DBX Expander

Thanks for all of your responses!! this is a wonderful site that I learn from each time I visit.

I have had the A-4010S reel to reel completely reconditioned, cleaned and aligned by a knowledgeable professional and I believe it sounds as new but...I'm sorry to say, just not as good as my CD or LP rigs. I've considered coming off the playback heads with RCA's to a Bottlehead tube amp but I'm told by a sound guy that a 3BX is the way to go and actually will give me better sound. Thing is he has the 3BX for sale and it has been totally refurbed but he wants $ 700 I think this is steep????
Thoughts???

Markus1299

$700 is a lot.

I paid between 2-3 hundred for mine on Ebay.

Ask a lot of questions before buying used though. These units have been around for a while. Make sure everything sounds good, no noise or distortion, switches and adjustments work cleanly, etc.

First - $700 is ridiculously high for a 3bx. The best 3bx, which is the DS series, can be bought for $250 (or less) on Ebay very easily and I've never ever heard of one needing to be "refurbed". So now I'm a little suspicious of your tech guy's ethics.
Second - the heads on a 4010s should never need alignment from what I understand. They are totally fixed by attachment to a base plate. Moving them around once they have wear on them (without resurfacing them first) can screw up your playback, and possibly your tapes. You can also check whether your tech did this by popping the cover off and seeing whether the locktite glue on the set screws has been disturbed/cracked.
Read these two links carefully. Note in the 2nd thread that there are potential preamp issues:

http://www.angelfire.com/electronic2/vintagetx/
http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/archive/index.php/t-96374.html

Markus,

The first this I would do is have the Reel to reel serviced. I know a Teac genius if you need a name. Even the cheapest Teacs were very good. I personally use a 3300SX and find it amazingly quiet and wonderfully dynamic. The only reel to reel that I have heard that I feel sounds BETTER is an Otari MX5050 (any version). Those are outstanding.

dbx NR (Type I or Type II) pretty much requires good equipment to start out with. The system is not tolerant with an unstable/mis-aligned tape transport, or being creative with the record levels printed to the tape. It exaggerates the problem of bad heads, intermittent loss of high frequencies, etc.