McIntosh Tuners

As the others have stated the MR 80 has some quirks that I believe is often caused by being near the ocean and the high salty humidity. I have had a number come up with our snowbirds and all had major issues with crude on the boards causing terrible problems.

We used to demo the 80 and 78 side by side.....I stayed with the 78......
 
MR80 is a contemporary of the B&O Beomaster 8000 receiver which also had one of the earliest digital tuners. And based on my experience with those, I would totally want an MR80 fully gone through by one of the experts before it ever made it to my hands.
 
McIntosh listners and evening wear...

Excuse me, but McIntosh listeners wear Brooks Brothers PJs or the classic Hugh Heffner walk-around wear. We do not watch TV, but like Mr. Romney, we do have friends that own large and profitable TV manufacturing companies - with Chinese child labor to keep import costs down of course. Um um. Please do not make such an error again.

Hey, nothing beats the nimble fingers children when it comes to electronic assembly. :beatnik:
 
Absolutely. Always enjoy a trip the McIntosh factory in Binghamton, NY. HIghlight of the visit is when they beat the little children who build our gear to make them work harder/faster/better.
 
Here is a spreadsheet of some Mac tuner specs taken from either Mac literature or Roger Russell. From the spec, the MX118 and MX130 seem to be the only cousins of the 7083. The MR500 is a real sleeper.

Nice chart. You'll notice that the MR77, MR78 and MR80 all have a THD spec of 0.2% in stereo mode.

I have both the MR77 and MR80, and the performance of the latter is pulling in stations near and far was excellent, living in a big city. The logarithmic signal strength display was also great. It even had an antenna switch in the top compartment to do A-B antenna comparison. That was the idea of the Chicago FM Log project.. comparing signal strength of a Yagi beam to a turnstile FM antenna. Also logged whet was whether the Auto filter came on, and what IF bandwidth was selected. Let's see if the Chicago FM Log can be uploaded somehow.

To sum up, I was very happy with the MR80 and don't regret spending 1.6k back in 1988 for it. It did have some issues with the FOUR preset buttons. Sometimes they'd work and other times not. Maybe it was the room humidity. No matter, didn't use them.

The MR77 is more of a novelty to me. Would have liked to try out an MR78. Certainly a very high performer with CLASSIC McIntosh styling. The usability of the MR80 is going to be superior though.


-Greg
 
I just got my MX113 back from Terry Dewick a few days ago after an alignment and I am amazed at the sensitivity and sound quality of the unit. I am able to pick up a very clean stereo signal in the narrow mode from a station over 50 miles away in Cleveland with just a $5 TV telescoping rabbit ears having a 75 ohm output. The confusing thing is that the antenna feeds both my MX113 and MR78 through a UHF-VHF splitter but the reception of the MR78 in the narrow mode is much poorer. It was aligned and recapped about five years ago by Terry and has sat in one place since I got it. I am running the signal into the MR78 directly from the splitter via 75 ohm cable. The 75 ohm signal to the MX113 goes through a VHF balun into the 300 ohm jacks (there is no 75 ohm threaded connector on the MX113). Can't afford another alignment of the MR78 right now. In the switch positions I have now the MR78 has a 16 pole IF and the MX113 a 10 pole IF.
 
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Terry did an MX113 for me 10yr ago (at least) and it blew the doors off my MR78. If I were to go back to separates I would find an MX115 and send along to Terry for a similar treatment. They are great pieces and way under-rated by those who don't know. The MX117 Terry did for me left me a bit cold on sonics. If I recall correctly, the MX117 used an ALPS front-end.
 
I had an absolutely pristine MR78 completely gone over by Terry but in the end, the MR80 was the better of the two.

I would also suggest eliminating the splitter for improved reception. (3 dB of sensitivity is lost when signal split).

- Yes MR75, MAC4100 and MX117 all have ALPS tuner which by most accounts is a fine tuner however the consensus tilts toward the MR74 as being Mc's Finest Hour for sound quality in a tuner.

Been in the hunt for a pristine MX113 on whose tuner section is shared with the MR74.
 
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Of my three FM capable pieces, I rank my MR77, MX113 followed by my 1900 receiver. I listen to jazz all day Sundays from WPFW and the richness and tonality is superior on the MR77. But not that the others are slouches!
 
Yes MR75, MAC4100 and MX117 all have ALPS tuner which by most accounts is a fine tuner however the consensus tilts toward the MR74 as being Mc's Finest Hour for sound quality in a tuner.

Been in the hunt for a pristine MX113 on whose tuner section is shared with the MR74.

What I find interesting regarding the MR77 vs the MR74 is where Mcintosh positioned these two tuners from a marketing perspective. I have one of the white catalogs from the distant past that absolutely throws praises and rose pedals at the 77 as being the greatest thing since sliced bread while two pages later the MR74 is treated like a stepchild. They also never mention that the MX113 and MX115 were actually MR74's with a built in preamp. They still used the "RIMO" IF without naming it and combined them with a more classical front end and detector. The 77 (and 78) had a much poorer capture ratio than almost all other tuners due to the bridge discriminator that has lower distortion. Also interesting to note that the capture ratio was poor enough that on spec lists the 77 and 78 list a really low number at the "detector" which is meaningless. They never did this for any other tuner. It seemed Mac was showcasing Richard Modifarri (sp?) designs without using his name. He left and none of his designs continued on for even one additional generation.
 
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I greatly enjoyed the time I spent with a friends MR77 a few years ago. The Audio Doctor serviced and aligned it and wow did it sound nice. It's been 20 years since I owned an MR74 - hard to remember.
 
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Wish my car service guy did tuners. I'll bet he would be a lot cheaper than a good stereo repair shop. ;) Perhaps you meant the Audio Doctor? dr*audio here on AK (Warren Bendler) has done a number of tuners for me, and, like Terry, does terrific work.
 
The Mc book also heaps praises upon the MR78 while barely mentioning the MR80. Because of its aesthetic beauty, I wanted the MR78 to perform better, but the MR80 could pull in more useable signals and better reject unwanted ones. Maybe an RM modification job may have elevated the MR78 into a better league but that would've gotten into some serious $$$. With strong signals, both performed very comparably but I still felt the MR80 was just a bit quieter.

I do wish the MR80 could have been designed with the traditional tuner dial (with LED counter) and the frequency presets have the tendency to drift meaning they must be retuned from time to time and occasionally the touch pads acting erratically, otherwise I consider it one of McIntosh's finest tuners overall - IMHO.
 
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Do agree on the MR80. Had a couple of them that Terry went thru and they were the best sounding stand-alone tuner from McIntosh that I've heard/owned. However, thought the MX113 he did had superior sonics.
 
Count me in as preferring the MR80 over an MR78 as well. I preferred my aligned and modded Sui TU9900 over the 78 but that didn't happen with my 80. The MR80 to me has just the right combination of selectivity and listenability. The 78 I thought is a bit better at pulling in weaker stations but I prefer the sound of my 74 over it as well. My MX113 even though it's been recently aligned also takes a backseat to the 74 soundwise and for pulling in stations. My 4100 receiver is a real sleeper here and probably has the best all around tuner I've ever owned in a receiver.

Recently I won a 7084 and I was looking forward to comparing it to and possibly replacing my MR80. That never happened as the seller thought a layer of bubble wrap in single box was enough to protect the 7084's fragile glass faceplate from Fedex's finest. Sadly it wasn't enough and a pristine example of a 7084 ended up destroyed.
 
The MR 80 is nice, but not a tuner which is repairable by most technicians, Terry DeWick is the only one I know who can repair one. Be mindful of that, I like the MR 80 better than the MR 78, but over the long term, the MR 78 is easier repaired.
 
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