Pioneer announces new Elite 2-channel components

[Pickoid]

Saw this over at the Steve Hoffman forum:

Press Release

According to information posted, the pictured receiver will list for $899 and the 2-channel only SACD player will be $499.

How about that? 55-watt dual mono amp, twin toroidal trannies. Just like the old days, maybe... I think they are great looking components. Excellent to see some products like this from Pioneer for the U.S. market. Maybe there will be some deals on these in a year or two!

 

[pioneervato]

Now if they would make it in classic silver then it might look better, at least.

 

[RadShak1251]

Awesome!

It has been so long that I honestly cannot remember the last time I saw a stereo receiver sold by Pioneer.

While I love surround sound (movies and especially music) stereo can still provide a great listening experience. And from a system perspective, the elegance of a 2.0 system is nice thing to see: receiver......disc player....turntable......two speakers - done. No bass management to mess with, no subwoofer to fuss with trying to find the optimum location and piss off the missus, etc etc.

One of the integrated amp versions of these receivers that Europeans get includes a USB input, which is a good thing since so many people use flash drives and MP3 players to store their music on. This feature should also help modernise the image of this "big" equipment to the younger crowd brought up on $20 plastic computer speakers and tinny sounding laptops w/their 1 inch "fullrange" speakers. It also includes a phono stage with MM and MC cart capability.

Anything that helps sell real audio gear to a new generation of audio hobbyists is allright with me.

 

[siamac]

Back to the roots :yes:
Quadrophonie couldn´t replace stereo and Dolby Digital / THX cannot do either

 

[RadShak1251]

This Australian site has photos of the CD/sacd player in silver - looks pretty nice.

BTW: while I agree multichannel music isn't everyone's cup of tea, the reason it flopped this time wasn't something wrong with the formats themselves i.e. sacd, dvd-audio and DTS-CD, IMO it's mostly because of MP3s (and that certain little white box with the fruit logo), the internet and the obsession some have with having music playing everywhere they go.

Quad died mostly because of way too many competing formats, most of which plain just didn't work very well. Only the tape-based ones produced truly discrete multichannel sound, along with the CD-4 vinyl format, though CD-4 was quite fussy about turntable and decoder set up.

 

[Catswold]

Multichannel music failed

Because they didn't do it properly (IMHO). I don't want to be in the middle of a band or orchestra, I want to duplicate the concert hall effect without using electronic tricks.

Three mikes across the front, and two or three in the middle of the hall, aimed at the rear and/or side walls.

I can't tell you how many times I've been watching a movie in "surround" with the camera focused on one character talking to someone behind the camera or some action takes place behind the camera (you know door, broken window, etc.) and the sound comes from the front speakers. I mean what's the point?

Nope, I used to have a bigtime 7-channel, 300 watts of pure amplification/channel, 2 X 500 watt 12" subs and 1 X 400 watt 15." all top of the line (well about $15,000 worth). Yet hear is sit with my stereo vintage pioneer for music and television and I like it better.

(okay, Matrix was pretty impressive in that surround system, but I do well enough with stereo for most movies)

 

[240sx4u]

Personally, I prefer my modern audio equipment in anything but silver.

The dark grey is pretty sharp, and will appeal to the higher end crowd.

Awesome.

Evan

 

[redcoates7]

Let mw tell you, those components look GREAT in person, and the sound quality driving a set of the new high-end Pioneer stand-mounted speakers was really quite good.

Regardless of finish, this (along with Onkyo's return to US 2-channel) is a very welcome market shift IMO

 

[Bone Yard]

Who had the crayons when they designed this set?