Comin' at you live from the chill zone

[Roboturner91]

IMG_0114

• Roboturner91
• Jul 20, 2018
• 1

Feeling pretty good about this setup. Is it particularly high-end, no. But it sounds really nice to me and honestly may be on the verge of overkill for this room, which is a 12x12 home office.

Receiver is Yamaha RX-V850, Pro Logic AVR from around 1992.
Equalizer is Yamaha EQ-550, not a great EQ but has some cool features - spectrum analyzer, subsonic filter
Disc player is Yamaha CDX-560, got this last year, was new old stock

In case you couldn't tell. I'm a big fan of the early 90s Yamaha stuff. It's well built, looks nice, sounds good, and also has a nostalgia factor for me. It's also super affordable - in fact, the receiver, equalizer and CD player combined cost me $59.

The RX-V850 especially is a real sleeper in my book, this was around $1000 when new and it's not at all what you would expect from a surround receiver. This thing is a beast and has a very good phono section, and in two-channel mode sounds as powerful and musical as any silver-faced gear I have heard. Yamaha was making some great gear with few compromises at this time.

Turntable is Technics SL-B20, soon to be replaced with the black version of the same table. I'm not a huge turntable guy, decent p-mounts like this are plenty satisfying for my needs.

Speakers are Canton Karat 300. I haven't had these long. Still getting accustomed to the sound. For a couple hours this afternoon I was feeling some buyer's remorse. I think my mood must have been getting in the way, because they sound pretty great right now. It may also be that they are simply very revealing of poor source material.

Stand is Pangea Audio Vulcan. Not the last word in rigidity but it's OK. There aren't a lot of cheap options when it comes to stands. If I had it to do over again I probably would've spent the extra $50 and got the Sanus AFA instead. Speaker stands are Paradigm Premier and originally matched with the Paradigm 7SE Mk2, but they sit just the right height here since my "listening chair" is a beanbag chair. LOL.

Also I just got an iPhone 7 and it's incredible how good the camera is compared to my previous cheap Android. Holy moly.

 

[Nightwisher]

Sweet! Very clean setup.

 

[Dave_1962]

That'll do nicely!

 

[guiller]

Nice system!

 

[Rome]

Mighty fine!

Rome

 

[squirrelnest]

Good looking system.....

 

[swechsler]

Old high end Prologic receivers are actually a bargain these days for use in a two channel system. Home theater users won't touch them, and most people looking for a stereo don't even consider them. But there was a lot of great stuff made in the early 90s that should still work fine.

 

[Roboturner91]

Old high end Prologic receivers are actually a bargain these days for use in a two channel system. Home theater users won't touch them, and most people looking for a stereo don't even consider them. But there was a lot of great stuff made in the early 90s that should still work fine.

Yep, there's tons of them out there and they're dirt cheap.

 

[Bucky Badger]

Bet it sounds great. Looks good too.

 

[Treyfus84]

Very clean...and minimalist...I like it

 

[Guest126]

Good stuff all around.

 

[Wildcat]

Old high end Prologic receivers are actually a bargain these days for use in a two channel system. Home theater users won't touch them, and most people looking for a stereo don't even consider them. But there was a lot of great stuff made in the early 90s that should still work fine.

A buddy of mine just donated a Rotel surround preamp with an add-on DTS decoder to Salvation Army since nobody wanted it. These days, video is all digital, and done via a single HDMI cable. This preamp had the S-video inputs, composite inputs, tons of audio in/out jacks, etc. It was in nice shape (he bought it a demo, never had a chance to use it), but it was about as dated as platform shoes, leisure suits and chest hair wigs.

 

[Roboturner91]

IMG_0137

• Roboturner91
• Jul 22, 2018

Closer look, I just dig the aesthetic of this era of Yamaha gear. It's almost....German? in design, construction and overall functionality. I have some silver-face stuff too, mostly Yamaha and Technics. I like it all but this setup really suits me right now. Also, remote control is a huge deciding factor for me these days.

 

[Drugolf]

I really like the look of those Cantons. Tell me more. Too bad the aren't mirrored.

 

[Roboturner91]

I really like the look of those Cantons. Tell me more. Too bad the aren't mirrored.

I've had that same thought myself. I have 3 nitpicks on these speakers - one, they aren't mirrored. Two, the binding posts are kind of funky and you can't really get a secure connection with bananas. Three the sticky domes are just dust magnets and I hate dust.

but, they sound really nice and I can fix at least the binding post thing, when I get some time. Still looking for a solution on cleaning the sticky domes.

I like them a lot....If there are specific questions you have feel free to ask!

 

[imral3]

I'm diggin' the setup!!

 

[Burner]

Really nice setup. I like the Canton's a lot. They are pretty.

 

[lightcapture]

I truly like your Canton speakers.
Looks like their version of ADS.

 

[Roboturner91]

I truly like your Canton speakers.
Looks like their version of ADS.

Somebody else here probably has a better insight into the relationship between ADS and Canton but there's definitely some parts being shared at least. They also have the same general sound profile.

 

[jdmccall]

I think ADS was more closely associated with Braun, but there definitely is a similarity. Must be a German thing. Perforated steel grilles, dome mids, etc. Whatever...I like your rig!