Sold my car to buy a high end system as a Freshman in college -1977. Talk about a killer dorm system. First amp was a Phase Linear 400....it flamed (literally) -- However, I thought it sounded very good. Then went with a fabulous Harman Kardon Citaion 16 amp and a GAS Theadra preamp, Dahlquist DQ10's (Denon TT w/ Supex 900 MC cartidge). It was fabulous. The HK amp was a tank and sounded superb. I replaced it with an Ampzilla in the 80's and regretted it. The Ampzilla was always breaking and was not as smooth as the HK...much better mids with the HK. The Ampzilla was very transparent sounding and had major balls in slam and low end energy. BTW, I got the "bug" after owning a nice Yamaha receiver w/ Infinity speakers. The rest is history and am still spending way too much money on stereo gear.
How do we remember 1970s amplifiers?
I would be curious to hear some of the memories and impressions associated with the following short list of 1970s amplifiers:
- McIntosh "first generation" SS amps, MC2105, MC2505, MC2300, MC250, MC2100
- Dynaco Stereo 400 and Stereo 120
- Phase Linear 400 and 700
- Bang & Olufsen "slide rule" receivers (i.e. especially blackface Beomaster 4000)
- Original Ampzilla (not Son of Ampzilla)
I've chosen this list mainly because they cover a wide range of approaches to solving the issues of early semiconductor technology, and they were all pretty mainstream products in the U.S. I'm excluding the Japanese receivers/amps not out of predjudice; it's simply that the circuit designs varied quite a bit with each model, and thus harder to broadly classify their characteristics.
I'm interested in impressions of both sonic and non-sonic attributes, and a preferred ranking of the above, if you like.
- McIntosh "first generation" SS amps, MC2105, MC2505, MC2300, MC250, MC2100
- Dynaco Stereo 400 and Stereo 120
- Phase Linear 400 and 700
- Bang & Olufsen "slide rule" receivers (i.e. especially blackface Beomaster 4000)
- Original Ampzilla (not Son of Ampzilla)
I've chosen this list mainly because they cover a wide range of approaches to solving the issues of early semiconductor technology, and they were all pretty mainstream products in the U.S. I'm excluding the Japanese receivers/amps not out of predjudice; it's simply that the circuit designs varied quite a bit with each model, and thus harder to broadly classify their characteristics.
I'm interested in impressions of both sonic and non-sonic attributes, and a preferred ranking of the above, if you like.