A few months ago I had purchased a vintage McIntosh MR78 from some F-tard in Wisconsin through Audiogon. It arrived pretty much with the front smashed up and suspect on the seller's description. Oh well, live and learn.
I sent the unit to Audio Classics for repair soon after and it just came back today.
The people at AC did a fantastic job repairing it, as it is in much better physical condition than if it arrived in one piece from f-tard, and as instructed they ran it through the mill, replacing and repairing everything to get it to original specs or better.
I hooked it up to my system asap because 1: It has now cost a fortune in time and money and wanted to make up for the loss, and 2: I wanted to see how it performs against the Sony XDR-F1HD I'm currently using (my SAE 8000 is sick and needs a trip to Audio Classics).
The MR78 fired up with a christmas tree palette of lights and is dead quiet when fully muted between stations. Selectivity seems better than the SAE, given more choices of filters and whatnot, and for this reason is much better than the digital Sony for making a weak station listenable. The Mcintosh's sound is fantastic. But the Sony has it beat by a smidgen
It is probably an unfair comparison the way I have the Sony and the Mac set up.
The Mac and Sony are connected to the same antenna via splitter, a MD whip antenna mounted on the peak of the roof.
The Sony is in full digital but the Mac has to contend with multipath on the analog signal which the Sony also had problems with. Unfortunately the Sony can't force analog receiving for a better comparison.
To make up a little on the Mac's side, it is connected to my preamp directly whereas the Sony has to go through a HD prosesser/preamp that I'm using in the system for rudimentary surround sound. Its signal is bypassed from any enhancements and sent to the main preamp. Levels are matched for either input.
The Macintosh's strong point in sound is in the lower mids and upper lows. Better than the Sony's? I'm not sure, just slightly more . . . more. The Sony blows it away in upper mids and lower highs, and I can really tell the qualitave difference. The Sony wins hands down on stereo separation also, giving a much more richer and nuanced stage, but that's the digital advantage here. Lows are apparently similar, but more listening will tell.
The Mac is beautiful, well built, and well voiced but it isn't really necessary. If I didn't like knobs, lights and tradition, I would probably have gotten the Sony first and left it at that. Its ugly and charmless but for an FM tuner, If anyone thinks it isn't good enough, they are probably never happy with most of their gear anyway.
I sent the unit to Audio Classics for repair soon after and it just came back today.
The people at AC did a fantastic job repairing it, as it is in much better physical condition than if it arrived in one piece from f-tard, and as instructed they ran it through the mill, replacing and repairing everything to get it to original specs or better.
I hooked it up to my system asap because 1: It has now cost a fortune in time and money and wanted to make up for the loss, and 2: I wanted to see how it performs against the Sony XDR-F1HD I'm currently using (my SAE 8000 is sick and needs a trip to Audio Classics).
The MR78 fired up with a christmas tree palette of lights and is dead quiet when fully muted between stations. Selectivity seems better than the SAE, given more choices of filters and whatnot, and for this reason is much better than the digital Sony for making a weak station listenable. The Mcintosh's sound is fantastic. But the Sony has it beat by a smidgen
It is probably an unfair comparison the way I have the Sony and the Mac set up.
The Mac and Sony are connected to the same antenna via splitter, a MD whip antenna mounted on the peak of the roof.
The Sony is in full digital but the Mac has to contend with multipath on the analog signal which the Sony also had problems with. Unfortunately the Sony can't force analog receiving for a better comparison.
To make up a little on the Mac's side, it is connected to my preamp directly whereas the Sony has to go through a HD prosesser/preamp that I'm using in the system for rudimentary surround sound. Its signal is bypassed from any enhancements and sent to the main preamp. Levels are matched for either input.
The Macintosh's strong point in sound is in the lower mids and upper lows. Better than the Sony's? I'm not sure, just slightly more . . . more. The Sony blows it away in upper mids and lower highs, and I can really tell the qualitave difference. The Sony wins hands down on stereo separation also, giving a much more richer and nuanced stage, but that's the digital advantage here. Lows are apparently similar, but more listening will tell.
The Mac is beautiful, well built, and well voiced but it isn't really necessary. If I didn't like knobs, lights and tradition, I would probably have gotten the Sony first and left it at that. Its ugly and charmless but for an FM tuner, If anyone thinks it isn't good enough, they are probably never happy with most of their gear anyway.
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