The best sounding FM Tuner is.....

Pioneer TX-9500 II

Pioneer TX-9800

Pioneer F-91

I own all three.

The TIC guys are Kenwood "'hos"....

Naim NAT 01 is a damn fine tuner but goes for silly money secondhand and thereby only chased by sadists and those with more money than sense,lol.
Then again Meridian did a tuner a thousand years ago the 104,
sounded rather good if my memory serves me.

McIntosh MR78
McIntosh MR88

without any doubts, the best I have heared are Revox tuners, the FM souns better than cds !!!

The best sounding I have direct experience with was the tuner in a Tandberg TR2080 receiver. Tandberg separates are supposedly even better.

I have a Carver tx11-a that is also pretty good, but not aas good as the Tandberg. If only more stations did not compress their signals into oblivion!

I'll nod "Yes" on the Tandberg 3011A and 3011. I have one of each and they are musical, smooth and clean sounding. The 3011 is paired with a Tandberg 3002A processor. It's a great multi-zone set-up because it adds volume with bass, treble controls, plus a loudness boost, great for distant zones. The 3011A has performed flawlessly in my main system about 5 years.

The "best" might just be too ambiguous ...but I am enjoying being a second owner of a recently aquired Mitsubishi DA-F20 which was a step up sonicly over my previous Sansui TU-717...both stock unmodfied...so far.

I have owned a few tuners over the years and recently a opportunity came about to buy a MR-78 with the Modafferi Mod done by Audio Classics and the unit looking like new. I could not believe the condition so I pulled the trigger.

Oh my what a gorgeous sounding pce, when not listening to my my vinyl I have this on 91.1 FM and is has many many times stopped me right in my tracks saying WOW!

I'm feel very fortuante.

I agree a modded MR78 is about as good as it gets, especially with proper high end antenna. Was lucky enough to side by side the 71, 77, and 78. All modded and the 71 had 3k in vintage tubes. Preferred the 78 for classical FM best but the 71 was better on rock. Found myself using the Wadia 27/270 for a paper weight, toggling tuners all night.

I own in my order of preference:
Rhode & Schwartz
Magnum Dynalab MD109
REL Precedent (stereo Charlie King conversion)
Marantz 10B
The R&S is by a margin the best.

There is no definitive "best" of anything. There are way too many variables involved. The "best" you can hope for is to find something that works well in your system. You can then say it's the "best" for you until you find something you think is better !!!!

Linn Kremlin is an excellent tuner.
What I like is the clean sound even for the piano. Most of other tuners do not good job for the dynamic music and produce some distortion.

The one that is aligned properly.

A friend recently purchased a Parasound Halo series amp and preamp. Since I was using a Parasound Halo T3 tuner, he wanted it badly. He traded me his Mcintosh MR78 straight across for it. He hardly listens to tuners, but wanted it mainly for the "looks". To say that I got the better end of the deal is a understatement. I have always wanted a MR78, I knew that they were good, but this thing is simply amazing. Jus using it is a pure joy, but the sound is the best I have heard through a tuner. I have had my share of them as well. I had a Day Seguerra a few years back, I didn't think that it was all that great. I had a MD Étude that was real nice, and I like the looks of it real well, but the sound was a bit thin and tinny. I have been trough a few Kenwoods, Pionears, Sansui's and a few others in my long bout with this addiction of mine.... And I really liked them all for different reasons. However, the Mcintosh is in a different world altogether. The look, the feel.. The way that they just drip of quality... (Ever pick up a MR78 and carry it a ways ?). But first and foremost "the Sound". The MR78 throws a soundstage from wall to wall with my DeCapo-i's. You can feel the musicians communicating with you. It doesn't try to win you over with extra artifacts like extra bass and punchy presentations. The Parasound Halo unit did plenty of that.... And it sounded good on some things. But late at night, listening to PBS and trying to relax with the Classical pieces, one has no need for punchy and bass-heavy. The MR78 really puts you in the seats to listen to the orchestra ... As it was meant to be.

My $0.0234 cents

Tony