Budget tuner?

Or ... go back to the time when FM listening was considered as important as listening to vinyl or tapes. Go on ebay or your local Salvation Army (or sometimes even here on Audiogon) and pick up a vintage 70's or 80's receiver and use the receiver as your tuner. You would simply connect the tape out on the receiver (bypasses the receiver's controls) to your NAD's tuner input. Receivers to look for are: vintage Pioneer (something like a 636 or SX3600); Marantz 22XX series (one of the baby Marantz receivers ... 2215; 2216B); and Sherwood 7000 series (7100 had a great tuner). Yamaha, Onkyo, and Kenwood also made some great ones. Because you will not be concerned about the amp portion of the receiver, you will not have to chase some of the more mammoth and pricy receivers. Also, few things look nicer than one of the vintage analog receivers with their cool blue lights and silver faceplates. I have a Marantz 2216B in my main system (I also use a 2240 in my bedoom system, but as a receiver) and it has worked out quite nicely.

regards, Rich

I'd get one of the early ca.1980 solid state tuners off of ebay. Something like my sansui I got off of ebay for $7. On the right jazz broadcast, it betters my redbook front end. If FM is really, really good in your area, you might strong for one of great old tube tuners and either restore it yourself or have it professionally restored.

Many of the new tuners seem to be a notch or two below in sound quality compared to the old ones. And two, the FM broadcast is going to be the limited factor be the SQ of my $7 sansui tuner is. Even for uncompressed stations. Something to think about.

Aaron

used sansui :)

Try http://www.fmtunerinfo.com/ they have an extensive list of tuners and reviews.

I love my cheap Sony 550ES tuner. Also get a Magnum Dynalab ST2 antenna - makes a huge difference. Arthur