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To the Technics bashers...

quatsino said:
In most forums on the Internet some single company or set of equipment gets a bruising and over time the unsuitablity of this same equipment takes on urban legend proportions. People need something to agree on in the negative I guess. On AK and elsewhere (although AK is king) Technics seems to have fallen victim to this phenomenon...

I picked up a gorgeous Yamaha CR1020 receiver the other day - mint of course, and hooked it up to my regular system for a try out. I'll post pics later. Then hooked up Akai AA1200 to do a side by side test. The Akai has never done well on my Angstrom speakers - too much bass and forget about the loudness switch -the speakers just want to pop out and the whole thing sounds like ass. So...out come the Kabuki Sansui XP's.

I know these aren't the best speakers around but the 120wpc Akai makes 'em work - the setup rocks, clear and tight - loudness switch in and the sliding glass doors start to rattle. But most importantly the sound is GOOD - phono or CD. This Akai just needs the right speakers.

So next I unpacked the 125wpc Technics SA-800...center the control knobs - nice resistance and tactile feel, each knob is even after all these years and 1000's of hours of play time. (I'm first owner from '78) Hook up the XP's, the Angstroms too, next the phono and the Nakamichi CD deck and an FM dipole. Volume down and....contact. All lights and LEDS looking good - give Madonna a whack on her big behind - and turn up the big knob. Magic - kickass magic - hit the acoustic control (tone defeat for bass/mid/treb and 2 boost switches) and roll on some tone controls. Yeah the little engineers at Matsushita knew what they were doing. Acoustic control off and hit the loudness switch - roll the power to 4 - sliding doors start to open by themselves. What about the sound at this volume? SOLID, punchy, clear, no hint of distortion, fun to listen to. Turn down the volume a bit and click over to the Angstroms - beautiful sound. Puts the Akai in it's place.

All of this out of mint 30 year old equipment that would look classy on ANY high-end audio showroom shelf. Sorry Technics bashers - All I have to say is that I guess you've never heard the good stuff.
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I have a SA-600 bought new that always sounded great, great tuner section (awesome AM as well). It has developed some power supply issues, but will be fixed soon. It sounded just a good as my Pioneer SX 750 (bought new as well, stolen after one year), press board bottom and all! I saw a recent test(oaktreeent) on a SA-600 where it easily put out 135 watts into a 8 ohm load. Quite a feat for a 70 watt receiver.
I totally agree, equipment matching is key, some combinations don't sound great together. Unfortunatley, it's often mistaken for a piece of eqipment being sub par. Depending on how you look at it, that's all part of the fun, and keeping a open mind makes it that much more enjoyable!
 
I have a SA-5570 receiver that I really enjoy. 85 WPC, and a great tuner section.

Technics is probably most respected for their turntables (I have an SL-2000), but hook up the receiver to my four Imperial 7's, and I'm good for the day. Wonderful tone and plenty of oomph.

There are highs and lows in every manufacturer's lineup, and one bad experience with one piece can color your perception about everything some company ever made.
 
PoppaSteve said:
There are highs and lows in every manufacturer's lineup, and one bad experience with one piece can color your perception about everything some company ever made.
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Exactly. I have an SA-222 that's been banished to the basement for various reasons... but that was BOTL, so it's no surprise. I'll rank out my own POS but never anyone else's. :nono:
A good piece of gear is the one that makes YOU happy, and to h€ll with what anyone else says.
Tom
 
Every audio company made good stuff, and they made bad stuff. Some were known for one thing (eg. Dual is known as a turntable company but they also made tape decks, some audio gear, etc) and some tried to be all things to all consumers. Personally, when I was in college, Technics outsold Pioneer in my area hands down. It wasn't out of the ordinary at all to see some college kid or gal walking into the dorm with a boxed Technics receiver, turntable, and some Genesis speakers.

I have a spot for Technics. My first 'table was an SL-2000 and I dearly wish I could have that back.

If you like 'em, and you like the styling and the sound, then that's all that matters.
 
Let them bash all they want:

My dad has a 1985 mid of the line full rack system. It liioks like crap, as these were the bad hair days for Technics. NEVERTHELESS, the system sounds fantastic with the HUGE speakers that came with it - and bear in mind, the 1985 CD players were really early once. The interesting thing about the system is that about 15 years ago I got some big (and great) Cerwin Vegas, and decided to test them against the Technics speakers. The Technics speakers were a better match for the Technics system, but sounded different on the system I had back then (A SONY STR-AV1040...don't ask :no:).

I myself have an SU-8600 integrated amp which I love: big comfortable knobs with a really good feel about them, cool silver face styling (a matter of taste, really. The 8600 is really BIG), and above all - an awsome sound. GOOOOD bass, clear non-screaming highs and perfect mid. Second only to my beloved Sansui AU-9500.

Let the bashers bash: they probably don't know the good Technics hard core components, and generalize.
 
I have passed on two very nice looking pieces of Technics at the thrifts recently.First of all I don't remember model numbers.One was a very clean looking receiver.Probably about a 20wpc unit but very clean and good looking.The other was a integrated amp with matching tuner with wood sides also in very clean condition.These were both analogue dial units.If I didn't have enough gear I would have snatched these in a heartbeat.I really don't need any mid-level gear.To be truthful I did not think of Technics as a serious brand.Maybe because of all the Technics junk I came across during the 80's.I went back the next day to see if the amp combo was still there.It was gone and i asked the lady that priced it what happened to it.She replied "I didn't think that old thing would sell" "I guess cause it was a Technics".Some people hold Technics in high regard because another guy at the same store said pretty much the same thing about some Technics speakers I was looking at awhile back.I would have bit on either except i have enough gear.It was very attractive looking stuff.
 
Have to Disagree WillyRover

I have a little SA-200 in my home office and I love it! Well made, sounds beautiful. I can't believe your 300 sounds so bad. It must need some work or something. Taking it apart wasn't any worse than my Pioneers or Sansuis or Kenwoods...I have a pair of Boston Acoustics HD-5 bookshelfs hooked up. It is actually one of my most pleasant systems to listen to. Granted, I don't crank it but it sounds beautiful at lower levels. I have put it up a bit some times and has never disappointed me. I keep a lookout for Technics because they don't bring the big money of the "Big 3"...so to put things in perspective, the most disappointing unit I own is my Pioneer SX-780. It hasn't been very reliable and my Sansui 4000 kicks it's ass in about every respect. I have a littl SX-680 that hasn't given me any trouble...and neither has the Technics...so, there you have it. Plus I like the SA-X00 Technics styling a lot. Hope to maybe find a higher power model just for fun with the cool meters...
 
I have an ole 5 dollah Technics SA-500 in storage waiting for a good cleaning and new skin. Glad to hear they sound half way decent. The looks are right up there with the best of them.
 
Like others I have a soft spot for the better Technics stuff and have made a point of collecting a circa 1989/90 system second hand for not a lot of $$.
I know the black stuff is not for every one but I like the look and the bigger and heavier the better.

The AMP is a SU-VX800 as best as I can tell it was a european market machine. 100wpc , Balance inputs , Dual transformers , weighs 17KG ( 38lbs ? ) enough current to drive anything to insane volume.

CDP is an SLP 990 , again heavy at 10kgs , realy nice build quality .
A RSB 965 Cassette deck which is as big as the CDP , quartz locked direct drive , 3 heads etc.
Add to that a SVDA-10 DAT and SHGE70 Equaliser and not to forget the SL1210M5G Turntable ( new but looks the part ) and I guess I have the full set :) .. apart from speakers . I have not yet found any Technics speakers that I could live with.

So how does this system sound? Detailed and warm at low volumes and cranked up the house vibrates ( no kidding ) , there is no way you could stay in the room without damaging your hearing.

All this for a few hundred $$ :)
 
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My freind has a SA 300 that sounds great and has never been refurbished! I like Technics ...just not in my house. No seriously I have a nice SB seaker set I use on my main unit and their incredible. I thought we all could have had a more constructive deconstruction of some brand like Onkyo or something
 
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Technics...I'm glad some of you like to collect these. I've had a SA-1000 which was a TOTL impulse purchase. After a year, I was glad to make a modest profit and flow that money back into something else. The few mid level units, SA-500, 505, 800, I've had sounded nice and had a decent tuner section, but the cheap build was ahead of that trend. The cheap construction and hot running module amps were unexpected when the competing equipment from the era still used metal cases and discrete circuits. Part of why I collect vintage gear is to marvel at the high quality construction and materials. To each his own I guess.
 
The SA-101 was my first solid state piece. Used it for years. I wrote a glowing tribute to it somewhere on AK. If bored, do a search and get a laugh allthough it is serious.

Anyway, Technics stuff was cool. Remember the big Technics logo under the scoreboard/monitor at the old Boston Garden? The LA Forum featured Kenwood.
 
My second receiver as a teenager was a Technics SA-5170, purchased new at Team Electronics in Oshkosh, WI. It was a nice little (25wpc) receiver. I now have a SA-5470 in my collection...also a very nice piece.

Back in 'the day', their turntables and tape decks were pretty well respected. The receivers never really caught on like the Pioneers and the Sansui's did (at least in my area), but their turntables and tape decks were more the standard than not.

I don't know that they made anything that we'd consider 'high end', but they certainly didn't make much crap, either...at least until the point in the 80's where everyone was making crap. I remember that as being around 1983, though some companies started their slippery downward slide earlier, and some later.
 
Really loved to see that glowing review of the Technics. I absolutely love my SA-800 & 700. They can power just about any speakers I connect. One really awesome, extremely rare feature that the SA-800 has that no other receiver I've ever seen has is automatic speaker impedance matching which actually taps the transformer at different points to assure maximum performance. I don't see any other manufacturers doing that!! I have about 6 pieces from Technics and I love them all, there's just something about Technics that tickles me right.:music:
 
MarantzDance said:
My freind has a SA 300 that sounds great and has never been refurbished! I like Technics ...just not in my house. No seriously I have a nice SB seaker set I use on my main unit and their incredible. I thought we all could have had a more constructive deconstruction of some brand like Onkyo or something
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What, you have a problem with Onkyo gear? :scratch2:
 
I find a major difference between 'Technics' and Technics by Panasonic. Won't be a prude and tell you my preference! he he :thmbsp:
 
AK 47 said:
I find a major difference between 'Technics' and Technics by Panasonic. Won't be a prude and tell you my preference! he he :thmbsp:
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I dunno about that. Earlier on, they used the "Technics by Panasonic" moniker on *all* their stuff, mostly to get the Technics name out there, me thinks. Some very fine stuff was produced that said "Technics by Panasonic" on it.

They dropped the "by Panasonic" in the late 70's.

Perhaps later, they went back to that moniker for low-end stuff, not sure.
 
There does seem to be a slight tendency towards legitimacy the last few years. I've got a varied collection of stuff ranging from a SA-8100X 4-Channel to the newest 1992 SA-G500 5-Channel, with speakers, tape decks, cd players lots of turntables, all rounding out the collection. Why do I like the line...the units are all very well built, while not high-end they're solid but the reason I really like them is the design, they made some really cool looking stuff over the years.

While the early 70's units were similar to everything else out there, they really put it in overdrive towards the end of the decade, the turntables were first, what they did with plastic was revolutionary, plastic turntables were no longer cheap low-end but sexy looking enough for any college student's budget.

With the 80's they seemed to go more towards "slim-line", but not minimalist like JVC or Kenwood, they were still loaded with buttons (that all work after 20+ years) and some neat features like graphic EQ's and the units had heft to them (and all-metal cases). For the market they were going for (college students IMO), they had everything....Now back to putting that Technic's Rack together...pics to follow....
 
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