Tuner recomendations

bill114

Active Member
I figured I'd put a shout out to find a tuner that would suit my situation. I live about 3 miles from the Gulf of Mexico on a ridge that's about 50 ft above sea level. The transmitters of the two FM stations I listen to
(88.5 and 89.7) are around 40 miles away to the east. I used to have an outdoor antenna but the frequent violent summer storms we get plus hurricane season makes an outdoor antenna impractical for me now
(plus the fact that when I had a new A/C system installed a while back, the numbnuts installers cut the rf cable I took great pains to run in my crawl space to the antenna (about 40 ft.).
So, I need to find a tuner that is good at DXing with an indoor antenna. I currently have a Marantz 115B that works ok on closer stations but with only 3 gangs, can't cut the distant listening. The Marantz possibly needs an alignment but there isn't anyone I know of around here that won't charge me three times what the tuner is worth for an alignment. I have a Godar FM 1A antenna but get just as good signal with an old Radio shack rabbit ears.
I need to keep the cost around $100
 
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Yeah $100 prolly won't cut it. Where I am: Accuphase T-100 going for over $1000 / Kenwood KT-600 go for $550 / KT-8300 go $250 - $500. These are 5, 8 and 6 gang respectively. If you find more than 3 gang at $100 consider it a fluke and buy immediately. But really - At $100 save your money until you have $500 then start looking. Of course IMHO and YMMV. My numbers are CAD both in funds and location.
 
Yeah $100 prolly won't cut it. Where I am: Accuphase T-100 going for over $1000 / Kenwood KT-600 go for $550 / KT-8300 go $250 - $500. These are 5, 8 and 6 gang respectively. If you find more than 3 gang at $100 consider it a fluke and buy immediately. But really - At $100 save your money until you have $500 then start looking. Of course IMHO and YMMV. My numbers are CAD both in funds and location.

I figured it wouldn't be analog. Most of those are old and in need of work which is what I have now. My target is around $100 but that's not a hard number. In my recent search I've run across candidates from Sony, Yamaha, Sanyo and others which were in my budget range and I'd consider upping the $ a bit for the right unit. Something like the Accuphase isn't in the picture.
 
The Yamaha TX-950 is a sweet little tuner, very sensitive, and it has fine
tuning on AM and FM. Several at auction around your target price.
 
I owned a couple at one point, and used them a lot, before I upgraded
to an Onkyo T-9090 II and T-4711.
 
How about a Denon TU-800? The last two completed listings I can see sold for $75 and $77.
 
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