I've had an equal share of misses as well. THe sansui au4900 turned out to be very average in turns of headphone amplification and the vintage rotel set I had (I forget which set precisely: late seventies) wasn't particularly impressive either in that regard.
i've had a lot hits than misses. i found the trick is to drive hi Z cans with em vintage amps. FWIW the only cans i've found that sounded worst thru them headouts are the low Z BA iems UE TF10pros & klispch X5. all others sounded great.
You need to use well-designed amps to start with and the idea that all vintage amps are gold is ridiculous. I was around when these amps came out and the Sansui au4900 was neither well thought of or well reviewed at the time. As for Rotel, it's often forgotten that Rotel was a crap brand in the 70s and only began to be legitimized when it tried to follow NADs lead. Forget Rotel until about the mid-80s.
No doubt about that. The reason that tube amps remained popular with a lot of audiophiles is that many early solid state amps sounded absolutely HORRID. I mean peel-the-paint horrid.
But you can score vintage amps for crazy cheap, too. I just bought a 70's Kenwood integrated for $50. You can't buy interconnects for that price! It's in beautiful shape too. Looking forward to testing it out. If it's awful, who cares?
You are right. But it's not always easy to tell the crap from the gold. Earlier (and later) Sansui amps comparable to the 4900 in terms of wattage etc. were worth it. And a well-designed integrated amp does not necessarily have a good headphone out of course.
You need to use well-designed amps to start with and the idea that all vintage amps are gold is ridiculous. I was around when these amps came out and the Sansui au4900 was neither well thought of or well reviewed at the time. As for Rotel, it's often forgotten that Rotel was a crap brand in the 70s and only began to be legitimized when it tried to follow NADs lead. Forget Rotel until about the mid-80s.
You are right. But it's not always easy to tell the crap from the gold. Earlier (and later) Sansui amps comparable to the 4900 in terms of wattage etc. were worth it. And a well-designed integrated amp does not necessarily have a good headphone out of course.
I think headphones were an after thought. I've only found lower powered amplifiers to have the best headphone out. But, it's all about design and the overall impedance/sensitivity of your headphones. I wouldn't dismiss Rotel too quickly, having been inside of my RA-1312, it's a well build amplifier, wasn't TOTL but it was second to the top. Same with the SA-9500ii and Audio Design.
With the age of information, it's very easy to know what's gold and what's not. Prices are one factor but finding information on especially known makers are pretty easy, it's those esoteric ones that are hard and whether or not they're worth the cash.
Being an owner of the Bottlehead Sex amplifier, I can see why many people love tube, it has to be the most smoothest sounding amplifier I've owned, and can power some of my vintage speakers too. Need to see if I can find me a Fisher tube amplifier or even an older Trio. However, I've also heard tube amps that didn't sound good either especially when matched with classical music.
Speaking of quadraphonic. I've actually come across an amplifier that actually has a subwoofer or center channel output connector, making it almost a 4.1 sound and I think the amplifier was made either in the early or mid 70s.
hey guys! im just wondering what would happen if i plug in a 3.1 setup into a 5.1 receiver? would i lose sound? or all 5.1 receiver can transform their function into 3.1? thanks!!
hey guys! im just wondering what would happen if i plug in a 3.1 setup into a 5.1 receiver? would i lose sound? or all 5.1 receiver can transform their function into 3.1? thanks!!
I dont really understand your questions. 5.1 channel are use when one is watching movies or 5.1 music source. When playing CDs, MP3. you only have 2 channel audio signal.
Most 5.1 amps allow you to turn off specific channels so you can do 2.1, 3.1, 4.1, 5.1, 2, 3, 4, or 5. Not sure why you're asking this in a thread about vintage stereo receivers though.
oh sorry about that but thanks! sorry to ruin the thread but this seemed like an active one mostly likely to get a faster response like just what you did , thanks!
headphone outs on these older amps were never an afterthought really. music listening was much more cherished and cared for during the 70's and 80's untill the HT became mainstream. they just ensured that headphones don't fry by putting a dropping resistor for both the left and right channel between the power amp section and headphone out. these older amps have more then enough juice to power about any headphone you stick in the the headphone socket.
like i explain before this whole impedance matching is kinda far fetched cause impedance always varies with frequencies and the push-pull design of these amps can handle the mutiple loads of voltage and current fine. the engineers knew this. headphones don't require much power at all when it comes to dynamic drivers compared to speakers so it doesn't take much for these amps to drive a 300-600ohm load no problem. speaker and headphone impedance are completely different. most speaker might be 8ohm avg in certain frequencies but require much more push-pull load than a 600ohm headphone. planer magnetic headphones uses a much more powerful magnet design compared to dynamic drivers so it's okay to plug them directly to speaker outputs without frying. electrostatics same thing. way they're design is to take large amounts of voltage as speakers do. that's why they are refered to as ''earspeakers''
volume level has to do how many w/mw can be driven into that specific load and due to how senstive the speaker or headphone is in db at 1w/mw. most dropping resistors are from 1/2w-2w into whatever resistor value(220-680ohm) and so forth. you can take the resistors out for full force of the power amp but goodluck with that cause even a pair of 600ohm beyerdynamic T1 will say bye-bye to it's drivers due to massive amount of voltage driven from the power amp section but most of all it's a matter of preference. there is no right or wrong when it comes to music listening. everyone is different and must be respected for their own personal taste and opinions. i respect your opinion and i'm fine with it.
oh sorry about that but thanks! sorry to ruin the thread but this seemed like an active one mostly likely to get a faster response like just what you did , thanks!
@rexaeterna: could you give me a rough idea how your d7 sounds compared to your sansui receiver? I've never heard the d7/9/11 and am very curious as to how they sound. Thanks!
headphone outs on these older amps were never an afterthought really. music listening was much more cherished and cared for during the 70's and 80's untill the HT became mainstream. they just ensured that headphones don't fry by putting a dropping resistor for both the left and right channel between the power amp section and headphone out. these older amps have more then enough juice to power about any headphone you stick in the the headphone socket.
like i explain before this whole impedance matching is kinda far fetched cause impedance always varies with frequencies and the push-pull design of these amps can handle the mutiple loads of voltage and current fine. the engineers knew this. headphones don't require much power at all when it comes to dynamic drivers compared to speakers so it doesn't take much for these amps to drive a 300-600ohm load no problem. speaker and headphone impedance are completely different. most speaker might be 8ohm avg in certain frequencies but require much more push-pull load than a 600ohm headphone. planer magnetic headphones uses a much more powerful magnet design compared to dynamic drivers so it's okay to plug them directly to speaker outputs without frying. electrostatics same thing. way they're design is to take large amounts of voltage as speakers do. that's why they are refered to as ''earspeakers''
volume level has to do how many w/mw can be driven into that specific load and due to how senstive the speaker or headphone is in db at 1w/mw. most dropping resistors are from 1/2w-2w into whatever resistor value(220-680ohm) and so forth. you can take the resistors out for full force of the power amp but goodluck with that cause even a pair of 600ohm beyerdynamic T1 will say bye-bye to it's drivers due to massive amount of voltage driven from the power amp section but most of all it's a matter of preference. there is no right or wrong when it comes to music listening. everyone is different and must be respected for their own personal taste and opinions. i respect your opinion and i'm fine with it.
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