The 1977 Apt/Holman preamp is one of the most famous preamps of all time. That’s partly because it was created by Tomlinson Holman, founder of Lucasfilm THX, co-founder of Audyssey Labs, and now working on audio product development at Apple. And it’s partly because the Apt/Holman preamp is such a graceful work, almost like a piece of laboratory gear as envisioned by one of IKEA’s industrial designers.
I love the cool little pushbuttons, which have mechanical covers inside that reveal green and white status indicators. No mere stereo/mono switch would have done for future surround-sound pioneer Holman; instead, he gave the preamp a mode dial that adjusted from full L+R (essentially a mono center-channel signal) to normal stereo to full L-R (essentially the signal that would go to the surround speakers in a Dolby Pro Logic setup). Infrasonic and ultrasonic filters save your woofers and tweeters from damage. The internal phono preamp’s cartridge loading options — capacitance from 50 to 400 pF in five steps, resistance at 47 Kohms or 100 Kohms — give more flexibility and fine-tuning than most of the today’s super-high-end phono pres. Want the full story? Here’s a PDF of the original review from Sound+Vision’s predecessor, Stereo Review.
There are so many great products from the past that either perform better, look better, or do both better than their current counterparts. You don't even have to even make subjective comparisons to arrive to this conclusion, either. The attention to detail many of the engineers had was outstanding.
The importance is that both modern designers and consumers should make comparisons between past and present to decide both how to design (what to focus) and what to buy (between 2nd hand in good condition or new).
The audio oscilloscope on the Marantz 2150 Tuner was for observing and correcting multipath in the FM Signal. By rotating your antenna (you did have a yagi antenna on a rotator, didn't you?) you would see the multipath change on the display. If you were in a metropollitan area with many high buildings, sometimes the best signal was a reflection off of a building. The scope gave you a visual indication of the strength of the multipath (noise) and allowed you an weasy way to minimize it. Also available in that time period was the Technics SH-3433, a standalone scope that provided FM Multipath viewing as well as 4 channel audio viewing.
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There are so many great products from the past that either perform better, look better, or do both better than their current counterparts. You don't even have to even make subjective comparisons to arrive to this conclusion, either. The attention to detail many of the engineers had was outstanding.
The importance is that both modern designers and consumers should make comparisons between past and present to decide both how to design (what to focus) and what to buy (between 2nd hand in good condition or new).
The audio oscilloscope on the Marantz 2150 Tuner was for observing and correcting multipath in the FM Signal. By rotating your antenna (you did have a yagi antenna on a rotator, didn't you?) you would see the multipath change on the display. If you were in a metropollitan area with many high buildings, sometimes the best signal was a reflection off of a building. The scope gave you a visual indication of the strength of the multipath (noise) and allowed you an weasy way to minimize it. Also available in that time period was the Technics SH-3433, a standalone scope that provided FM Multipath viewing as well as 4 channel audio viewing.