Old Nakamichi Receiver

jflail2

I've got one of these bad boys sitting idle:

Nakamichi AV3s




and was pondering using it for a basic 2 channel setup for the bedroom. Is it even worth messing with, or should I donate it to a less fortunate friend and start over? I bought it years ago on name alone, and haven't done much with it since. I know its not the latest and greatest, don't think it has preamp outs, but it still seems like Nakamichi quality would help out some.

Any "somewhat inexpensive" speaker recommendations that might jive well with this receiver?

Any input at all?

Thanks!

Bill Ayotte

I would just keep it...It seems well received on the link you provided, and Nakamichi makes quality stuff....

Now for the speakers....I use B&W 600i's that I picked up at the pawn shop...They are amazing little speakers....I am thinking in the future I am going with the bigger 602S3s, but that is a decent ways away at this point...You can find the 600i's for about $100-220 in various places....The New 601S3s are about $600-700 new....These speakers would also work well if you decided to upgrade your source later....There is always a nice used set of Polk LSi7s as well......

heiney9

This was built/designed way after Nak's heydey. The company had been sold and some of the products started showing up in Best Buy shortly after these units were manufactured. This is NOT from the original reign of Nakamichi.

Still some of these units get some praise and certainly since you already have it in your posession I'd say give it a try and see what you think. Does this tout the buzz word "Harmonic Time Alignment"?

The original founder of Nakamichi passed away in the mid-late 90's (I think that's the time frame) and his son Niro Nakamichi took over the company and for all intents and purposes ran it into the ground by trying to keep the cassette tape genre alive and ignoring popular trends in audio. At some point they were purchased by a European company (not known for outstanding products at the time) Grundig. Not sure who owns them now, but Niro has since gone his seperate way to produce some very intriguing yet odd audio components for the Japanes only market.

H9

jflail2

Ahh, thanks for the clarification Heiney; didn't know that about Nak. This thing was purchased off of some electronics auction site that pre-dated even Ebay (to put it into perspective I ordered it on a Pentium 200 after a night of CTF for the original Quake....)

Does this tout the buzz word "Harmonic Time Alignment"?

Yes. Is this a bad thing? Are they making up for a lack of quality with a buzzword that essentially means nothing? Do tell.

Thanks for the speaker tip Bill; that's exactly the price range I had in mind.

heiney9

jflail2 wrote: »

Ahh, thanks for the clarification Heiney; didn't know that about Nak. This thing was purchased off of some electronics auction site that pre-dated even Ebay (to put it into perspective I ordered it on a Pentium 200 after a night of CTF for the original Quake....)



Yes. Is this a bad thing? Are they making up for a lack of quality with a buzzword that essentially means nothing? Do tell.

Thanks for the speaker tip Bill; that's exactly the price range I had in mind.

I forget exactly what it means.............but a quick google search will give a brief desc. It's not really negative and it's not really positive, just a buzz word to be different. Certainly worthy since it's already in your possession.

Classic Polk Monitors like 5jr+ or 5's or 7's or even 10's would work nicely. Athena makes some speakers. EPOS or even older RT series.

jflail2

After a quick search I found this (for a different receiver but I assume its the same idea)........wtf is that saying?

NAKAMICHI HARMONIC TIME ALIGNMENT™ TECHNOLOGY
The time alignment of an amplified music signal and its distortion components has a profound effect on perceived sound quality. Nakamichi researchers discovered that the human ear is much more tolerant of harmonic distortion if the distortion components are time-aligned with respect to the primary signal. Nakamichi Harmonic Time Alignment (HTA)™ amplifiers, such as those in the RE-10, adopt a wideband, low open-loop gain design. A minimal amount of negative feedback is used, but, more important, it is kept constant over the entire audio spectrum. This assures the proper timing between the primary signal and any amplifier distortion components. The sonic benefits of this design include powerful, high-resolution bass, a natural, richly detailed midrange, and smooth, clear highs.

jakelm

jflail2 wrote: »

After a quick search I found this (for a different receiver but I assume its the same idea)........wtf is that saying?

NAKAMICHI HARMONIC TIME ALIGNMENT™ TECHNOLOGY
The time alignment of an amplified music signal and its distortion components has a profound effect on perceived sound quality. Nakamichi researchers discovered that the human ear is much more tolerant of harmonic distortion if the distortion components are time-aligned with respect to the primary signal. Nakamichi Harmonic Time Alignment (HTA)™ amplifiers, such as those in the RE-10, adopt a wideband, low open-loop gain design. A minimal amount of negative feedback is used, but, more important, it is kept constant over the entire audio spectrum. This assures the proper timing between the primary signal and any amplifier distortion components. The sonic benefits of this design include powerful, high-resolution bass, a natural, richly detailed midrange, and smooth, clear highs.

Hmmmm....Maybe I can get my HK aligned. It does pull to the right alittle.

Bill Ayotte

jakelm wrote: »

Hmmmm....Maybe I can get my HK aligned. It does pull to the right alittle.

Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!:D

Bill Ayotte

If you aren't partial to speaker grills, these are a steal.....I am too streached out to afford these right now.....

http://cgi.ebay.com/B-W-BOWERS-WILKINS-DM602-BLACK-BOOKSHELF-SPEAKER_W0QQitemZ140116564126QQihZ004QQcategoryZ14991QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

engtaz

nice

heiney9

jflail2 wrote: »

After a quick search I found this (for a different receiver but I assume its the same idea)........wtf is that saying?

NAKAMICHI HARMONIC TIME ALIGNMENT™ TECHNOLOGY
The time alignment of an amplified music signal and its distortion components has a profound effect on perceived sound quality. Nakamichi researchers discovered that the human ear is much more tolerant of harmonic distortion if the distortion components are time-aligned with respect to the primary signal. Nakamichi Harmonic Time Alignment (HTA)™ amplifiers, such as those in the RE-10, adopt a wideband, low open-loop gain design. A minimal amount of negative feedback is used, but, more important, it is kept constant over the entire audio spectrum. This assures the proper timing between the primary signal and any amplifier distortion components. The sonic benefits of this design include powerful, high-resolution bass, a natural, richly detailed midrange, and smooth, clear highs.

IMO, a bunch of marketing BS.

Bill Ayotte

Anybody buy those speakers? I am kicking myself in the **** for buying another F'in pre-amp......

JimBRICK

I have one of these free from an uncle in mint condition
Nackamichi CDP-2A cd player
I dont know how good it is but I can tell you my cd's sound better in it than in my dvd player

jflail2

Anybody buy those speakers? I am kicking myself in the **** for buying another F'in pre-amp......

Not I. I will have to take aesthetics into account, as that is the one thing the woman DOES care about. I got the Nak set up in the bedroom last night. Now I just need to find some practical bookshelves to go with it (and some extra $$ to pay for it!)

Thx Heiney, I figured as much after reading that...

JimBRICK

check frys out they have bookshelves on sale. I always liked my monitor 40's when I had them