New McIntosh C52

[damacman]

Glad to see you have a sense of humor damacman.

I have to hang-up now...

Agent 19?

 

[exhippy]

Agent 19?

If we need to discuss anything else I'm afraid we'll have to use the...



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[Crazeehorse]

Congrats! Very nice! I want one!

Question, you say your using PS Audio for power protection. Are you by chance using a P-3, P-5 or a P-10 ? The reason I ask is I'm using a P-10 and I think it may be "coloring" the sound. Maybe I'm not getting the "McIntosh sound" from my preamp/amp. It was a good deal that at the time I didn't want to pass on. I have a friend that'll buy it from me. I'm considering it.

A local dealer has/had a demo C52 for sale. I talked to them last weekend. We didn't come to a price I was comfortable with. My bitch was I spent about $8 grand here four years ago, where's the repeat customer loyalty? I told them I may be back and that my C48 works just fine.

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Ahh that sounds like The Sound Room. Those guys are jerks for the most part. I also talked to them about the C52 and their moving sale. The wanted $5950 for the C52 floor model. How do you like your MC302? I want at least a C50 and a MC302.

 

[exhippy]

Ahh that sounds like The Sound Room. Those guys are jerks for the most part. I also talked to them about the C52 and their moving sale. The wanted $5950 for the C52 floor model. How do you like your MC302? I want at least a C50 and a MC302.

Bingo! So, they tried squeezing another 50 bucks from you, figures. Funny, the salesmen didn't even know what a C52 was. I'm not kidding, when I walked in the door I immediately asked about the McIntosh C52 ( I had a phone conversation that morning with the manager.) He lead me to the room with the Mac gear and at first we walked past some A/V processors and then past a stack of two channel. He didn't know that a C52 was a preamp. I spotted it and knelled down to take a closer look, I said here it is, his reply, oh yeah as he turned around walking past it. I laughed to myself thinking you sell this audio equipment and you don't even know what the C52 moniker means? I offered $5700, they came back with "If you buy it today only." I told'm I don't play that game. I'm a repeat McIntosh buyer. You should offer that to me whenever I walk through the door....and you know the rest of the story...
I love the 302. It did and still does a fine job. It powered my JBL 240ti's with ease. When I bought the JBL 4365 monitors I was a little concerned about power, but the 302 did just fine. If your interested contact me about my 302. I'm using a MC452 now. If I pass-on my 302 I'm sure I'll pick-up a C52. Then I may have a C48 to pass-on.

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[Citroen]

Hi exhippy, am considering trading in a 302 for the 452.
Apart from being able to go slightly louder, how does it compare soundwise?

 

[exhippy]

Hi exhippy, am considering trading in a 302 for the 452.
Apart from being able to go slightly louder, how does it compare soundwise?

I feel for the OP here. It's like he's lost control of this whole thing. I guess I'm partly to blame...


In my opinion the MC452 sounds better. It may have something to do with the Quad Balance of the MC452. I don't want to put the MC302 down. It's fine amp and I think a lot of people put it down for no reason other than they have a "bigger" amp.

You can also ask another member here, Kevzep, he also is running a MC452 amp. He's from New Zealand too!

I have to ask, do you own a Citroen? Are there a lot of Citroen's in New Zealand or is just one of your favorite cars?

Cheers!

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[Citroen]

Did @kevzep have a 302 to compare to?

Yes, my daily driver is a Citroen 2CV6 Charleston. I think that there are about 200 registered 2CVs in NZ. Probably more than there are McIntosh owners in NZ!

 

[exhippy]

Did @kevzep have a 302 to compare to?

Yes, my daily driver is a Citroen 2CV6 Charleston. I think that there are about 200 registered 2CVs in NZ. Probably more than there are McIntosh owners in NZ!

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No, I don't think Kevzep had/has a MC302.

I believe it depends on the speaker system your using too. For example my JBL 4365 monitors rated at roughly 300 watts worked just fine with the 302, but bringing in a "little" more power with the 452 really opened them up and allowed for their full potential to shine-through. Nothing wrong with more power and I can't say enough good things about the Quad Balanced system McIntosh uses.

After looking at some pictures of Citroen's I really like this one...



Speaking of your home country. My new favorite TV show. BTW, NZ looks to be a beautiful country!



For some reason I can never pay attention to the recipes, I just keep looking at her!



Cheers!

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[Citroen]

View attachment 770737 View attachment 770740
Here is my new Mac C52 preamp I just received today. Everything sounds great so far!

Got to love those tone controls!
How does the headphone amp sound @Mamrak1?

 

[kevzep]

Did @kevzep have a 302 to compare to?

Yes, my daily driver is a Citroen 2CV6 Charleston. I think that there are about 200 registered 2CVs in NZ. Probably more than there are McIntosh owners in NZ!

Nope, I never owned a MC302, have heard one though but not on my speakers, I went straight from the MC352 to the MC452.
So sorry but I cannot give any comparisons between the 302-452, except to say its a horrendous amount of money (in New Zealand) to invest in a upgrade which may not return as much improvement as you might expect considering what it will cost.

Brave man buying McIntosh in New Zealand, I just cannot justify the prices at the dealer here, I bought the MC452 in NZ but it was a tough job negotiating the price down to something vaguely reasonable, still a lot more money than I really wanted to spend, I'll never buy any more McIntosh here, waaaay too expensive......

I've lived in Auckland for 50 years and can't actually remember the last time I saw a 2CV.....I'm sure they're out there somewhere though....

 

[damacman]

re: 2cv

What a unique animal. I actually traveled from Germany to Holland in one as a teen. To this day, I've never seen another vehicle at which the manual gearbox selector came out of the dash like in a 2cv!

 

[DS1784]

To EXHIPPY I have a ton of records that go back to my teen years that I played on some lousy and cheap record players, you know, put a stack on and let them play. I bought a used SAE 5000 impulse noise rejection unit off the bay for $125.00. Works great if you want to play those old discs again. I too,like you am not going to replace all those records when I mostly listen to digital stuff.

 

[Mamrak1]

Got to love those tone controls!
How does the headphone amp sound @Mamrak1?

I haven't used it yet, to be honest.