too. Having a Dead Amp like that is probably quite scary when it Trips Circuit Breakers. They work very fast & of 4 'Protection' points on Mains, three worked right to stop Mains which is reassuring messing with 50-60 year old amps.

November 2025 Blog

Why Bother With Germanium Amps?
We're clearly into Japanese Germanium Amps from having tried & got several. The UK-EU Germaniums like AD140 are a very different thin & aged badly soon after being new in the 1960s. In Comparing Amps, to treat Germaniums as different as Valves are to Silicons. The Germanium sound is Very Pure & the better Treble & Deep Bass may think you have Loudness on, even on playing a fully original one. The Germanium sound is more upfront as Precise but Sweet & Neutral rather than Harsh & Tiring. In A Circuit, a Germanium is Much Easier to Drive than a Silicon. Germaniums are much Smoother with Extended Bass & Treble in a Neutral Way & in a much more Effortless Way than Silicon. The setback is Germaniums can be Noisy with a Background Hiss. Some Amps with Germanium can be quiet in use, all down to the Design. A Germanium has a Lower Saturation Point. That means 'When It Works Best' to put it clearly. In Valves you can go past or go under Saturation as the Valve Datashbeet Curves show & the Gain is wrong or is Clipped off. Various features of Silicon need Good Design else Silicon can sound Rough & Grainy. Silicon Amps using Ceramic Capacitors only adds to the Grainy sound, they can sound Quite Awful, a Fizzy Imprecise Sound lacking Focus. One 'Highly Respected USA Brand' used so many Ceramics, the Sound to us was very poor if did improve done properly, other design was still poor. A Germanium Amp can strangely "Sound So Modern" as it is without the Smeary & Grainy Silicon sound. A Germanium for this Linearity can outdo Valves too. Germaniums are certainly Special, if 1965-66 Amps are now very aged & need Expensive Rebuilds, still leaving you not know how Hissy it'll be. Guitar Amp Users Like Germaniums. See Guitar sites for more, they notice the 'more dynamic & expressive' sound of the Germanium. The narrower Bandwidth explains a lack of needing High Frequency taming, the Silicon transistor can amplify frequencies way above the Audible Range & this can cause problems. But Guitar Users also like the Fizzy Sound of Ceramic Capacitors, it's not what Hifi needs, not that some Big Brands seemed to realise. The 1965-66 JVC MCA 104-E of about 16w we got in 2015 after finding their 1967-69 ones worthwhile, if very ignored at the time. To Hear 'Something Special' with that Amp if it was only partly Germanium. Early stages were 2SC458 the notorious Hissy Ones, the amount of those we've replaced. 2SB22 & 2SD30 P-P drivers with 2SB407 Outputs. The next one in 2015 was the 1965 Fisher 600-T with mostly Germaniums including Outputs. It had a more Trebly Sound that wasn't quite understood if it sounded good on speakers. These Germanium amps aren't much around & to get in 2018 the 1965 Sansui TR-707A was more of seeing one made before the 1966 Sansui 3000. Always a Great Sound if was rather Noisy when first here as some of the Sony Germaniums were extra noisy, swapping them around found a quieter set, the Noise only shows on Playing, an Oscilloscope doesn't pick it up too clearly. One we don't consider worthy was the 1965 Rotel 100AMP, a very poorly made low spec piece of junk. All Germanium but not well designed & Phono-Tone-Power amp all on one tiny board. Ended up in the Bin after much time wasted, the Tuner was better & finally sold. Rotel made some good amps, not many, but most are not that good & the brand is way short of the brands we show on this Blog. The next was the 1965 Sanyo DC-60 which still hasn't been rebuilt since 2021. It works to reveal that Sweet Germanium Sound if this one like many Germanium amps, reveals it uses weak spec Germaniums & it may sound nice through Quite A Noisy background, once Recapped it'll show the weak spec. 1965 Pioneer SX-600T purposely sought out as The First Transistor Pioneer with the slighly later SX-1000T. Again the Sweet Germaniums Sound & a less Noisy one, use 'Tape In' to bypass the Inputs Board & on Speakers it's not Noisy at all. The Silent Background on 95dB speakers reveals the Depth of the Germaniums sound which is probably the Best Sound in Hifi, if it took 11 months to get useable & it has several issues to deal with. 1965 Trio-Kenwood TK-80 as a Kenwood is one we find only recently. It has that Sublime Germaniums sound even as Original, if it's more Noisy like the TR-707A was. It'll need a year spent on it to get it's best. But In Reality, the Germanium Amp will still be Too Noisy for Modern Listeners. Germanium Designs are the tging, but subtly redone as Silicon.

Things Don't Last As Long As You Hope. You Can Repair Them & Save Money.
Having 'Hope' with Modern Items is a bit too optimistic. they are Not Made To Last & "Buy A New One" is the idea. Our Bosch Washing Machine from 1997 the Plastic goes yellowy but after only a few minor repairs, still works. Others seeing it say 'Not Seen One Of Those In Years' & they probably wouldn't if the Owner wasn't Repairing it to keep going. Some Things are Too Complicated so Fail & if it's an item like a Fridge-Freezer, you can't really live without one as the usual 'weeks wait for spares' & to have looked at Bosch parts, they aren't made the same so the Board would need modifying, which the Shop who we bought a new one from certainly did & resold it. We got a rubbishy Zanussi one that was rubbish & in the end trying to fix it broke the copper to lose the gas inside. To need another in a June month left choices very limited so got a Hotpoint one, no wheels, no proper Thermostat, just a 0-5 dial inside that related not to any Temperature. It needs constant varying to not be too cold & freeze things. But it's lasted 10 years with no issues at all. Buy A Simple one & there's Nothing To Go Wrong. We have a Black & Decker PowerFile that gets use, but last time the Belts kept breaking. The Glued join had dried out & they broke very quickly. At least with B&D they keep spares going for a lot longer, a 1960s Drill you could still buy a Brushes Set in the 1990s. The Belts still buyable so get a batch. Looking at the item, it has a date '2004' on it so it's only needed a new pack of belts after 20 years which is good going. Other items like a Twist Stepper to use for exercise, the plastic feet pads are made of poor quality plastic, it goes smelly & crumbly. In use one foot pad seems uncertain & soon breaks. again. It was glued on a couple of years ago but the glue mostly ran out as the construction is poor. That's what the PowerFile is needed for, to tidy & get a better surface to Glue on. So poorly made are the Feet Pads & they don't sell Spare ones, the dumb idea of 'Buy A New One' doesn't please when the rest is OK. Both the Foot Plate pads will get 'Refurbished' as in Hifi, if one bit goes bad, be sure similar will soon after. The Stepper will get sorted out & last longer, but Repair & Mend is our Way because We Can Do It. Some things you have to Give Up On as they are getting a bit far gone. Make Do & Mend comes from a Wartime way of thinking & good to see in Harder Times such as now that people are getting things Repaired. Shoe Repairs were perhaps the only High Street Shop beyond TV Repairs if be sure you'd need to look hard to find these Shops now. Old Items are given a New Lease Of Life on the 'Repair Shop', people need to look further into seeing what can be Made Good Again, if always The Price puts people off despite New being More Expensive & Less Good. For Us & Having the Skills, it's only Parts to buy or cobble something together. Oh How Gloriously Old Fashioned. Live It & Stop Wasting Money Buying New which is generally Worse every 10 years.

Comparing 1965 Germanium to 1966 Silicon Amps as Sansui Receivers.
1965 Sansui TR-707A vs 1966 Sansui 3000. Both Recapped with Further Upgrades. Both far too good to Sell as Models not so known & the amount of work including Redesign just to see how good they are. TR-707A as it is currently can give a formidable sound with that Germanium sweetness, which later found to be more Design than Germaium itself.. Germanium amps have a slight background noise that shows more after midnight, it's not too much & even later in the day to listen hard for the Soft Seashore background. It has a more colourful sound as in Depth of Tone rather than being off-neutral. Playing a bit louder as in talking voices in a room level, it sounds really unlike any other amp for it's smooth clean Treble, precise smooth Midrange, tidy smooth Bass but with a pleasing amount of Deeper sub Bass. Germanium amps after a lot of work really can be The Best in Hifi. Over to the Silicon with the Sansui 3000. This has been much optimised by us with the Preamp-Tone much redesigned to be free of the heavy NFB the design has. The NFB makes it sound rougher, less detailed & a bit tiring. To notice the Sansui 3000 after playing the TR-707A has more 'weight' to it as the Germanium transistors aren't as powerful when Silicons were soon developed further for the TO5/TO39 ones when Germanium was generally forgotten by 1966 in the Japanese amps. Redesigned Sansui 3000 sounds nearer the Germanium sound as we designed it with that sound in mind. It was thought 'a bit thin' initially so altered slightly, actually changing the design when it was made less Rich sounding by the 1966 design. The Sansui 3000 or 3000A as original is a very bassy amp for the Preamp-Tone. Comparing Amps is never easy, so to play the Sansui 3000 more. To turn the Bass back slightly to previously used matches it to the TR-707A better. Have played the TR-707A & the 1965 Germanium Pioneer SX-600T the last few weeks to understand them better. To use the Sansui 3000 more then compare to the 1970 Trio-Kenwood KR-6170 & the 1969 Pioneer SX-2500.

Beware The Stories "We've Had It Checked Over By A Tech" & "It's Working".
For us as Advanced Techs, we're not too bothered & have got Amps & Receives said "Not To Power Up" or even the unlikely "Totally Untested" which you should never believe, as an Amp that at least shows Lights On is quite a huge step afte a totally dead amp. We've seen good 1970s amps all rusted from the Floods & sadly they are too far gone, as with Cars that have been Underwater, certain parts will Rust & never been reliable unless fully replaced. Some sellers are good & show inside photos, or will send one if you ask. This makes a Non Worker seem well worth buying seeing the top inside looks nice & unusually clean. It still needed repairs but to us well worth having. One amp the seller said had been checked over. Not so, not a fingermark in the dust inside, inside covers not undone & the plug in boards tight as never moved. One wire had got hot so it will have smoked which was probably why it got put aside after buying on ebay. Great amp to us, but these amps are not for general Hifi buyers as they need work. We don't trust them to even try on speakers as original even, but after our Rebuild & Running in for many hours, then it's Trusted. Even then, if it goes on Speakers, to unplug it from Mains not to leave it on always, until a few days use show it's reliable.

Vintage Transistor Hi-Fi Is Safest & Best On 8 Ohms Speakers.
You can read the Specifications on the .pdf manuals as on the HFE site, oif beware they foolishly limit you to a certain amount by day/week/month/year which is not good for us looking. They have the chjeek to say our 13 yea account is unrecognised now, sadly this sort if 'stupid' is common. So just avoid it & get it from Elektrotanya site instead. Buyer of a 1967 Sony TA-1120A from 2015 says it's going strong still after 9 years as a part rebuild amp, but wants to use 4 Ohm speakers. As a quick reply to suggest 8 ohms is best for Vintage. Reasons Why on thinking further based on the amp being a 57 year design. Here the TA-1120A manual shows 8 or 16 ohm speaker specs, but 4 ohms isn't mentioned so isn't recommended. The buyer of the 1966 Akai AA-7000 that we got back & still have tried it on 4 ohms speakers. The back says 'MIN 8 OHM". The result was it upset the Bias & the amp sounded bad. We know this amp well & these early Transformer Coupled ammps have a Precise Bias to suit them correctly, do it incorrectly & it'll get Too Hot or Not Work right being very distorted. 8 ohm speakers means our 8 ohm Tannoys with Nominal 5.5 ohm work right. 'Nominal' here meaning 8 ohm is the main impedamnce, if this dips to 5.5 ohm in places. Try find this info, 5.5 ohm from memory. Ours has been tried on many amps with this rating never being any problem. Hard to find info on the TMG 15" Impedance if one with the gear tested theirs to show about 6 ohms dip around 100Hz which explains why it's no problem. Beware Bad Impedance Curves. As blogged before, the early 1970s Celestion Dittons had a terrible 1-2ohm impedance dip. This is way too low & will have wrecked many Amps. If an Amp says 8 ohm only & even those saying 4-16 ohm, a 1-2 ohm dip will be way too Hard To Drive. You'll see "Hard To Dive" in Speaker Reviews, do not use pre 1970s amps on these & ve very careful with post 1970 ones. By 1970 amps had lots more Limiting & as these "Hard To Drive" speakers became popular, be sure Amp Designers just Dumbed Down amps to put up with Bad Impedance Curves. No Benefit With 4 Ohm Speakers. In Europe the 4 ohm speaker is more common, Bang & Olufsen used 4ohm. It makes a 40w into 4 ohm a 30w into 8 ohm. 4 ohms is harder to drive. A B&O amp withe B+O speakers will be fine, but a B&O amp into modern 4 ohm speakers without first checking the Impedance Curves don't dip too low can still cause problems. A 1967 Amp has had 57 years of Speakers come after it's 1967 year. There will be Speakers that do not match. So stick to 8 ohm on pre 1970, to check any Speaker Impedance Curve as some makers give Nonsense Ratings like 4-8 ohm actually on the speaker label. It won't be anything else but a 4 Ohm speaker as 4 ohms is it's Nominal Value.

Great Amp Unsold? 1966 Pioneer SX-1000TA Receiver.
Some Amps are still Selling quite quickly, even in the Murky World of 2023-24 as People are slowly realising Life Since 2020 has been 'played'... We've Sold Sonys & an Akai recently, if they are 1971-73 models. You can't help but tell We Love the 1965-66 ones & are trying to find ones of 20w or more. These include Valves & Nuvistors, a sort of Valve & Germanium Transistors. The Sound on these Early Amps is Extra Good. They were designed from Valve & Germanium Transistor ideas. By 1967 the Designs started to Tame Down as The Public foolishly complained of Bass Rumble using a Cheap Turntable on High Quality Amplifiers & Receivers. The Manufacturer's Response was "Sod Them If They Don't Understand", unwritten of course, but it shows in The Designs. More & More Amplifiers got Tamed Down yet the 1977-79 Monster Receivers are supposedly 'The Best Hifi' yet we see how Tame & Safe they are, they can sound Polite but never as Wild as the 65-66 ones. This Blog is about the SX-1000TA. It's the smaller sized case compared to the 1965 Germanium SX-600T & SX-1000T, it looks very smart with the glossy fascia & lever switches. It's quite heavy too for it's size. We got it cheap on ebay with a dented & resprayed lid, but had a spare on the 'new' SX-1500TDF that never worked. The Tuner on this is Valve & Nuvistor like other 1965-66 Receivers. The Sound is much better with the Front End not Transistors or FETs. No ICs in the Tuner on Pioneer until 1967. These Early Amps take a lot more work & the fact we have Ten of the 1965-66 ones plus the 1962 Luxman shows we're digging deep. These amps are usually too old to use, need a lot rebuilding but sound oh so good. Few will know the Valve or Germanium Transistor sound & are probably scared off them, which is such a shame. The SX-1000TA is Silicon Amp & Pre-Tone stage. It has some strange thin 1/4w resistors that we're not so keen on if it works fine to list it. Finding we don't use the 1969 Pioneer SX-2500 much even though it sounds great, the 1965-66 ones get used the most, the ignored SX-1000TA gets another look. 1966 40w Receiver is very high power in days when 10w was usual especially on UK product. We'll keep the SX-2500 4mm Sockets we made for another amp, far too much R&D & work to make those, only ever made those from the failed SX-1500TDF ones so the original SX-2500 ones can go back with the plugs from this 1000TA as we'll put the 4mm ones on the 1000TA, it only needs one set. Looking Deeper At The SX-1000TA reveals it's not unlike the later 1967 designs if to see why it sounds different too. Phono is much the same on 1966-67 ones taking in Mag, Cer & Tape Head with 2 transistors per channel. Aux goes to the Preamp via the Tape Monitor switch, none of the Aux into Phono, if using 'Tape Mon' in bypasses this usually. Pre-Tone is 2 transistors per channel with NFB Tone. Here we can see weaknesses in the design that make the Pioneer nice if a little soft sounding. We've got a great SX-1000TA, why not 'up the game' on it? There are 'Dumbing Down' bits the SX-600T from 1965 doesn't have including the 'T' bass filter 1967-69 Pioneer use. Power Amp isn't so unlike the SX-2500 with some 'why that' parts. It sounds nice as do ones like the SX-1500TDF we've had more recently, but it's a more Domestic Sound. Knowing how great the 1965 Germanium SX-600T can sound since getting the 1000TA is why it gets another look. Currently the Valves ER-420 & Germanium SX-600T show it up a bit, if to try more as is The Game of Upgrading. The SX-1000TA is their first All Silicon Amp stages. Is It Worth Bothering To Upgrade More? Always the Question & Results are never 100% Predictable. Some Redesign is Required to get the Best from the 1965-66 amps, if not as much as later ones need that really do go too far sometimes. We've Gathered a Huge Amount of Research into What Can Be Done but it's never a Universal Fix, it's Amp By Amp, some work out better but some don't. Circuit Gazing gives the Ideas.

What Do We Do To It? 1966 Pioneer SX-1000TA.
This is the First Silicon Transistor Pioneer, having the Tuner with a Valve & two Nuvistors. They run on about 110v and these Balve & Nuvistor Tuners not only Sund much better than the FET-IC ones but are reliable, unlike the 1967-69 Trio-Kenwood tuners that can be Silent as something in the 'Front End' that the Valve & Nuvistors do so well. We're amazer the 1000TA didn't sell, previous SX-1500TDF & SX-1000TDf sold well. Last Had The SX-1000TDF in 2018 & a customer wanted it despite it not being for sale, if they want it, let 'em have it. SX-000TDF looks much like the 1000TA, updated real with Two Speaker sets, black finish & easier lavelling of features on the back panel. Underneath is without the Valve-Nuvistor power supply & the same boards with the Power Amp rotated 180°. The 1000TA is a rare version as is the Germanium SX-1000T. Pleased to fibd this 1000TA for a bargain price & found it "Very Old Looking" inside compared to the 1967 1000TDF version. Old but still good & reliable. Some Was A Bit Too Old Style. Early Resistors. Boards using strange hand marked 1/4w resistors we thought were best replaced with our usual 1/2w Carbon MCF ones from Farnell. These 1965-66 Receivers & Amps do benefit from New Resistors as the 1965 Sansui TR-707A ones were a bit noisy compared to it rebuilt. The Trouble is there are No Board Layouts usually this early & Pioneer often altered boards so the W15-006 board we had to make our own board layout of. To research, draw, compare & redo the Resistors is easily a 10 Hour Job. For Us to do this for our own interest, but at £50 an hour for Skilled Labour, would anyone pay that much for what is maybe a 10%-20% improvement? To redo the 1965 Valve Pioneer ER-420 with New Resistors would be better done when redoimg the Capacitors. Again a huge job & no board layouts as ER-420 is hardwired to posts & pins. The Phono Board & Power Amp Board need doing too, the Power Amp in the 1000TA is a bit different in places to the 1000TDF. Further Upgrades are possible plus putting LEDs in, the Pioneer can take the slightly Flickery LEDs as it bounces back the light & cancels the flicker, as the LED aims as the back of the Fascia. This is where an amp ignored for £850 could easily Double if it was a Customer's Job. Are Customers confident enough to pay extra for the 'Last 10%-20% Upgrade" in amp? Not Yet. We Got The 1000TA In Spring 2021 & only Three Years Laer are considering it to Upgrade. The Board Track especially on the Power Amp can be tricky, it's very fine, vey closely drawn & it can come loose too easily. The Tone-Pre board was good beyond one 'pad' that came loose, the Power Amp Board needs a huge amount of care. To be wary of that as a previous "Mint" SX-1000TA never worked & probably was Sold Faulty as New in 1967. It was a cheap buy & despite much trying, a no-go but has supplied a good amount of Spares. Was It Worth Bothering? Dpoimg the Tone-Pre with New Resistors plus a batch of Redesigning brings what was a Nice Amp if a Little Soft in Attack into something Unexpectedly Good. This Is The Problem Too. You can spend Forever Upgrading to only find another amp was Nearly That Good as Original. Until you actually Try, you'll Never Know. You may get Excellent Results bringing yet another Amp bettering the Others, or one that shows it wasn't really worth doing that. When the Results are Way Better, to then go Circuit Reading to try to find Why that Sounds so good. Next Day Reveals More. Played the Valves Luxman earlier. Gives a different Sound to compare. To Hear What's Lacking but to Hear How Great it sounds for Pre-Tone upgrades. Looks better with LEDs instead of the dingy Brown Light. Play another amp we're working on, it hasn't got the Crisp Detail or Wider Stereo, if other may prefer a less upfront sound. That Amp still sounds great & has a different Bass. Next Amp tried one of the Germaniums. 1000TD sounds quite like it, the Germaniums one, Kenwood TK-80U, plays one track cleaner without bringing facial expressions of it not being as tidy. The TK-80U is still much as original & having Germaniums of a certain spec, the 1000TA isn't so different, but the TK-80U plays cleaner as is The Joy of Germaniums. Would The SX-1000TA Ever Be As Good As Germaniums? This is the big question. The Power Amp board is so fragile on the board track, to try it on Speakers to see how it does. Comparing Silicon to Germaniums is as Different as Silicon to Valves. To look at it as how would the 1000TA compare to Akai AA-7000 or Sansui 3000. 1000TA now has one of the SX-2500's 4mm Speaker Blocks to try it more. On Speakers Then. So much easier than using before with those crappy Pioneer Speaker Plugs, to wonder how owners put up with them & heavier cable meaning they usually fall out. Our Custom Ones take ages to do to not break them thinking it's easy. Playing 'Wheeler Dealers' & half way swap amps as used to the sound on the 1966 Akai AA-7000 for another Silicon Amp. 1000TA shows the improvement, but as on Headphones it shows up the Power Amp. It struggles with the better Treble & the Bass is a bit Thick Sounding giving the unwanted Plummy Sound if we've bypassed their awful 'PTF' 'T' Bass Filter board that is of absolutely zero use in Hifi, but the Rumbly Turntable fools demanded it. The Power Amp lacks speed & control. It still has the strange 1/4w skinny hand-marked resistors. The Sweet Sound of the Treble & Upper mid could be heard as to keep on with it. To redo this Power Amp board without upsetting the fragile track will be The Challenge. Remember trying one SX-1500TDF on Speakers as original, on an earlier Blog, a similar sort of 'lack of confidence' beyond the PTF filter. But the 1965 Pioneer SX-600T Germaniums amp still as designed is where the 1000TA gets it's origins, so to play that next. Sounds rather like the Akai AA-7000 with a bit more of a Sweet Sound as Germaniums can bring, they are far more easy to design than Silicon. 600T needs volume past midway & balanve adjusted still, but No Background Noise which isn't generally a Germanium thing. 1000TA we have the parts here ready, but it's hours of skilled work on a fragile board.