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It’s useful to know what performance levels are actually distinguishable. Generally, old Japanese consumer receivers (including that Realistic) had reasonable electronics. The crappy stuff was the house-brand stuff from places like Olson Electronics, but Lafayette and Radio Shack sold better stuff. It was typical to see distortion figures in the 0.5-0.8 range. In dB terms, that’s distortion overtones (hence “harmonic distortion”) 50ish dB down from the signal. Harmonic distortion that low is hard to hear when playing music. The much bigger weakness of that stuff was linearity, load dependency, and clipping caused by lack of power. The spectral tilt resulting from poor linearity is easy to hear, but a drop off in the top octave not so much, especially for us old people.

Speakers in those days, especially at the cheap end of the spectrum, had higher impedance, which helped with load dependency.

Lack of power coupled with clipping behavior is the real problem, and I think at the root of many of the old truisms, such as solid-state bring harsh. I have no use for inadequate power, even if the distortion level is at -90 dB.

My stereo from college was a Kenwood 40-watt integrated amplifier, a Technics belt-drive turntable (their bottom of the line), and a pair of Advent loudspeakers. I still have it and it still works well. But it will clip if I try to listen at realistic levels (like if I want to play along), and long ago I bought a 200-watt Spectro Acoudtics amp plus a nice Onkyo preamp.

The Spectro amp released its magic smoke a couple of times, and I replaced it with a Carver commercial PA amp. I replaced that with a much more powerful Samson commercial amp. When I bought a B&K amp of much better specification, I didn’t hear a difference.

I’m now using an inexpensive Hypex NC502MP Class D amp from Buckeye in my main system, and at 350 watts/channel, I can play the recording as loudly as it seems on stage so that I can play along and not hold back. But even it will clip slightly if I play, say, a drum solo recorded without compression at realistic levels.

I’ve had to refoam the woofers in my Advents a couple of times, and have replaced a couple of tweeters in the two pairs of Advents I now own. I use a pair in my YouTube-watching workout room, which is what the garage turned into when I built the shop, along with the B&K amp. In my main system, I installed a pair of used Revel F12 tower speakers, and that’s where the investment makes a difference.

So, even though I’m an enthusiast I’m certainly no audiophile in the sense of buying what today gets praise from magazines like Stereophile. (Except for the speakers—but the Stereophile reviewer that praised those is a friend whose senses are honed by measurements.) But I’d bet not many people would be able to tell the difference in a truly blind test.

But upstairs that old Kenwood still plays CDs through an old pair of Canton speakers, and it sounds great at the volume levels it’s intended to provide.

Rick “nothing wrong with economical choices” Denney

@Rick Denney

My 1970's Woodson (same guts as "Kustom"...that brand with the sparkly tufted/upholstered cabinets) P.A. (tremendous wattage head, and two 4x12" towers) does REMARKABLY well at producing (to me, at least - as long as I keep the volume knobs turned down to no more than about 3-1/2) realistic, full-volume grand piano or play-along symphony orchestra accompaniments/recordings...so (well...) I really never use the Realistic receiver NOR the still-as-good-as-new (never re-coned) Advent speakers.

The Woodson P.A. system was (basically) "free"...It came with a huge pile of stuff (insurance salvage from a flooded band-room from who-knows-where) that I bought...
btw...NONE of that (so called "flood-damaged") stuff was damaged at all.
There's TREMENDOUS waste (fraud...??) on BOTH sides in that industry...imo.

reminder, for those who've seen them but just can't remember:

This is what 1970's Kustom p.a.'s and amps looked like:



The three brands, Kustom, Kasino, and Woodson, were all made in Kansas (ok...maybe Woodson's were stuck together barely over in southern Missouri), but (as with Buick/Oldsmobile/Pontiac/etc.) were branded and and made to APPEAR just enough different as to be sold by competing combo stores in the same towns/neighborhoods.

Kasino was the budget brand, as I recall. Woodson was for people who didn’t want tufting.

I thought there might be a connection between Woodson and Crate, which was one of the original product lines of St. Louis Music, but wrong side of that state.

I have a Crate 6-channel powered mixer and a couple of pedestal PA speakers. It’s supposedly junk, and I paid nearly nothing for it. But it works well and it’s been reliable. I suspect the reputation is from Rick bands buying it because of the price point and thinking they can turn it up to 11 like bigger, more expensive stuff.

PA equipment does pretty well in terms of producing the sorts of dynamics that make stuff sound real. That’s what it’s made for.

Rick “value for dollar” Denney

well...I believe the three brands (all the same guts) were more for the reasons that I suspect (and has been explained to me by various even-older-than-me peeps).

Kustom: The sparkly upholstery was campy, but I'm sorta happy that I have the Woodson (Tolex) cosmetics. (I even got good-condition vinyl covers for the two towers.

When I've caught some (in some adjacent properties) poaching and illegally using dogs to flush out deer, I've dragged those two towers out to the deck, really cranked up the gain on the head, and played some REALLY offensive-lyrics rap through that system (pointed in the direction from which the dogs appeared).

The dogs and - hopefully - the deer scattered.

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peterbas wrote: ↑Sun Jan 21, 2024 11:40 am https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dONSkfbxnao

TERRIBLE...

That sounds JUST LIKE my crappy Dell laptop speakers.

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Second for the Audio Technica MX50s. Clean & neutral, nothing overly boosted, comfortable. They can be found on ebay in this price range or you can get the 30s factory refurbished for $50.