Vintage Marantz..

[J*E*Cole]

I've been thinking about buying a nice vintage Marantz receiver purely for fun, and mainly because some of them just look so cool with the machined knobs and cool blue lights etc... Can anyone tell me of some good sources to find these, and maybe even some models to look for? I would spend up to $750.00.

Thanks...

[ericl]

HI JE

I've had a lot of the old 70's receivers, including a couple Marantzezez. Pretty much get anything from the 22xx series, depending on your power needs. In the naming convention, the last two numbers represent their power ratings. I had a 2240b i gave to my buddy which has 40 watts. You will see units with and without the "B" designation, apparently the B's came out later. I'm not sure what the differences are, but people seem to think they are slightly "better" for whatever reason (just reporting here, i really have no clue). 2270's are the most popular, attractive, etc, but are slightly overpriced for that reason.

THe usual places to find them are eBay and Audiogon. Also, if you have an local online classifieds like Craigslist (http://www.craigslist.org) you can find them locally and inspect them first. With that big budget, look for a real cherry one and think about having it inspected and brought to spec by a local tech.

Another thing, some of these Marantzs seem to have problem with 4 ohm/difficult loads. Other than that, they are really great sounding receivers, very sexy, and lots of fun. They're tough too. The 2240b i gave to my friend looks like it was run over by truck, but sounds amazing! just like in their old ads.

More info here:
http://www.classic-audio.com
and
http://www.audioasylum.com/forums/vintage/bbs.html

-Eric

[J*E*Cole]

HI JE

I've had a lot of the old 70's receivers, including a couple Marantzezez. Pretty much get anything from the 22xx series, depending on your power needs. In the naming convention, the last two numbers represent their power ratings. I had a 2240b i gave to my buddy which has 40 watts. You will see units with and without the "B" designation, apparently the B's came out later. I'm not sure what the differences are, but people seem to think they are slightly "better" for whatever reason (just reporting here, i really have no clue). 2270's are the most popular, attractive, etc, but are slightly overpriced for that reason.

THe usual places to find them are eBay and Audiogon. Also, if you have an local online classifieds like Craigslist (http://www.craigslist.org) you can find them locally and inspect them first. With that big budget, look for a real cherry one and think about having it inspected and brought to spec by a local tech.

Another thing, some of these Marantzs seem to have problem with 4 ohm/difficult loads. Other than that, they are really great sounding receivers, very sexy, and lots of fun. They're tough too. The 2240b i gave to my friend looks like it was run over by truck, but sounds amazing! just like in their old ads.

More info here:
http://www.classic-audio.com
and
http://www.audioasylum.com/forums/vintage/bbs.html

-Eric

Cool, thanks for the fine info. BTW, I've never owned any Marantz stuff. new or old, would you say they are on the warm side (the older ones of course) or not?, and I recently upgraded my fronts in my main system to Infinity Beta 50's and moved my Alpha 50's to the l and r surround which replaced my Primus 360's that I would like to use for the Marantz in sweet 2 channel (I guess that's my only choice anyway), but do you see any problem driving some Primus 360's?

Thanks again...

[natlus]

[QUOTE=J*E*Cole]I've been thinking about buying a nice vintage Marantz receiver purely for fun

I got the Marantz bug in the last year, having picked up a 4230 Quad Receiver after reading so much about Marantz receivers on this and the classic audio site. The sound truly is warm (with my Paradigm mini monitors), and also the tuner section is outstanding--I've never had such a sensitive FM and AM radio. My Marantz also has that solid feel to its switches and knobs, to float your boat on top of the blue lights and old fashioned needles.

Like what the other gentleman said, they're built like tanks, and weigh as much. It also seems the Quads have their own rabid following, having just paid too much for a non working 4230 for its face plate and wood enclosure on ebay.

I should add that I bought my receiver from stealitback.com, an auction site run by the LA and NYC Police departments. At the time I was very naive about internet bidding and audio equipment, and really thought I would just get the receiver and start getting the proper parts. Lo and behold, with a smashed faceplate, it sounds beautiful, so it just proves how indestructible these bemoths are.

Good luck.

stealitback.com