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Vintage Kenwood?


christjared

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Are the vintage Kenwood reveivers/integraded good quality of electronics? What model number would be a good one to get? Do they compare to the vintage HK or Marantz receivers? Has anyone had experience with these, if so please let me know I am currently looking to find an old receiver for my KG4 speakers. Thanks

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Guest Anonymous

a lot of people here have the hk 430 which seems to be a very popular setup with the kg line and they swear by them, i personnally would stay away from kenwood all together esp the newer stuff (maybe not soverign), but then again i have limited expierence with their vintage stuff....

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I'd stay away from anything from the 80s or later. I had their top of the line A/V reciever from the early 80s (100 w) and it had a hard time driving KG4s! The 50 watt Nakamichi I replaced it with blew it away in every concievable regard.

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  • 6 years later...

In the 60's and 70's Ttrio, later Kenwood were were among the high end audio at par with Akai, Sansui, and Marantz, and where reknowned for their clean natural sound.

My Kenwood kr 2600 receiver and kd 2500 "rock" turntable bought in 1976 still sounds and looks beautiful. In the eighties with cd's and everything going digital, it seemed to ruin the quality of audio, don't single out Kenwood, look at all the great manufactures the time like Akai and Sansui, and what happened later to them after the seventies. Another loss with digital, is the missing sub-harmonics that are part of the vinyl recordings, so no matter how fine or expensive your digital equipment is, it is handicapped.

Hmm, I think i'll put on my Stevie Wonder "innervisions" album now.

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The Kenwood KA 7100, 8100 and top of the line 9100 are excellent receivers. I had the 8100 that was still working when I sold it last summer.

I still use a Kenwood Basic M2A amp that works great but the Basic C2 preamp has balance control problems so stay away from them.

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Many of the 70's and early 80's Kenwood products are outstanding in my opinion. They definately have models on par with comparable Pioneer, Sansui, Marantz and Yamaha. The TOTL Kenwood was probably always targeted as "High Mid-Fi" but in my experiance overdelivered and under appreciated. I have a KR1000B (KR="Kenwood Receiver") with 120wpc@8ohms both channels driven. This thing is a complicated marvel of electronics. Kind of like a fully loaded Crysler New Yorker", pick your year. This piece at low volume has a fabulous "loudness" circuit that makes my Heresy's sound like they are on tubes. Seriously!

The M2 I have experiance with is another "Brick", solid clean power and at 220 wpc/8ohm/both channels, more than enough for any normal worldly situation. Super clean, reliable, fast and articulate. No they are propably not on par with Krell or Pass Labs but the things are $300 and kick a..!

Kenwood was a big player that put out a lot of equipment. Later on it became a "brand" that put out a lot of equipment. My opinion is that most anything made pre 80's is decent and in most circumstances worth more that it is sold for.

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