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McIntosh, overrated? I Used to Think So.

8-Tracked said:
Till the moment you actually want to sell it is my personal experience!
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You must have over paid then because no vintage gear that I an aware of has dropped in value in the last 10 years especially mac gear in fact some items have doubled in value take a look at SX-1980 receivers for example. I think you just don't want to admit when you are wrong and are now grasping at straws.
 
Magfinity said:
c

Mintosh nor my marantz stack is anywhere near what I play with in my main system . This isn't a advertisement for the unit I have. Just to put that out there. My planars (Tympani I, mIIIa ,mgI ,mgII, mmg,mmgi) I have many I never really driven with them. McIntosh doesn't need me to speak for them...

However it can easily be done, magnepans are not hard to drive speakers aside from the low sensitivity. My infinity kappa 9 dips to 0.8ohm , it just needs a welder. And it's pretty rare , not many speakers out there that have such dips (Apogee scintilla, rs4.5 ) I think we can count them on one hand.

Anyways it's interesting and makes me want to venture a bit more into the vintage side again. Re capping is not hard on most equipment. And it seems more needed than I thought . I wonder how many here listen to inaccurate equipment, I bet many (vintage) lovers .
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Reading this post I now understand your user name.
 
Pio1980 said:
It'd be interesting to have something like that to parity check against more prosaic amps, but that ship sailed for me some time ago. Say, an Adcom GFA-535 vs an MC250 would be interesting.
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I actually had the gfa555 it went up in smoke two weeks after purchase unfortunately! As it did sound great when it was working . I have no idea how that would sound vs a mcintosh. In reality adcoms were budget intended amplifiers. I remember, reading that nelson pass himself forgot most of what was going on in them. As he gets still tons of questions about them on the diy forum.
 
goodolpg said:
Reading this post I now understand your user name.
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Yes , funfact I see a rsII in your profile pic. That's the speaker I traded for the mac1700

Had the rsII for years ,loved it also the rs1b I sold at double the price I had them for. They are valuable these days .
 
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Magfinity said:
I actually had the gfa555 it went up in smoke two weeks after purchase unfortunately! As it did sound great when it was working . I have no idea how that would sound vs a mcintosh. In reality adcoms were budget intended amplifiers. I remember, reading that nelson pass himself forgot most of what was going on in them. As he gets still tons of questions about them on the diy forum.
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Adcom worked his template into a good budget amp, he talked about putting out an update for the first series but never got around to it, afaik. What they could use besides a recap is rail bypass elyticaps on the boards after the fuses. Walt Morrey did that on his second series versions, and added an input blocking cap, the Pass versions were DC coupled thruout, which could cause problems with input sources with DC leakage. The second series also had higher quality board parts and terminals.
Otherwise, all seem pretty decent performers.
 
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Pio1980 said:
Adcom worked his template into a good budget amp, he talked about putting out an update for the first series but never got around to it, afaik. What they could use besides a recap is rail bypass elyticaps on the boards after the fuses. Walt Morrey did that on his second series versions, and added an input blocking cap, the Pass versions were DC coupled thruout, which could cause problems with input sources with DC leakage. The second series also had higher quality board parts and terminals.
Otherwise, all seem pretty decent performers.
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The input blocking cap is an absolute necessity on this or any other DC coupled power amp, and was the first thing I installed when I purchased my 555 MK I. I am quite happy to forego the "my amp goes down to DC" bragging rights to ensure my that my woofers are never subjected to the possibility of continuous offset or a catastrophic full-rail application due to an unforeseen input event.
While I can certainly understand why manufacturers omit this component (specs, cost, bragging rights) they are certainly taking one hell of a risk with our speakers!

Mine still has the original Adcom-labelled filter capacitors. I brought them to work about ten (?) years ago and tested them on our Chroma 11800 ripple current tester & Chroma 13100 capacitor analyzer. All were still testing fine. Not sure who made them for the OEM, but I strongly suspect Mallory. Good cans:)
 
Slightly surprised, some here take my post as some attack on McIntosh. If you just read the post guys , I do anything but. Stop selectively reading, I am sure each and everyone one of us has gear that is more than capeable. Of playing any format of choice, with utmost pleasure.

Why is it always being made into something it's not ? Or a pissing contest for that matter. Common now, nobody here has the perfect system. Simple fact ..

Just enjoying music is something really good in itself. It doesn't require verbal attacks or being called names. And most certainly not a system that requires expertise status to put together.

I hope we can all get along hence forward
 
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Snow said:
You must have over paid then because no vintage gear that I an aware of has dropped in value in the last 10 years especially mac gear in fact some items have doubled in value take a look at SX-1980 receivers for example. I think you just don't want to admit when you are wrong and are now grasping at straws.
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True ! I've sold plenty gear now to come to that same conclusion. I made on some gear more than double I gave for it. It's supply demand I guess. Especially if you know your way around the brands that are hot ..
 
Me, I've been a Mac fan for decades. There was a time where there were very little players, and the best way I can say it, was "McIntosh went where no man went before".

I feel McIntosh largely "gave birth" to the countless companies out there today producing high fidelity equipment.

I've done it, cracked open brand new pairs of MC-2105 Amps, hooked to a couple brand new pairs of JBLs.
I realized for the next 40 years I made no mistake with my choices. I did real good!

And I converted many friends, if not McIntosh as a brand, but to make many apostles to quite enjoyable audio fidelity.

We've sure come a good ways since then.
That equipment I mention above. It all has stood the test of time.

At current day, I could still live with a properly operating MC-2105, a good Mac Pre, and a couple sweet JBLs.
Quality of sound often depends largely on what you feed your gear. I commonly never found fault with the McIntosh stuff I owned. It was other components at fault I found.
 
Mcintosh has changed over the years. When my 2505, MPI-4 and MR-80 along with the C-28 and 29 were built the company had no idea people would keep their units for long periods of time. I think it was when the 7000 series amps along with the 2600 were built that factory started to use much better components and better designs. Though my 2505 is still operating as new and has never been touched. The MPI-4 and the MR 80 and 78 have been totally restored. Normally I don't keep Mac amps more than 20 to 25 years and the disc players about 20 years. My last purchases should last longer than I will. But I don't buy Mac TT's for the money I think there are much better bargains with higher performance characteristics. If I'm going to buy a MT-10 I would rather spend the same monies on a Clear Audio, Bergmann or Technics. But preferably a pre-owned SME. Levinson markets some nice tables made by others for them, too. I like my 515B which is an updated prime signature 21 by VPI. If my TD 125 dies with a Rabco SL 8E I will replace it it with the 5105 Levinson or Clear Audio Ovation with a TT5 arm. I heard the Levinson in Vestal and was very pleased.
 
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Mcintosh has always been the best with out going to extremes of other companies. They have never been esoteric in looks design or performance. Always the very well engineered product with dependable performance and now with a much longer life span as the years have gone bye. They have always catered to their base whether they be tube owners or SS. There were periods of difficulties when management was reluctant to move forward. They skipped Quad for instance. They weren't sure about CD's at first like some of the rest of us. They had their struggles with HT and still do not producing a 4K disc player and yet making an 8K processor for the gamers. I wish they would make a separate DAC for us old timers and quit combining them with pre-amps and CD players. Explain how you make a disc player for obsolete CD's and SACD's and combine it with the latest DAC decoder? Then throw in tubes that will have to be replaced periodically. Back in the 60s when tubes being made were better than they are today you were lucky to get three or 4 years out of miniature tubes and a year out of power tubes. 6l6 in particular. KT 88 would just barely make it 2 years using Mcintosh Gold Lion tubes. Of course back in the 60's my system was on 12 hours a day whether I was home or not. My mom and Dad played the system mostly listening to the MR 71 as a source. While played mostly tapes and LP's. Never was fond of cassettes for the hifi. They were for the cars.
 
There should be standardized plug-in card slots for the digital stuff likely to be upgraded, and a deep stock of standardized replacement plug-and-play disc deck drives to keep components from becoming fashionable bricked door stops.
The disc drive should be considered an fw&t expendable part, like a phono stylus, because that is what it is.
 
Snow said:
In your opinion... What if an item sounds great without restoration is that invalid also? I have actually owned items that sounded better without restoration versus being restored. Personally I think that most items you can get a good idea whether or not you want to restore them by listening, if they truly sound awful before odds are you wont like even after restoration.
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if you have heard a piece of restored gear and it sounded worse, something went wrong.
 
Some folks will expect a certain generic "house sound" filter, rather than a "straight-wire-with-gain" transparency.
I seriously doubt that Frank & Gordon steered parts and design choices to creating gain filters with particular SQ coloration. Unless the designs are so unstable that they require lossier old school parts to behave, newer and better quality more "ideal" parts should make a good solid design result better in all respects.
 
In the market for a new DAC/Digital Preamp.

Looked at Ayre, Bryston, Moon and McIntosh

In the end, looks like the McIntosh D1100 will get the nod. Features and pricing are very competitive,
 
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