What's your tuner?

gjs_cds · « **on:** 2 Sep 2007, 02:39 am »

What tuners are you guys using, if any at all?

/I lived tuner-free for years, but recently broke down and picked one up. Just curious to see what others are using...

Toka · « **Reply #1 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 02:46 am »

I have a Yamaha TX-1000U. Fantastic tuner, both reception-wise and sound quality-wise. And its bone stock! True audiophile-grade equipment (if such things exist

). I'd love to track down one of those Philips tuners and send it to Frank, but I'll be darned if I can find one.

weirdo · « **Reply #2 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 02:59 am »

I have a Yammy CT 1010 circa 1977. Great sonics. The only drawback is that it is a HUGE unit. I had a magnum dynalab FT 101 which was a great DXer but short on sonics. The chaps at FM Tuner Info convinced me to get a good sounding vintage analog and have it serviced. They were right. The Yamaha sounds sweet and I'm listening to a lot of good FM these days.

plaf26 · « **Reply #3 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 04:54 am »

Got a Dynaco FM-5 that Frank modified for me back in the early 80's. Wouldn't mind trying to fix up a tube type FM-3 according to an old issue (I think) of his Audio Basics. IF I had the time!

David Ellis · « **Reply #4 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 06:45 am »

I have an older Kenwood 7500 following the recommendations and commentary found here:

http://www..com/DIY.HTML

I have used 4-5 tuners in my system. All of them should have sounded just fine, but the Kenwood is the only one that actually sound good.

Dave

TONEPUB · « **Reply #5 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 07:33 am »

the new magnum dynalab 609... high performance XM radio!!

Wayner · « **Reply #6 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 11:24 am »

An old un-modded Dynco FM-5 and a Soundcraftsmen T-6200.

W

tonyptony · « **Reply #7 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 12:09 pm »

I have a Yamaha T-2 that I was very happy with. Don't use it much as there's really nothing to listen to, at least in my area. The quality of the classical and jazz stations around here has gone to zilch. I hate to say it, but I get better variety listening to 'net radio stations (and Sirius) piped through my Squeezebox, compressed and all at least there's something to listen to.

Now if FM was the way it was years ago I might try to spring for a Marantz 10B! Always wanted one of those.

Dan Kolton · « **Reply #8 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 02:47 pm »

I use a Dynaco FM-5 that Frank modified back in the 80s just as plaf26 does. I've had to change the dial lights once, but it sounds great.

TONEPUB · « **Reply #9 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 03:01 pm »

Unfortunately, where I live, there aren't any good terrestrial radio stations!
Same when I lived in Phoenix.

I grew up with Chicago rock radio and got spoiled!

What are you guys finding as far as stations go where you live?

mark funk · « **Reply #10 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 03:07 pm »

Well now, I have one Adcom GTP-350,two Pioneer TX9100s,one Dynaco AF-6 and five Dynaco FM-3s. What I am listening to is, 1965 factory wired Dynaco FM-3 for FM and one of those TX9100s for AM. I was using the AF-6 for AM but one of the antenna wires keeps breaking off, the AF-6 does sound much better then the Pioneer on AM. On FM they all sound kinda bad compared to the FM-3.

Toka · « **Reply #11 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 03:54 pm »

Quote from: TONEPUB on 2 Sep 2007, 03:01 pm

Unfortunately, where I live, there aren't any good terrestrial radio stations!
Same when I lived in Phoenix.

I grew up with Chicago rock radio and got spoiled!

What are you guys finding as far as stations go where you live?

Used to live in Philly, live in Cleveland now, and the one upgrade I can say for sure I got with the move was with radio. Better rock stations (classic anyway), GREAT college/non-comm stations, and the standards & classical offerings are both on the FM dial, and they blow me away...WKHR (standards) fills the room with sound, and I have a bog-standard indoor antenna! Gotta get that Yamaha hot-rodded and married to an APS antenna, then look out!

dB Cooper · « **Reply #12 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 04:52 pm »

Quote from: TONEPUB on 2 Sep 2007, 03:01 pm

What are you guys finding as far as stations go where you live?

Not much- and I live in what used to be one of the best FM markets in the country (WDC). WPFW plays jazz and a glorious one hour a day of blues but not much of either at times I can listen. 9 til midnite they go "latin" which isn't my cup of tea, no offense. WDCU Jazz/Blues) gave it up years ago and is now C-Span. WAMU has great news and talk programming, but don't really need a great "tuna" for talk radio. No real reason to expect any of this to change for the better anytime soon, so, like one of the earlier posters, I listen a lot to satellite (Sirius)- at least there's something to listen to, although the sound is barely mid-fi at best. But I can turn it on and hear my usual music (jazz & blues) anytime. Terrestrial radio has become every bit as much a wasteland as broadcast TV- maybe more so,

Toka · « **Reply #13 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 05:24 pm »

Quote from: Marbles on 2 Sep 2007, 05:05 pm

Sansui TU-X1

Man, I would love one of those!

If only I could find one that I could afford...still can't believe a guy from the FM Tuners group got one at an estate sale for $199.

Hope he bought some lottery tickets that day too.

doug s. · « **Reply #14 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 06:37 pm »

Quote from: dB Cooper on 2 Sep 2007, 04:52 pm

Quote from: TONEPUB on 2 Sep 2007, 03:01 pm

What are you guys finding as far as stations go where you live?
Not much- and I live in what used to be one of the best FM markets in the country (WDC). WPFW plays jazz and a glorious one hour a day of blues but not much of either at times I can listen. 9 til midnite they go "latin" which isn't my cup of tea, no offense. WDCU Jazz/Blues) gave it up years ago and is now C-Span. WAMU has great news and talk programming, but don't really need a great "tuna" for talk radio. No real reason to expect any of this to change for the better anytime soon, so, like one of the earlier posters, I listen a lot to satellite (Sirius)- at least there's something to listen to, although the sound is barely mid-fi at best. But I can turn it on and hear my usual music (jazz & blues) anytime. Terrestrial radio has become every bit as much a wasteland as broadcast TV- maybe more so,

dunno much about the tv wasteland - i don't have one!

re: wpfw, it's my fave station, and thanks to it, i have way too many tunas - i guess for me, the question would be what isn't my tuna?

back to wpfw, they broadcast a very clean signal, relatively uncompressed signal that will give you sound quality as good as any other source, in a good rig. re: their programming, their daytime stuff alternates between talk/news/music. i listen to the music programs at work on my vintage refurb'd general electric tubed stereo table radio. evenings mon-thru-fri, they do jazz 7-9; latin 9-10, world 10-11. (they also started hip-hop, from 11-midnite, which i found extremely disconcerting, as it took 30 minutes each out of the latin & world programming, which i love, & i really can't stand hip-hop. oh well.) on weekends, sat has a lot of all-day old school r&b & blues, which i think is great, & sunday has all day jazz, which i also love.

other stuff i listen to in the dc area is weta 90.9, which is classical, wamu 88.5, which is mostly npr, but does bluegrass on weekends, & it does mary cliff's great "traditions" show on sat nites from 11pm to 1am, & wypr (frederick) 88.1 which has a lot of jazz in the evenings. i agree that commercial radio is a wasteland, both in programming & in signal quailty. re: satellite radio, i can't stand the sound, even for background music - ymmv.

ok - tunas - some of my faves that i presently own, in no particular order:
-accuphase t100, refurb'd
-aiwa au9700t, stock, presently in use (excellent stock tuna, but rare as hen's teeth.)
-mitsubishi da-f20, awaiting a trip to az for mods (best all-around stock tuna for the money?)
-hk citation 18, modded (best tuna? i need to do some more a-b'ing. mebbe also the best all-around stock tuna for the money, but i have never heard one stock!

and, they're quite scarce.)
-modded sansui tu-x1
-modded sansui tu9900
-modded shewrwood s3000v (best sound? mebbe, but only decent, not exceptional reception.)
-stock sherwood s3000lll (excellent sound also, w/a coupla outboard mpx stereo decoders.)
-onix bwd1 w/soap-2 power supply (my first "real" tuna - still excellent sounding, & excellent reception.)
-stromberg carlson sr445 (right up there w/thte mono sherwoods in sound, but sucky reception.)
-dyna fm3 , modded & refurb'd (supposed to be up there w/the best sonically, but reception here sucks, & i yust recently got this, so i never heard it w/a strong signal, which it needs.)
-jvc fx1100bk (killer sounding bargain tuna)
-rotel rht-10 (one guy thinks this is the best there is, after mods; mine's great, but stock. get the rotel 990, almost identical inside, for 1/4 the price, if you wanna try one.)
-roksan caspian (one of the few excellent tunas still currently awailable, imo, especially at used prices)
-revox b261 (as good as the revox b760, imo, which i used to own. mine is serving duties at the ex's abode.)
-heathkit aj1600, modded/refurb'd (this tuna is better than a modded kenwood kt7500, imo; which is jim rivers' of fmtunerinfo.com fave tuna...)
-sansui fm8 (excellent sound w/an outboard mpx stereo decoder, & decent reception, for an old tuber...)
i am prolly forgetting a tuna or three...

doug s.,
so many tunas, so little time...

doug s. · « **Reply #15 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 06:46 pm »

Quote from: David Ellis on 2 Sep 2007, 06:45 am

I have an older Kenwood 7500 following the recommendations and commentary found here:

http://www..com/DIY.HTML

I have used 4-5 tuners in my system. All of them should have sounded just fine, but the Kenwood is the only one that actually sound good.

Dave

dave,

send your kt7500 to bill ammons for mods if you wanna really hear what a good tuna sounds like. this tuna in stock condition is really quite unexceptional sounding, imo...

doug s.

TheChairGuy · « **Reply #16 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 07:52 pm »

Quote from: doug s. on 2 Sep 2007, 06:37 pm

ok - tunas - some of my faves that i presently own, in no particular order:
-accuphase t100, refurb'd
-aiwa au9700t, stock, presently in use (excellent stock tuna, but rare as hen's teeth.)
-mitsubishi da-f20, awaiting a trip to az for mods (best all-around stock tuna for the money?)

doug,

I use the Mitsubishi DA-C20....which is a combo tuner/preamp consisting of the DA-F10 tuner and DA-P20 preamp they made.

I find the tuner portion rather unexceptional....but have heard the F20 was built to higher standard.

Where are you sending it to be modded in AZ if I may ask?

John

gjs_cds · « **Reply #17 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 07:54 pm »

Thanks for all the replies, guys...

I, too, would like to get my paws on a vintage Dyna FM5, for example. But I'm also a dad who would rather spend his money on family experiences, rather than myself (at this stage of my life)... So here's what I ended up doing.

I read an interesting idea in a back issue of The Audio Critic; and the idea was using a car stereo as an FM tuner. And that made sense to me, as (at least in my experience) my most sensitive and best receiving FM tuners were (oddly enough) in my car. TAC used the Blaupunkt digiciever--but I asked around and found (almost unanimously) that while digiciever should be the best (due to its technical design), it is not.

So I took a chance on the Alpine DVA-9860--and I've been quite pleased with the end result. (Got it for about 50% off of MSRP because it was an open box unit on an old model number.) The FM tuner is quite sensitive and seems to do a great job at signal-to-noise. All my channels come in crystal clear, and seem to be as good as I could have ever hoped for the medium. This particular deck has a defeatable internal amp, which I have turned off. (It also has defeatable EQ, which is off as well.) The deck is powered by a 3 amp AC-DC transformer. I picked up a car antenna from an AutoZone, which is concealed within the wall above the fireplace. (My gear is in a built-in cabinet w/ good ventilation; a feature we had installed during construction. My wife said, "No Wires!")

And I gotta say--I'm pretty pleased. It's certainly unconventional--but it gives me a pretty cheap but still good performing FM tuner. (AM not so good--but big deal.) It also gives me a DVD player that can read uncompressed music files on DVD-R or DVD-RW discs... which is a great "set it and forget it" feature. (My wife keeps this system on all day, with one DVD filled w/ our girl's favorite music.) (It's also great, because I could easily fit *all* of Mozart's piano sonatas *and* concertos on one DVD.)

Ok--I have come out of the closet. I am ready to be heckled. But don't knock it too much until you've tried it. Great design and engineering doesn't need to be expensive--it just needs to be well conceived.

dB Cooper · « **Reply #18 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 08:26 pm »

This may be considered heresy also, but the tuner section of the Kloss Model One table radio gives a decent account of itself used as a tuna.

I currently use a restored/upgraded Dyna FM3. Had a van Alstine-gutted FM5 years ago & sold it for a magnum Dynalab- one of the ones with three meters- BIG mistake; the AVA kicked the MD's (_!_) in the sonics department.

David Ellis · « **Reply #19 on:** 2 Sep 2007, 08:59 pm »

Quote

send your kt7500 to bill ammons for mods if you wanna really hear what a good tuna sounds like. this tuna in stock condition is really quite unexceptional sounding, imo...] send your kt7500 to bill ammons for mods if you wanna really hear what a good tuna sounds like. this tuna in stock condition is really quite unexceptional sounding, imo...

Thanks for the recommendation.

There are some very good public domain mods for this tuner and this was a purchase factor intially. When I received the KT7500 I opened the lid and noticed there is a good amount of access/landscape for mods. For me this is a relatively significant consideration when purchasing a piece of hifi gear. IMO, everything commercially available sounds better with some mods. The degree of improvement varies, but I have always found modest to profound improvements with mods.

However, I really don't listen to the radio very often. I really don't have the desire to spend more $$ on something that barely gets used. I also made some mistakes during my last adventure into my CD player

. I couldn't find my bad solder joint and had to pay a professional to find my problem

. My wife wasn't very happy

. Following this event, my wife "made" me promise not to modify any more of "her" source gear.

So, I do understand that a modded KT7500 would surely sound better, but in stock form it really does sound better than the other tuners I have used (an old heathkit, an NAD, an Adcom, and few receivers from Kenwood, Marantz etc etc.).

Dave