Where to Find Vintage Stereo Manuals and Operator Guides

If you're like me, you've searched all over the Web for vintage audio operator manuals, service manuals, and the like. 


I've found two excellent sources for you. HiFi Engine requires registration, but it's free, and the AK (AudioKarma) manual database does not require registration to access the .pdf files, but does ask for donations. 


HiFi Engine link: http://www.hifiengine.com/manuals.shtml


AK Manuals link: http://akdatabase.org/AKview/index.php


Enjoy!

Rega RP-1 Turntable - Seeking advice

Need some advice from the HiFiCollector community. 


I'm thinking of selling my Denon DP 1200 turntable and getting a new Rega RP-1. The Denon  has served me very well, but the Rega will outlast the Denon in the long-run and probably outperform it in the short-run.


Your thoughts?


Here's a link to the Rega for a good price (no affiliation to vendor).


Thanks!

Where to Sell Your Gear

I received this comment today from a HiFiCollector.com community member, Shane, and I thought the information might be useful to y'all. I realize this info is already posted on the site, but it's buried in the McIntosh 4200 post, so here it is for easy reference:

Shane said....

Thanks for all this great info on the MAC 4200. I have one in mint condition that I was looking to sell, where might you suggest I look to put this guy up?

Take care and have a great evening!

January 9, 2011 3:10 PM 

Step To The Beat Podcast said...

Hi Shane - When it comes to selling gear, you basically have three main choices: eBay, CraigsList, and Audiogon. Each has its advantages and disadvantages. If you don't want to worry about shipping, CraigsList might be your best choice. Expect to get a little less though than you would from the broader audience and competitive bidding action that eBay provides. If you don't have the original boxes this came in, you'll want to get it double-boxed and professionally packed by the UPS Store or your mailing house of choice. I've sold a couple of items on Audiogon.com as well and had a good experience from them. You might get upwards of $800 for a McIntosh 4200 in good condition on eBay or Audiogon. If you try selling on CraigsList, be prepared for people to try to talk you down in price. Hope this helps! Best of luck selling the unit. --Tom

January 9, 2011 4:10 PM 

HiFiCollector.com Audio Accessory Store on Amazon.com

Still standing in the Radio Shack checkout line behind the guy getting an education on wire gauge??


Save yourself the hassle and purchase your basic audio accessories from the HiFiCollector Audio Accessory Store on Amazon.com. ...Unless of course you WANT to learn about wire gauge. :)    Shop HERE

Noise and Stuff

I haven't posted for a while, but I found an interesting New York Times article on noise that I thought I'd share.

A few weeks ago I shipped my KLH Model Eight table radio off to Ohio to be fixed and it came back in tip-top shape. The guy replaced one tube and several capacitors as well as a general cleaning and getting rid of volume knob static. It sounds as good as new and should be good to go for another 40 years or so.

Not exactly vintage audio-related, but I picked up a full-sized Aero Fighters arcade game from Salvation Army yesterday. You can see a video of it here.

I've got my eyes on a vintage Toshiba receiver, so I'll post that if I decide to get it. Otherwise - send in your photos, stories, and links to videos.

Don't forget you can post your gear photos on the HiFiCollector.com Facebook fan page HERE. We're over 100 strong now!

Also - Our new blog, The Nostalgia Lounge, has several vintage and strange items from around our house.

Last but not least, the HiFi Collector Forum continues to grow and is a great place to get vintage stereo pricing info, gear suggestions, technical tips, and much more. Join or just browse - have fun!

The Loudness War

>

We've all heard about the compression technology that makes .mp3 files as small as they are, but there's another kind of music compression that doesn't get talked about as much. It's dynamic compression and some music enthusiast claim that, for the past decade or so, it's been ruining popular musical recordings.

What are your thoughts on dynamic compression? Chime in and let us know.

HiFi Collector Swag - Proudly Show Off Your Hobby

Visit the HiFi Collector Store HERE

Love collecting audio gear? Consider yourself an audiophile, audioholic, or are you still in denial and use the term "audio enthusiast?" :)

In any case, why should your wife be the only one who knows of your obsession?!?

Show off your hobby proudly with some HiFi Collector gear - Caps, mugs, shirts, hoodies. . . We're stackin' 'em deep and sellin' 'em cheap!

The Dangers of Over-Driving Vintage Speakers

Facebook Fan Page - Vintage Stereo Ads Galore!

Each day I'm posting a vintage stereo advertisement on the HiFiCollector Fan Page on Facebook.

Join in, leave comments, post photos of your gear. . .it's a great way to share with our growing community of collectors!

What's My Gear Worth? >> Part Deux

I'm getting quite a few requests for gear quotes, which is great!

I want all these requests to be arranged for easy retrieval - not only by the people who requested the quotes, but also by future visitors as well.

So. . . From now on, please submit all your gear quote requests on the HiFiCollector.com forum.

You'll see the "What's it Worth?!?" topic, so just create a new post under that topic and I'll answer it ASAP.

Thanks folks!

What's My Gear Worth? HiFiCollector Is Here to Help!

I'm excited to announce a new feature for HiFiCollector.com - What's it Worth?

With years of buying and selling, collection, pricing, and trading experience behind me (and hopefully in front of me as well), I've acquired the skills to confidently quote prices on vintage audio gear. In addition to personal experience with brands and current market conditions, I'll also use eBay completed auction listings and, to a lesser extent, the Orion Blue Book for audio. Orion is still catching up with the downturn of the economy, so their prices seem a little high from my observations.

All posts from this point on will feature a What's it Worth? section which will provide my best guess as to the value of an item similar to the one I'm describing in the post.

Disclaimer - Pricing vintage gear is always a best-guess scenario. I'll provide my estimate based on what I believe would be fair market value and a good place to put a reserve price if I were to try to sell on eBay. Please use my price quotes as a guide and not a point of dispute with a potential buyer. Your experience has probably taught you the same things I've learned when it comes to appraising audio gear - it's worth whatever someone is willing to pay. Collectors with deep pockets will pay whatever they can to win an auction, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the value of that piece of gear has risen.

Of course many variables exist - whether the item would be sold internationally or just within the US, whether the price is meant for eBay (with a huge potential buyer base) or CraigsList (where that base is much smaller), etc. I'll address each one of these on a quote-by-quote basis.

As time allows I'll also go back through the 150 plus posts I've written so far and add the What's it Worth? section to them as well.

Thanks for making HiFiCollector.com such an informative and fun site! Keep the comments and suggestions coming and Happy Listening!

Happy Holidays too!

UPDATE

I'm getting quite a few requests for gear quotes, which is great!

I want all these requests to be arranged for easy retrieval - not only by the people who requested the quotes, but also by future visitors as well.

So. . . From now on, please submit all your gear quote requests on the HiFiCollector.com forum.

You'll see the "What's it Worth?!?" topic, so just create a new post under that topic and I'll answer it ASAP.

Thanks folks!

HiFiCollector.com Forum is Now Open!

Be one of the first members of our new forum!

http://forum.hificollector.com

The HiFiCollector.com forum is NOW OPEN and available to start posting questions, comments, and observations. Head on over to http://forum.hificollector.com and get started.

Registration is easy and only takes a moment.

Wouldn't it be cool to tell people you are "member number four" of the HiFiCollector.com forum?!? Well, it will be once we get 40,000 members :)

Thanks so much for your support!

Forum - Coming Sunday!

Look for the HiFiCollector.com Forum launch Sunday 10/18!

HiFiCollector.com Discussion Board

Until I can get a full-blown forum up and running, I thought I'd use the built-in discussion board on Facebook.

If you're already a member of Facebook, click HERE to join our discussions or start one yourself.

You can join Facebook without getting involved in all it has to offer. In fact, you can join just to become a "fan" of HiFiCollector.com and join in on the discussions, post photos of your gear like HiFiCollector.com community member, Graham just did of his newly refinished and re-edged AR TSW 910s HERE.

Current discussion topics:

• What are your favorite speakers?
• What's your favorite vintage receiver?
• Where do you find your vintage gear?

See you on Facebook!

HiFiCollector Facebook Fan Page

Okay, "Fan" may be a stretch, but I did find an easy way for us to post photos back and forth.

Simply become a fan of HiFiCollector.com on Facebook, and you can post directly to my wall, write me messages and leave messages to the community, in general.

Join NOW. It's FREE (cheap at twice the price :) You have to be a member of Facebook first.

Click on the "Discussions" tab and provide your advice, take a poll, let us know about your favorite vintage gear.

See you on FB!

Tom

Weird-looking? Cool? You Decide

Tube amps are still the rage, and these look like something I'd find at the bottom of my spare parts drawer. Is that 12 gauge speaker wire wrapped around the outside? Are their retro-rustic designs sexy or just weird? Chime in if you'd like.

How do they sound? Check out Steve, the Audiophiliac's article HERE to find out.

Speakers - B&W 802 Series 80 - Follow-Up

"The suspect, you see my dear Watson, is right here in this room!"

After a week of listening to these speakers and not being satisfied with the sound, I finally figured out what the problem is. There's a hole in the upper-midrange frequencies that's probably being caused by a bad capacitor. . .or it could be the midrange driver, itself. In any case, one speaker sounds fantastic, and the other one is sorely lacking in the upper register.

It took nearly a week to diagnose this problem because it wasn't apparent in all the music I listened to. I just couldn't figure out why some jazz sounded great, while female vocals (and Michael Buble when really belting one) sounded anemic, flat, and . . .cheezy - good technical term.

Anyway, I wrestled both speakers out of the loft and they will be going to Orange County Speaker on Monday for a thorough work-up.

Stay tuned for their professional diagnosis, and the amount of the . . .gasp. . .bill!

KEF 105.2 Re-Cap - One down. . .

I tackled one of the two crossover re-caps this weekend and it was a success! ALMOST all the caps fit on the board. There was one, huge 60 uf 250 volt monster that has to hang over the side. No problem as far as mounting the board goes.

I'm not a hands-on, tinkering type of collector. My total number of soldering sessions can be counted on one burnt hand. So, when I finished soldering all these on the board, I was very nervous about putting the board back into the cabinet and testing it. Turned out there was nothing to worry about. The speaker sounds great, and I'll have more time to compare it to the non-upgraded speaker this weekend before I do that crossover too.

I was able to match all the caps values except the 120 uf, which I found a 125 uf for instead. All the caps I bought were 5% tolerance, not the 1% that KEF was known for hand-picking from military spec caps back in the day. I also couldn't find 150 V caps in all the correct values, so I bought 100V ones for most of them instead. 100V will work fine at the volumes I play them at.

Initial tests revealed more open, brighter top-end than the non-upgraded speaker. Again, more on the sound when I get more time to test.

Thanks to all of you who wrote me emails with advice on this project - much appreciated.

Pacific Stereo Commercials

Pacific Stereo was big here on the West coast. That place, Federated Group, University Stereo, Rogers Sound Labs - remember them well. Couldn't afford to buy anything when these were around, but enjoyed wandering the aisles.

What are your memories of stereo shops from the 70s and 80s?

McIntosh Photos - Finally!

I finally got around to taking some high-res (notice I didn't use High Quality?) photos of my McIntosh gear. You can view them HERE.

A special thanks to Adobe Photoshop.