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What makes the old McIntosh stuff so good?

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#183
I AB'd them with my own design and mine clearly sounds better to me. I asked some others their opinions and they say the same thing.

Nevertheless, it is an interesting circuit and will sound better to others. I wonder if cost and the fact they are a prestigious amplifiers cause people to claim they are really good. Also, I wonder if folks are not honest with themselves on sound quality of amplifiers.

I never had a chance to hear their modern tube amps. Maybe they improved them. Who knows?
 
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#186
Is'nt it more a quistion of synergi betwen the speaker and amp we hear. I had a well build 6l6gc pp amp with my old Martin logan quests and it sounded marvolus, Then i bought the new ML vantages and they actual sounded quite borring with that amp. After a lot of amp's i used a radford sta 15 for some time with great results, tooday i run Them with a MC 275 and it Sound quite good, the point being that bad gear often Sound bad, and good gear sometimes Sound good. Ill Think i keep the macintoch for some time 😉.
 
#187
I think that people ought to send me all the unwanted McIntosh amps, I will pay the shipping. Rusty is ok too. Working or not.

When you are listening to a vintage McIntosh, you are listening to a pile of carbon resistors and old paper caps. Now you know what that sounds like. This has everything to do with what you hear out of a vintage piece - we can skip the power supply for now.

_-_-
 
#191
I have rebuilt several Mac's the owners { China} wanted carbon and Paper caps.
Keen Mac owners prefer the old sound over Mac's done up with Polyprop or Mylar.
The Macs have excellent bass.very good damping.
To me they don't sound as good as much simpler designs, macs design fixes some problems but creates a lot more.
A good triode connected amp leaves them for dead
Phil
 
#192
I've had my Mc75's for the last 25 years, in that time I have put thousands of hours on them,I had one electrolytic fail 20 years ago(doubling cap)other than that, no problems,They have always sounded great to me,(I am sure they should be recapped by now,but they still sound fine) but the sound is also dependent on the preamp,I have a C22, a C20, Dynaco pas3x,MX110 they all sound different n their own ways.
The Mc240 sounds fine also,as well as the Fairchild 260's(C core transformers from 1959)
 
#195
Here is a link to the C22CE preamp schematic.

http://www.berners.ch/McIntosh/Downloads/C22CE_ser.zip

The phono preamp is just an ordinary active eq dual 12AX7 seen in all kinds of preamps. How do they get -80dB StoN out of something like that? The resistors are huge and the transconductance of the 12AX7 does not compare to E88CC's or 6C45P's. Do they pick the least noisy tubes from a bunch? What about the resistors?
 
#196
BRSHiFi said:
Here is a link to the C22CE preamp schematic.

http://www.berners.ch/McIntosh/Downloads/C22CE_ser.zip

The phono preamp is just an ordinary active eq dual 12AX7 seen in all kinds of preamps. How do they get -80dB StoN out of something like that? The resistors are huge and the transconductance of the 12AX7 does not compare to E88CC's or 6C45P's. Do they pick the least noisy tubes from a bunch? What about the resistors?
Click to expand...

Which of the many files shows the12AX7 tube? All I can find are a couple op-amps
 
#198
The C22CE is a tricky schematic to read, you just have to pick it out.

The C2500 preamp also claims a -80dB StoN, and both the MM and MC stages are the same as the C22CE.

http://www.berners.ch/McIntosh/Downloads/C2500_ser.pdf

This is much easier to read. The phono stage is on page 66-67. The phono stage is mostly tube, but there are solid state components in the signal path, making it a hybrid (yet it is advertised as a tube preamp).

Is it normal for the low 70's (-70 to -75dB down) to sound like "Niagara Falls" with the volume open wide on a phono stage?
 
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#200
BRSHiFi said:
The C22CE is a tricky schematic to read, you just have to pick it out.

The C2500 preamp also claims a -80dB StoN, and both the MM and MC stages are the same as the C22CE.

http://www.berners.ch/McIntosh/Downloads/C2500_ser.pdf

This is much easier to read. The phono stage is on page 66-67. The phono stage is mostly tube, but there are solid state components in the signal path, making it a hybrid (yet it is advertised as a tube preamp).

Is it normal for the low 70's (-70 to -75dB down) to sound like "Niagara Falls" with the volume open wide on a phono stage?
Click to expand...

I did not read the whole thread, but I took a quick look of this schematic. This is so complicated.:smash:. This is only a preamp!!!! How can they have so so so many stuff in it? I am new in audiophile, but I have been designing a lot of analog and digital circuit in the pass 30 years as an engineer. One thing I learn, if it looks too complicated, it is too complicated!!!:smash: This is way way way too complicated no matter what excuse they can come up. There is a lot of truth about "less is more".

Sorry, I have to put in my two cents. I did listened to one or two McIntosh before, I was not impressed to put it politely. You sure it's not like people taking prescription medication, then they have to take a second medication to deal with the side effect of the medication. Then have to take another medication to counteract the effect of the second medication that deal with the side effect of the first medication??!!! And so on and so on?
 
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