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McIntosh MR78 upgrades?

I have an MR78 that's working well. 

I can bring it to Audio Classics, and for about a grand, get the power supply and audio section upgraded, and the tuner will be aligned. 

There's another shop, maybe 2 hrs from Audio Classics that does a power supply upgrade for $250, plus an alignment would be billed based on actual time on the bench. So let's say $350-$400. 

Is the audio section upgrade worth $600? Would be most interested to hear from people with Mac tuners that have had them modernized. 
128x128zavato
zavato's avatar
zavato OP
1,405 posts
 
Decided not to go the Audio Classics route. Selectivity is not an issue where I live and and I only have a handful of stations worth grabbing. Given that, I'm doing the recap and alignment and easily saving $600 in the process. That's solid $ to spend on music. 
zavato's avatar
zavato OP
1,405 posts
 
So I heard from the folks that I brought my MR78 to for recapping. They advise that some of the caps inside are just a few years old, and some are original. Apparently someone tinkered around inside several years back. I'm told the work was neat and high quality caps were used. Curious that whoever did the work a few years ago only replaced a few caps. 
barbapapa
244 posts
 
I had some good tuners in my audiophile life (Naim NAT01, Sequerra Ref) and still have a Tandberg 3001A for sale and a recently acquired Leak Troughline 2 (shipped to London Sound for check restoration and alignment) with De Paravicini stereo decoder, but never a Mac yet.
Sure one day I will have one but hesitate between MR78 and 77. I heard the "77" would be more musical sounding than the "78" model (without mods).  Did someone on the forum comared them ?

zavato's avatar
zavato OP
1,405 posts
 
So- to update this old thread I started years ago, the cap and LED work I had done in 2017 turned out to be $125 or so. In March 2020, but before NY went into lockdown, I sent my tuner to AC for Rich Modaferri to wave his magic wand over it. I’ve had my tuner back for a while now. It was worthwhile and dealing with Rich was both a pleasure and enlightening 
lewm
13,169 posts
 
cleeds, I am not in any way challenging your statement that FM radio is a "huge industry" in the US, but with all respect can you explain the why and how that works?  Thanks.
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