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Amps from the 1980's -- What gear holds up sonically? Reliably?

Hi Everyone,

For me, the 1980s were a real "golden age" of amplifiers. Dr. Leach’s paper on building a low TIM amplifier had been widely distributed and relied on by budding designers, and lots of boutique brands came. It was also the era of the biggest of the Conrad Johsnon tube amps as well and the invention of the MOSFET.

For me, brands I cared about:

  • Threshold
  • Sumo
  • Perreaux (New Zealand, very pretty)
  • Tandberg
  • Hitachi
  • Kyocera
  • Nikko
  • Krell (of course)
  • CJ
  • ARC
  • Yamaha (professional)
  • Carver
  • Mark Levinson
  • Amber 
  • Tandberg
This was also the speaker era of Snell and Apogee and Martin Logan. I am not sure there would be a Krell today if it wasn't for Apogee's 1 ohm speakers.

I’m curious who is still listening to these vintage pieces, and which brands you think have stood up both in terms of reliability and / or sonics ?
erik_squires
rokacafe2007
2 posts
 
Berning amp with Keith Herron preamp, still working strong for many years..
lou_setriodes's avatar
lou_setriodes
414 posts
 
Great thread Erik! I was 20 years old in 1980, so the 80s gear was my intro into high end gear having owned a Mitsubishi DA-R8 rec’r & B&O RX tt in the early 80s to owning a B&K ST-140,  Music Reference RM5 pre & Rega Planar 3 by the end of the 80s.

i also had a TAS & Stereophile subscription back then and several issues of HiFi Heretic & other defunct magazines as well, so I ended up reading about a whole lot of gear that I never got a chance to hear.

Currently, I’m thoroughly enjoying a Tandberg TIA 3012 integrated, (and Erik, as you mentioned earlier in a post), it is a deep, rich sound as compared to my aural memory of the B&K ST-140 sound, more like the higher powered EX442 Sonata that I owned back in the day too.

I’ve owned several other 80s products as well but a few that really stood out were the B&K amps, the Onix OA-21s & Onix OA 20/2 integrateds, cj MV50, Mac MC225,  Music Reference RM9 & RM5 pre. I also auditioned a VSP Labs TransMos 150 & an Acoustat TNT120 that were both very memorable as well.

I always wanted to hear/own a Perreaux amp, PS Audio 200C, Forte 1a, Spectral DMA50 or Motif amp as I thought they were amongst the coolest looking pieces back in the 80s.
dracule1
1,043 posts
 
Oh yes, Electron Kinetics. I had the Eagle 2a. Great bass and dynamics, flat earth imaging.

The best of the 70's and 80's that I've owned or own.  Threshold SA3 slightly modded power supply bypass caps and  Bedini 25/25.
erik_squires OP
5,268 posts
 
Just wanted to point out that Parts Connexion has a number of Nakamichi Stasis (Pass designed) amps on sale right now. If I wasn't strapped for cash and space I'd jump on them just for looks. :)

Best,

E
timrhu
2,778 posts
 
A couple years ago a friend gave me a Hafler P225 (pro version of DH220) with one faulty channel. The fault was a bad connection at the RCA input jack my friend had installed; an easy fix. After recapping, rewiring and then setting DC offset and bias, the amp sounded great. 

At the time I was using a Nelson Pass First Watt amp. After listening to the Hafler for a while, I found I preferred it to the First Watt amp. The Hafler has been in my system for more than a year now and surprisingly, I have no desire to swap it out. 

This amp was my favorite amp to drive a pair of Magnepan 1.6s I was playing with.
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