Companies that used to make high end gear

kach22i said:

Great thread, I owned a SAE RC3 reciever long ago.

Just to jerk a few chains...................................Bose.

http://blog.pcnews.ro/2007/02/25/bose-901-speakers/

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Yup, the 901's were probably Bose's best achievement in speakers. Nowadays....well, that's another story.

The Marantz mid-90s tube gear was made by VAC., under contract from Philips.

SundayNiagara said:

The Marantz mid-90s tube gear was made by VAC., under contract from Philips.

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Very interesting, I never knew that. Thanks for sharing.

SundayNiagara said:

The Marantz mid-90s tube gear was made by VAC., under contract from Philips.

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Very interesting - I had no idea either!

Sharp- Who would have thought that Sharp, the same people who make the Aquos line of TV's, would have gone really high end with audio gear. Mainly on the audio side of things they just offered Home Theater In A Box (HTIB) systems. Well back in '99 and later 2001, they came out with high end all digital products that used 1 bit technology. Their SM-SX100 digital amplifier retailed for $10,000 USD, and the SM-SX200 for $12,500.

They sure do look interesting.



SM-SX100


SM-SX200

Acurus- A company that was well known for their products that offered elegant simplicity in their designs, and excellent sound. Acurus was once owned by Mondial (makers of the Aragon brand), and later marketed by Klipsch. For whatever reason the Acurus brand was halted and their products are no longer being made. One of their most remembered products was their ACT3 pre/pro. They also made some great sounding amps and CD players.

Kenwood- Kenwood is still with us and doing quite well with entry/mid-priced receivers, car audio systems, and land and mobile radio products. But anymore the Kenwood name isn't one would think of when high end audio comes to mind. But back in the early 90's they made some good separates. Cherian shared a photo of a classic Kenwood integrated amp earlier in this thread, thanks for sharing that photo.

Have any of you tried Minidisc in your setups? I have a sony Portable as well as separate component and I SWEAR it sounds better than even my Marantz SA-14 playing SACDs.

Maybe I'm just weird like that

Beat_Dominator said:

Have any of you tried Minidisc in your setups? I have a sony Portable as well as separate component and I SWEAR it sounds better than even my Marantz SA-14 playing SACDs.

Maybe I'm just weird like that

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Nope you're not wierd,

trust your own ears, :music:

STV said:

Sharp- Who would have thought that Sharp, the same people who make the Aquos line of TV's, would have gone really high end with audio gear. Mainly on the audio side of things they just offered Home Theater In A Box (HTIB) systems. Well back in '99 and later 2001, they came out with high end all digital products that used 1 bit technology. Their SM-SX100 digital amplifier retailed for $10,000 USD, and the SM-SX200 for $12,500.

They sure do look interesting.

SM-SX100

SM-SX200

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Didn't Sharp have a line called "Optonica?"

STV said:

Kenwood- Kenwood is still with us and doing quite well with entry/mid-priced receivers, car audio systems, and land and mobile radio products. But anymore the Kenwood name isn't one would think of when high end audio comes to mind. But back in the early 90's they made some good separates. Cherian shared a photo of a classic Kenwood integrated amp earlier in this thread, thanks for sharing that photo.

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I just read a turntable review in a British rag and the reviewer uses a Kenwood Audio Purist L-07D as a reference. Remember the KAP line?

Beat_Dominator said:

Have any of you tried Minidisc in your setups? I have a sony Portable as well as separate component and I SWEAR it sounds better than even my Marantz SA-14 playing SACDs.

Maybe I'm just weird like that

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Trust your own ears alright. That said, I've got a Sony portable and it sounds downright unlistenable - even compared to my iPod.

amey01 said:

Trust your own ears alright. That said, I've got a Sony portable and it sounds downright unlistenable - even compared to my iPod.

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Well the portable I have was one of their Japan-only Top-of-the-line deals, and the media I listen to on it, is direct from CD, not compressed or anything.

Maybe I'm deaf

The Kenwood L-07D is on Audiogon now and it belongs to Ken Kessler.

Beat_Dominator said:

Have any of you tried Minidisc in your setups? I have a Sony Portable as well as separate component and I SWEAR it sounds better than even my Marantz SA-14 playing SACDs.

Maybe I'm just weird like that

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No you're not deaf, and no you're definitely not weird.

I have a stand alone Minidisc player in my setup that I still use and still enjoy. As far as sound quality goes, it sounds pretty darn good. While not quite up there with my Sony CDP-XA20ES CD player (this has to be one of the finest sounding CD players I have listened to), it does however sound equally as good as the ES cassette player shown in the picture.

But I will say one thing that Minidisc has over CD's, those little things are rugged as all get out. With them being in their own little enclosed cases, there is no worries about ever scratching them or getting smudges or fingerprints on em'. And being able to re-arrange tracks, rename tracks, or delete tracks on the fly, is something that you just can't do with a CD-R.

It's really a shame that these little things never really caught on here the way they did in Japan. The technology is cool as heck.

SundayNiagara said:

Didn't Sharp have a line called "Optonica?"

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You got me curious, so I did a bit of searching and you are totally correct, Sharp did indeed once have a higher end line called Optonica. They made products under that name from the 70's through the early 80's. I found some cool pix of some of their products that I will post soon.



Seth

SundayNiagara said:

I just read a turntable review in a British rag and the reviewer uses a Kenwood Audio Purist L-07D as a reference. Remember the KAP line?

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Thanks for sharing that bit of info, I never realized that Kenwood ever made such a high quality high end turntable system. But from what I read on the unit, it's still considered by many as reference, and up there with even top end models from today. Must be an amazing piece of work.

Sharp Optonica- Thanks to SundayNiagara for mentioning this brand. Optonica did once have a high end line of products back in the mid 70's through the early 80's. They made amplifiers, integrated amplifiers, tape decks, tuners, and turntables. For their time they were cutting edge.