FWIW, I owned a number of Carver Corporation products during the 1980s, namely the M400t, M400a, C-4000, C-9, and TX-11. All were absolutely reliable, and in fact after about 35 years the M400t is still going strong in the home of a relative. Sonically the M400t, which was the version of the cube amp that was designed to emulate the "transfer function" (the relation between output and input) of the very expensive and highly regarded pure class A Mark Levinson ML-2, I remember as being quite good, at least with the easy to drive speakers I was using it with. And despite its diminutive size it seemed every bit as powerful as its 201 watt/channel rating would suggest. Its predecessor model, though, the M400a, sounded poor, with a strange glare often being present. I found the sonics of the other products to be satisfactory for a few years, if not particularly enthralling, and I ultimately moved on. The M400t, though, I used in rotation with various tube amps until well into this century, when I gave it to the relative. Regards, -- Al |
P.S: Regarding the Carver TX-11 tuner, my experience differed from what another poster reported earlier in the thread. Despite the special signal processing it incorporated to enhance weak signal reception, it was handily outperformed in that respect as well as in terms of sonic quality by two different Marantz 10B’s I owned during the 1990s, and by the 1954 REL (Radio Engineering Laboratories) Precedent I still have in my main system. The 10B and the Precedent (which is monophonic, but provides a "multiplex out" signal that can be demultiplexed into stereo by an external H. H. Scott or Fisher "multiplex adapter") are by a substantial margin the most sensitive of many tuners I have owned over the years, most of them being "golden age" tube designs. Both live up to their outstanding reputations sonically as well, assuming of course that they are in top condition and/or well restored. Regards, -- Al |
clearthink359 posts06-09-2018 6:23amBob Carver produces cheap, unreliable and poorly performing products hence the nicknames for some of his creations such as "Flame Linear" he is a promoter, showman and marketer of the first class however!clearthink Could you describe your Carver product experience that would provoke such a throughly negative remark? |
