A thread for Basschatters who have an interest in HIFI

[Misdee]

On 06/10/2020 at 14:25, Big_Stu said:

I have a defunct Marantz 63 KI Signature CD deck, a world-beater in it's day. It died a few months ago. Marantz customer care is diabolical, they referred me to some depot in Blackpool, who didn't want to know because they found it impossible to get parts off Marantz. I suspect the laser has packed in. Calls to many local hi-fi shops have all expressed sympathy for the loss, "great machine", "a classic" etc. but were unable to advise further.

A guy my brother knows builds his own hi-fi so I'll be paying a visit with the deck one I'm safe to stop shielding. In the meantime I have a Pioneer CD-R deck I can use, not as good a sound, but better than many. 

The CD63KI is indeed a true classic. It's still a great-sounding piece of kit twenty-odd years after it came out .

If the deck in question has started skipping when you are trying to play a disc, there is a  good chance that what has happened is that the lubricant in the transport has dried out. It can  usually be re-lubricated by an  hifi repairer. The  particular Phillips transport the the CD63KI used was very prone to that fault  developing as the years pass. 

Edited October 7, 2020 by Misdee

[grenadillabama]

3 hours ago, itu said:

What is wrong with your Naka? Belt sets are available for a decent price. If button lamps are dead, they should be changed because the output goes off without them.

You can try to find one unit with Dolby S. There were some, and they should represent the better half of the herd. Pioneer CT-93 was one of them.

My Naka works fine in the computer room. The living room has the mediocre Teacs . They only start/stop well with the remotes.  Also the treble from them is not real crisp. Remember when you played bass through an 18 (like my Vox Westminster ) the sound was not great ? The Teacs are mellow more than hi fi .

[Shaggy]

Always wanted to put together a really stonking hi-fi system, but space, funds and wives have generally precluded it.     

Systems have come and gone; currently a decent-ish Denon DAB / CD receiver and 1980’s JVC linear tracking turntable.    However - as with bass, it’s all about the cabs: I bought a pair of Dahlquist dq10 speakers secondhand in around 1980, and those bad boys have been travelling around with me ever since.  One pictured with my Streamer bass for scale, but they’re quite shallow front to back.   Immense, clear, transparent sound.  

[Leonard Smalls]

33 minutes ago, Shaggy said:

Dahlquist dq10 speakers

Nice!

I'd be tempted to give them the drive they deserve - something with some oomph...

Perhaps an old Crown/Amcron power amp, though on a budget £3-400 will get you a surprisingly fine class D Crown which will make the most of its possible bass extension!

[Shaggy]

11 minutes ago, Leonard Smalls said:

Nice!

I'd be tempted to give them the drive they deserve - something with some oomph...

Perhaps an old Crown/Amcron power amp, though on a budget £3-400 will get you a surprisingly fine class D Crown which will make the most of its possible bass extension!

I thought the compact Denon wouldn't have enough guts to drive the dq10's, but it's actually got a surprising amount of grunt.   The best and biggest amp I had was a huge 200W RMS receiver from the States (I think it was branded Kenwood - it was Sansui's top end stuff in the US anyway) that really brought the speakers alive.   But yes; one of these days maybe something with valves.....

[Big_Stu]

On 06/10/2020 at 18:38, Matt P said:

 

I believe that all of the various cd-63 versions all used the same laser unit, the original Philips one is not available any more but there is a good alternative, there is a guide to swapping it here. 

 

https://www.hifigear.co.uk/blog/marantz-cd63se-laser-transport-mechanism-replacement/

 

Matt 

Fantastic Matt, very much appreciated!!! I'll let you know how it goes. The reviews of the KI are very accurate - it's a great machine.

[Big_Stu]

On 07/10/2020 at 09:11, jassthebass said:

Hi @Big_Stu

 

Re Marantz, I assume you've checked these people out ?

http://sstonline.co.uk/our-clients/

 

 

The place in Blackpool referred me to them, and they said the same about getting hold of parts. But thanks for the reminder, I'll give them another go if I don't get anywhere with Matt's ides.

[Big_Stu]

On 07/10/2020 at 21:52, Misdee said:

The CD63KI is indeed a true classic. It's still a great-sounding piece of kit twenty-odd years after it came out .

If the deck in question has started skipping when you are trying to play a disc, there is a  good chance that what has happened is that the lubricant in the transport has dried out. It can  usually be re-lubricated by an  hifi repairer. The  particular Phillips transport the the CD63KI used was very prone to that fault  developing as the years pass. 

What happened was at first the right channel kept cutting out, it would come back the next day but happened more and more often. Then it went totally silent. It still powers up etc and looks fully functional, apart from no sound.

[Leonard Smalls]

On 11/10/2020 at 17:23, Shaggy said:

huge 200W RMS

I'd be thinking 4x that, with about +/- 40amps current swing! Crowns will do that - perhaps not with the finesse of my Bryston but at <1/10 of the price!

Saying that, those old Sansui amps put out quite decent grunt....

[Misdee]

6 hours ago, Big_Stu said:

What happened was at first the right channel kept cutting out, it would come back the next day but happened more and more often. Then it went totally silent. It still powers up etc and looks fully functional, apart from no sound.

Sounds fixable. Look for a specialist hifi dealer in your area ( if you have one) and ask if they have someone they can recommend who does repairs on audio equipment. As you have already found out, if  you have a CD63KI they will understand why you want to get it fixed. There are loads of old machines out there to provide cannibalised parts if Marantz can't provide the. 

Edited October 14, 2020 by Misdee

[StickyDBRmf]

Nothing worse than a bass geek talking geek hifi. I won't even go into it (except for the time I incorporated my Gauss/BagEnd 18" sub into the house system - hard to keep the turntable from skipping w/ that one)

[tomthebass]

Great thread! So one of my lockdown projects was to build a pair of isobaric speakers... managed to pick up four Seas bass units for not much, and built these cabs as a slightly more aesthetic alternative to rectangles - the bass units are 8" and there is one hiding inside the cab, so it can't be any narrower. Paired them up with some fountek ribbon tweeters. A bit of crossover tweaking and hey presto... huge meaty bass and drums, breathy midrange and delicate tops. My 5th attempt at speaker design, so a huge surprise at how great they sound. Upset my brother when we compared them to his very pricey Wilson-Benesch's. A shame those bass units aren't made any more, otherwise I might be going into production 😂

[Leonard Smalls]

Looks like a Bryston 14 amp? That would definitely help with bass - mine has a test certificate saying 968/967 w/ch @ 4ohms with around +-40A...

And did you not want to make the cabinets just a bit bigger for more extension? I used to have some Kef 104/2s with isobaric-style twin bass units which nearly rivalled my Ditton 66/series2s for quantity of bass, though not for extension.

[Big_Stu]

On 14/10/2020 at 16:35, Misdee said:

Sounds fixable. Look for a specialist hifi dealer in your area ( if you have one) and ask if they have someone they can recommend who does repairs on audio equipment. As you have already found out, if  you have a CD63KI they will understand why you want to get it fixed. There are loads of old machines out there to provide cannibalised parts if Marantz can't provide the. 

There were a couple, but the best one was taken over by SevenOaks and doesn't do repairs now, or help with them; the other closed down. I'll try Manchester when it's a bit safer to go.

[tomthebass]

2 hours ago, Leonard Smalls said:

Looks like a Bryston 14 amp? That would definitely help with bass - mine has a test certificate saying 968/967 w/ch @ 4ohms with around +-40A...

And did you not want to make the cabinets just a bit bigger for more extension? I used to have some Kef 104/2s with isobaric-style twin bass units which nearly rivalled my Ditton 66/series2s for quantity of bass, though not for extension.

Ah good spot. It is indeed a 14B! My brother's...had to give it back unfortunately...let me know if you ever want to move yours on 😁

Re the cabinet size, yes that could be design number 6... but I was going for the compromise here between deep bass and living room acceptability! But they already go low... I don't have a proper spl measurement system but there is audible bass from 29 Hz and they have a super kick with bass drum etc. Certainly enough aural awesomeness to make me rummage through my record collection to feast on the sounds 😋

[bass_dinger]

A thread resurrection, to recommend a hi fi amplifier repair company. 

 

I discovered ARS (Amplifier Repair Services) when I wanted to fix the crackling selection knob on my Arcam Alpha 9.  For £140 they removed the selector switch, gold-plated the contacts, and replaced internal components to factory specification.

 

They now repair other items too.

 

CYRUS ONE & TWO

NAD 3020

ARCAM ALPHA 9, DELTA 290, ALPHA 7 & 8

MUSICAL FIDELITY A1, B1, MA50

A&R CAMBRIDGE A60

NAD3130

 

https://www.amprepairservices.com/

 

No financial interest, just a satisfied customer. 

[BigRedX]

On 07/10/2020 at 20:58, grenadillabama said:

Can anyone recommend a currently available cassette deck to replace my old Nakamichi BX-100 ? I have bought two Teac decks with fair sound . Would a Tascam cassette deck be the best ?

 

Is anyone still making cassette decks?

 

IME the most important thing any cassette deck can have is for it to be solidly built, especially around the tape transport area. I still have an Aiwa F660 deck that is close on 40 years old new and has performed pretty much flawlessly throughout this time (it did need to have the "rubber" parts replaced about 15 years ago). The whole area around where the cassette goes is full of clunky metalwork and built like a tank. It was used for playing back the backing tape of my synth band, and also an essential pat of my home studio for most of the 80s, so it has had a lot of use and some abuse. The top of the range Sony deck I bought in the late 90s to replace it failed within about 10 years, and unsurprisingly it appears to be mostly made of weedy plastic. It has also outlasted 2 Nakamichi decks (owned by musician friends) which cost a lot more but to me didn't sound any better and were considerably less reliable.

[steve-bbb]

Recently updated a new audiotechnica cartridge and a cambridge phono preamp and was pleasantly surprised at the improvement in clarity and definition for a modest sub 500 outlay

[bass_dinger]

2 hours ago, BigRedX said:

 

Is anyone still making cassette decks?

 

https://www.hifix.co.uk/hi-fi/hi-fi-separates/cassette-decks/

 

TEAC appear to. 

 

Or you could look on ebay for new-old stock, of the brand and model that you are looking for.

[Linus27]

Great thread

 

I grew up with NAD gear thanks to my dad who was a huge HiFi geek. We would go to the HiFi shows in the 80's and 90's that were on around the country and try out all the various gear. He had an original NAD 3020 amp and a set of Monitor Audio speakers and combined with the NAD CD player he had, it sounded phenomenal. I inherited it all when he died in the late 90's but I have since upgraded mine over the years. I've currently settled on a modern digital NAD 3020v2 which is really really good for the money but I do miss some of the original features of the original 3020 amp. I've also got back into vinyl and run a Planar 3 with RB300 arm and Linn K9 through the NAD and it sounds very good but I really need some better bookshelf speakers at some point. I mostly play old Jazz records, some original 80's stuff and one or two other records. At some point I'll probably upgrade everything to something better but at the moment, it will be the speakers getting upgraded. No idea what so any recommendations on a good set of bookshelf speakers would be appreciatated.

 

I'd also do a shoutout to the original Mission Cyrus One and Two amp heads. They were awesome bits of kit.