Advent 300

Mike Kozak

Any thoughts on the Advent 300 receiver? I am bidding on one on ebay. Looks cool, from what I have gleaned from internet it is a fairly high quality piece of gear (for it's age)

Timothy Smith

I have owned two of those.

One I bought new in the late 70's. The other I bought used maybe 10 yrs. ago.

Wish I still had one of them.

Only 15 watts but sounded far superior to most recievers of that time.

Also has preamp/amp jumpers so I eventually used them as a preamp/tuner when I had larger power amps amps.

Great phono stage.

No delay or muting, so it thumped when you turned on the power.

If I ever find and buy another one I will keep it. Just a cool item.

Both of mine were black. They made a few silver ones that are rare and desireable.

Mike Kozak

yea, the one I am bidding on has a silver face, looks to be in new condition. It will be mine! (largest wallet wins this one)

mhardy6647

They are very nice. 15 wpc. Phono preamp famously designed by Tomlinson Holman (APT Corporation, nowadays better known as the "THX" guy...).
If you get one today, it will need to have every electrolytic capacitor in it replaced to perform anything like its capability. Not a terrible job... but something of which to be aware.

FWIW, and in the interest of disclosure, the Boston Audio Society thought it sucked.
http://www.bostonaudiosociety.org/pdf/bass/BASS-05-10-7707.pdf
(scroll down past the first 18 pages for the 1977 comparison test)

Timothy Smith

mhardy6647 wrote: »

They are very nice. 15 wpc. Phono preamp famously designed by Tomlinson Holman (APT Corporation, nowadays better known as the "THX" guy...).
If you get one today, it will need to have every electrolytic capacitor in it replaced to perform anything like its capability. Not a terrible job... but something of which to be aware.

FWIW, and in the interest of disclosure, the Boston Audio Society thought it sucked.
http://www.bostonaudiosociety.org/pdf/bass/BASS-05-10-7707.pdf
(scroll down past the first 18 pages for the 1977 comparison test)

I think the Boston Audio Society "bites the big one".

On the other hand, Sterophile magazine lists the Advent 300 as one of the "100 Most Important Audio Components" in their famous 2002 list.

Looking at the B.A.S. list....35 years later, who really still wants a Pioneer SX-550 (OK, some people probably do), a Toshiba SA-420, a Technics SA-5060, or a Nikko 3035?

The Harman Kardon 330C is a classic in it's own right, and the Marantz 2275 @$650 (2-1/2 times the Advent's price) is still desireable.

If you score the silver Advent 300 and don't care for it, please sell it to me.

Mike Kozak

bidding is over on Sat 11:00 pm eastern time

mhardy6647

I, too would love to have one - black or silver; I bear no prejudice :-)

I don't disagree at all about the BAS report - I suspect the reviewer(s) had a strictly personal grudge against ol' Henry and dealt with it in an impressively adult manner (ahem) :-P (too bad there were no hifi forums in those days...).

Oconomowoc... heh, there was an amusing reference to Oconomowoc on A Prairie Home Companion last Saturday night.

Timothy Smith

mhardy6647 wrote: »

I, too would love to have one - black or silver; I bear no prejudice :-)

I don't disagree at all about the BAS report - I suspect the reviewer(s) had a strictly personal grudge against ol' Henry and dealt with it in an impressively adult manner (ahem) :-P (too bad there were no hifi forums in those days...).

Oconomowoc... heh, there was an amusing reference to Oconomowoc on A Prairie Home Companion last Saturday night.

We take a beating here in Oconomowoc

I was watching the TV show "Law and Order" a few years back and the detectives were standing over a recently deceased businessman laying on the floor dressed in a bad suit and hairpiece. One Detective opened the stiff's wallet and snickered and said "This clown lasted all of 6 hours in NYC", another detective asked where he was from and first Detective squinted at the dead guy's ID and said "someplace called....Oconomowoc Wisconsin", and everyone laughed.

Oconomowoc was the site of the world premier of "The Wizard of Oz" in 1939.

Kind of resting on our laurels since then.

mhardy6647

Timothy Smith wrote: »

Oconomowoc was the site of the world premier of "The Wizard of Oz" in 1939.

Now that is a truly wild nugget of ephemera! :-)

APHC last Saturday - Guy Noir segment...

http://prairiehome.publicradio.org/programs/2012/02/11/videos/04.shtml
from 8:20 to the end of the video

"Oconomowoc! A person could start a new life in a town called Oconomowoc... with five "Os" in it. Yeah, the presence of an "O" in the name of a place is a guarantee it's gonna be good for you! Remember that. Ohio. Minnesota. California..."

Timothy Smith

Yes,

It is a little known, and less cared about, fact.

Timothy Smith

Mike Kozak wrote: »

Any thoughts on the Advent 300 receiver? I am bidding on one on ebay. Looks cool, from what I have gleaned from internet it is a fairly high quality piece of gear (for it's age)

Mike,

In their 1977 "The Great Preamp Survey", the Staff of "The Audio Critic" called the Advent Model 300 "The greatest per-dollar value of all time in preamp performance....and it isn't even a preamplifier".

(But sell it to me anyway if you win it on e-bay).

Tim

Timothy Smith

The Advent Model 300
Advent Corporation, 195 Albany Street, Cambridge,
Massachusetts 02139. Model 300 FM Stereo Receiver.
Three-year warranty; manufacturer pays return freight.
Tested No. JO 02876, owned by The Audio Critic.
The very first unit in our alphabetical listing will
recoup the subscription cost of The Audio
Critic many times over for anyone who is looking
for the greatest per-dollar value of all time
in preamp performance.
The Advent Model 300 isn’t even a preamplifier,
but who cares? For $260, you get a neat little
FM tuner and a 15-watt-per-channel power
amplifier thrown in free of charge. We haven’t
tested these, but we can assure you that they
work. The Editor’s two young sons are blasting
away with our expropriated 300, straight
through, even as these lines are being written.
The only reason for the inclusion of the Advent
300 in this survey was the announcement ad
from Advent that asserted that the 300 incorporates
“an entirely new phono preamp section
that is audibly equal or superior to any separate
preamp at any price.” While we find ourselves
unable to endorse that claim without
any qualification, we must report that it’s far
from the usual advertising bombast and is substantially
truthful. Only a small handful of the
preamps we tested come even close to the
Advent when you convert it to a separate preamplifier
by removing two thick, U-shaped aluminum
jumper wires in the back of the receiver.
As we hint on our front cover, the Advent
sounds better than, for example, the Yamaha
C-1 at $1800.We still can’t recommend the Advent to those
who want absolutely the best, regardless of
price. While completely open, free, neutral,
and non-fatiguing in sound, with excellent
depth perspective and very impressive dynamics,
the Advent still doesn’t possess the ultimate
refinement of inner detail audible on the
top four or five units in our survey. It would be
grossly unfair to pit the Advent against each of
these, freckle by freckle and eyelash by eyelash,
since even the cheapest of them costs
almost twice as much. What’s more, even their
narrow margin of superiority must be somewhat
qualified.
Whatever slight blunting or veiling of detail the
Advent may produce (and we must emphasize
that it’s very slight) is due, in our opinion, to
the tone control circuit, which cannot be
switched out. This is the feature we liked least
about the unit; in fact, we discovered in the lab
that when the tone controls were set for deadflat
response on the right channel, there was a
2 dB bass boost on the left channel.
Furthermore, the dead-flat position of the treble
control was a few minutes past the 12
o’clock position. (Of course, we mustn’t forget
that we’re dealing with a $260 stereo receiver
here; it’s really a schizophrenic situation! Next
thing you know, we’ll complain that the controls
don’t have that expensive feel. They don’t,
damn it. ..)
The point we’re trying to make, though, is that
when you bypass the tone control circuit and
the volume control by testing the Advent at
“tape out,” unbelievable things begin to happen.
We absolutely drove our keen-eared
Associate Editor up the wall by going from
those “tape out” jacks into the “remote phono”
inputs of the Mark Levinson JC-2 and A-B-ing
the phono stage of the Advent against the JC-
2’s own phono stage. He couldn’t decide which
one he preferred! After a long evening of agonizing
reappraisal, we came to the reasonably
firm conclusion that we preferred the JC-2 with
its own phono stage. It seemed just the slightest
bit higher in resolution of inner detail.
Whew!
About the only thing to add is that the Advent
Model 300 has rather low gain when used as a
separate preamp, preferring to see a power
amplifier with an input sensitivity of 1 volt or
even less. And that all the lower-priced preamps
in the world are dead, dead, dead.
Recommendations
With the reminder, once more, that all of the
above is work-in-progress and that our conclusions
may change as this survey goes into its
second part, here are our present recommendations
to those who wish to buy a preamplifier
immediately.
Best sound through mag phono, regardless
of all other considerations: Rappaport PREl
(with the caveat about hum-see review).
Alternate choice for better system compatibility
in specific cases: Mark Levinson JC-
2.
Close to the best at a much lower price:
Advent Model 300.
Reprinted by permission of The Audio Critic, Box 392,
Bronxville, NY 10708. ? 1977 by The Audio Critic.
Printed in USA 85-955-072
ADVENT

George Grand

You couldn't pry mine away from me. Neat item.

Timothy Smith

Don't pay any attention to what some tweedy barfmats from the Boston Audio Society said.

Buy the Advent 300.

mhardy6647

I thoroughly agree - I think the BAS review is most amusing (although they're right about the hk330c).

Mike Kozak

So if I am going to by a reasonably priced amd to go with the Advent what should I be looking for?

thanks for all the help!!

Timothy Smith

Mike Kozak wrote: »

So if I am going to by a reasonably priced amd to go with the Advent what should I be looking for?

thanks for all the help!!

Keeping with the "bang for the buck" theme:

I would recommend looking for a used NAD "basic" amp. Low priced and lots of them floating around on CL. Smooth sound and more powerfull than their conservative output ratings would suggest. Modern/utilitarian look like the Advent 300.

You can always sell the NAD and go up from there as budget and interest allows.

What kind of speakers do you have, or are planning to get for your system?

Mike Kozak

I have monitor 70s in cherry finish, love them. Onkyo 7.1 driving them, great for movies, but not for 2 channel

George Grand

My other preamp is a Holman.