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KEF reference 103.2 vs BOSE 301 series II

bibfortuna said:
Good morning everybody

I have just inherited an early 80s Luxman HIFI equipment

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Attached to this gear, there is a pair of KEF reference 103.2 in very good condition, in the main hall, and a pair of BOSE 301 series II, added by the owner some years after, in a contiguous room. These Bose have the woofer foam suspensions "disintegrated", but I learnt that these can be easily repaired. Since I will only need a pair of speakers for my living room.... which pair do you advise me to use? jazz and blues in mind, vinyls mainly.

Thanks
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I wouldn't bother with the BOSE speakers. Good enough for learning to refoam - if you are keen to learn - but even when fixed they won't be able to deliver half as much as the KEF can. KEF have made budget speakers as well but even these are good performers. The reference series is on another league. The R103.2 are "budget" reference speakers in that they are medium size stand mount speakers - or could fit on a large bookshelf, even though it's not a recommended placement.

The B200 SP1075 and T33 SP1074 are a good combination and were used on multiple products, like the Carlton III I'm using in the office system (in a larger enclosure and with a passive radiator). You may get an improvement in sound by replacing the capacitors on the crossovers. I've found that speakers produced in mid-to-late 70's suffer from dried capacitors and that results in lacking treble mostly but would also affect the imaging seriously. Your speakers are about 10 years newer so you may (or may not) have a few months or years before they really need to be recapped.

The Luxman kit appears to be from the same era as well. They are not the products that gave Luxman their name but are medium+ level (for a Luxman) - that is much better from most of the junk you can find these days.

The cassette deck appears to be a K-230, a middle-of-the-line deck with 2 heads and decent specks. It would be better for it to be the K-250 from the same series (3 heads) but is still a decent deck.
The tuner appears to be the matching T-230, which should be plenty good.
The amplifier is the L-410, which gives a hefty 75WRMS at 8Ohms, plenty to drive the KEFs without problems.
The CD player looks to be a later addition (late 90s') model D-113D - an alright deck.
I am not sure about the turntable though. Could be a PD290 (average but good looking) or a PD291, which is a much better full automatic turntable. Looks to have a Shure cartidge - an M91ED perhaps? Let us know more details about that, please.

All in all, a good all round system that is really worth to keep and enjoy.
 
Here again for updates

I have already installed all the gear (except the tape deck, it doesn't make any sense since I got rid of all my tapes years ago)

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Issues:
  • Turntable: definitely has issues, the sound is horrible, more noise than sound, I'll check the connections and grounding again and will replace the capsule for an Audiotecnica I have around, and let's see.
  • CD player: skips like a motherf*cker, won't play straigh more than ten seconds. I'll try to remove the cover to see if lens is dirty or something.
  • Tuner: the only thing that works fine so far.
I wired the speakers with brand new 2.5mm speakers wires. I also bought some decent quality RCA cables (for everything except the turntable, I can't unplug it since there are no external RCA connections)

Question: I have a Stanton ST-100 turntable, that sounded decently with my previous sound gear.

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I am aware this is not an audiophile turntable, but... do you guys think I should use it instead the PD290 one?

Thanks again!
 
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another question... I have an AIWA TS60W active sub
https://www.manualslib.com/manual/3581/Aiwa-Ts-W60.html?page=7

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My receiver lacks RCA subwoofer output, but the sub has line level input, too, just it is 4ohm and my receiver output is 8ohm... I tested it briefly (using B speakers outputs) and sounds good, reinforcing the bass freqs (as expected), but I'm afraid the impedance mismatch could damage something... any advice?

Thanks again.
 
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