Absolutely Yamaha is making great 2 channel gear today. An example is the highly spoken of A-S2100 integrated amp. Highly praised with many personal reviews of it on various different forums too.
Yamaha Audio products from the past? vs. more current.
There was a time when Yamaha high end audio gear was well thought of....items like the B-1 and B-2 amps, the NS-1000 speakers, the CT-1000 tuner and more. My questions are: Are any of you on this forum/site still using any of that gear? I know there have been some well thought of tuners, like the 85, but how has Yamaha audio gear been in the recent past? Is any of it in the league of the best from the U.S., England, etc.?
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I still own an M80 power amp that I bought new in 1984 along with a matching pre amp (C80) and tuner. About 3 years ago I had the amp completely restored and it came back as new. I used it for 6 months and came across a deal on a Pass 250.8 which I purchased but to be honest there is little difference in the sound of these two amps driving my Aerial 7T's at the volume I listen at most of the time. I think the Yamaha gear was really good back in the day and you can still find these amps for cheap dough on ebay. Unfortunately these are not without issues. The speaker connections, bonding glue used on the circuit boards and of course the age of internal components will almost surely degrade what once was a very decent sounding component. In my rig there is a difference between the two amps but it is not easy to distinguish at low to moderate volume. Perhaps a more demanding pair of speakers might make the difference more obvious? I still have a review for both the preamp and amp that was published in Stereo Review, November 1984 and the commentary and measurements are impressive. Some years back I met a fellow that bought the same components while he was stationed in Japan and was in the middle of moving his house. He got tired of lugging the stuff around so he gave them to me. Just a couple months ago a fellow A'goner was looking for a Tuner so I gave away the T80 tuner to him and last I heard he was loving it which makes me smile. As @mjcmt mentioned, I think their newer gear is still very good, but not sure how it compares to the other brands. If you are interested in staying on the fattest part of the diminishing returns curve, the Yamaha is probably still a strong contender. |
Wow, just read a quick review online and they sound impressive. Yamaha is not the first company I think of when talking about loudspeakers but it is great to see that they are getting back in with renewed commitment. Will be interested in your experience once you take delivery and get them broken in. Best of luck! |
I use a Yamaha R-N803 receiver. I’ve had lots of high end gear over the years. It’s very, very good. I’ve recommended it to a number of people. Check out my system page. Here is is an info link: https://www.crutchfield.com/S-7Mw4aUSrU1u/p_022RN803/Yamaha-R-N803.html |
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