A few of my favourites

[Beosystem10]

Hi all, new boy posting images, here's hoping these work:

My B&O, the box that inspired my forum handle (yeah, a little lacking in imagination I know).

All of its other controls are hidden away, below the cassette door, hence the uncluttered look, I realise it hardly yells "LOUD" by the way it looks but trust me, the thing can drown out my GF555 and still sound good! GF555 is a work in progress, no pics as yet since bits of it are all over the room.

And here's my much-loved Technics.

The Hacker Cassette Sovereign:

There are others, one day they'll all work as well as thae three do. Honestly, they will.

 

[devol-toni]

That technics is

 

[Beosystem10]

Yeah, it is isn't it. It's had three new clutches, two sets of audio output chips, a lot of resoldering to keep its edge-mounted LEDs and the Line/phono sockets at the back working, a new tweeter in the left speaker followed one week later by the right one, a few electrolytic caps to replace various ones that had started to weep electrolyte over the years and a blanket resolder of every component on every board last year, plus replacement of the remaining original electrolytics.
I don't know why Matsushita had to cram everything in so randomly when their National Panasonic branded stuff is usually so much easier to work on but it's all been worth it since the sound of the beast is just so amazingly good.

 

[AE_Stereo]

Hi all, new boy posting images, here's hoping these work:

My B&O, the box that inspired my forum handle (yeah, a little lacking in imagination I know).
...

Great to see the B&O.
I had an eye on it. How does it sound? You said it is loud, but eager to know the quality of sound and the features.

 

[MKS]

2 lovely boxes, you are of to a good start

About the B&O or, Beosystem 10, it's definetly one of the best sounding boxes (of that sice) that i own, heavy and with a metal frame, a real quality box.

I'm from Denmark, where these were made. On my local "ebay" there are always 3-5 of these for sale, so naturally i bought one.
It has a hidden panel under the casette door, here are the sliders for tone (or "Accustic mode" as it is called ), balance, stereo-mode, and tape type.
It also has 3 FM-presets. Oh and of course it has aux/phono In .

If you see one, and the price is good, i would say, grab one!

 

[oldskool69]

Nice stuff! And definitely understand about the issues with layout of equipment. It's amazing that the same family (Matsushita) could have so many wild variants in its products. Even if they shared the same basic chassis.

 

[Reli]

That B&O looks very cool

Reminds me of this video ---- it's just a joke, don't kill me!

[youtube]tyZspqjtG2k[/youtube]

 

[Northerner]

Woop!...another northerner!! Welcome!

Nice Technics

 

[Beosystem10]

Hi all, new boy posting images, here's hoping these work:

My B&O, the box that inspired my forum handle (yeah, a little lacking in imagination I know).
...

Great to see the B&O.
I had an eye on it. How does it sound? You said it is loud, but eager to know the quality of sound and the features.

It sounds superb. Far more true to the source than the Technics and with a bass line that is not only capable of depth, but is tuneful on reggae bass lines and that legendarily bass-heavy intro to "Blue Monday" by New Order sounds good on it too.
Unfortunately, these B&Os are prone to wear on the cassette door hinges causing the door to drop and catch on the top of the flap beneath that's there to facilitate access to the other controls, these being shown in the photo that should be appearing below.
I had it apart last year and did improve the door droop to a point but the sleeves that I made on the lathe to fit around those hinges started to wear the plastic parts that move around them and now I'm going to have to operate again. The clearance between the two opening parts is only intended to be around 0.6mm so needless to say, it'll have to be a careful job.
There's one on eBay UK just now and I was toying with the idea of buying that as the seller - when I asked him - told me that there's no door droop at all on the one he's selling. Trouble is, this wouldn't provide a solution in the long term as regular use would make the repair necessary on that example too at some point so I think I'll let it go but trust me when I say that the asking price isn't out of the way. Go for it, someone will and that person will be happy with their purchase. Unless that is they only want it as an MP3 player dock! The line inputs are a little insensitive compared to those on the GF555 or especially those on that Technics, so much so in fact that it works better if the input sensitivity is switched for a moving magnet cartridge input and the output level on the MP3 device reduced to suit. Worth doing though.

2 lovely boxes, you are of to a good start

About the B&O or, Beosystem 10, it's definetly one of the best sounding boxes (of that sice) that i own, heavy and with a metal frame, a real quality box.

I'm from Denmark, where these were made. On my local "ebay" there are always 3-5 of these for sale, so naturally i bought one.
It has a hidden panel under the casette door, here are the sliders for tone (or "Accustic mode" as it is called ), balance, stereo-mode, and tape type.
It also has 3 FM-presets. Oh and of course it has aux/phono In .

If you see one, and the price is good, i would say, grab one!

Agreed! Here's that photo of the controls that hide behind that flap:

(No, it isn't distorted, my camera phone does that and my "real" camera is, as usual when I want to use it, dead in the battery department!)


@ the Steve Coogan clip, I've been into the local B&O retailer after parts for one of my older radios, the subject came round to the Beosystem 10 and they ripped the p*** out of me as they don't regard these as "proper" B&O, probably on account of its having a reliable, Japanese (Hitachi or Tosh, not sure) tape transport mech. Meh, do I care?

 

[Reli]

[youtube]6pLROuX-hw0[/youtube]

 

[bklyn sound]

love the b&o...

 

[Beosystem10]

I've always believed that Coogan based that character on one of my ex-bosses from work, that clip confirms it!

 

[alfie]

Cracking posts Reli!!!!!!!!!

The old Alan Partridge stuff is my all time favourite

 

[Beosystem10]

And hands up anyone who can honestly say that they don't know someone just like him!

More box content coming up:

That GF555, quickly reassembled for the picture :

Hitachi. It sounds truly awful IMHO, maybe it's just a bad example? I don't know, I can't actually find anything wrong with it but how did they sell these things if they're all as bad as this one, which nevertheless had to be rescued, just don't ask me to justify being the sucker who took it in and gave it electricity:

I live in hope that the boombox fairy will come down the chimney in the night, take the Hitachi away and leave me a shiny sixpence in its place.

 

[goodman]

That technics is

This is good boombox with powerful sound...

 

[oldskool69]

...That GF555, quickly reassembled for the picture...

So Fresh and So Clean, Clean...

 

[Beosystem10]

Yeah, the old Sharp box scrubs up well, but enough about the Mrs......

That technics is

This is good boombox with powerful sound...

Yes, it certainly is.

I've recently bought this one to keep it company:

Now, the JVC is a great box, don't get me wrong, it's competent, I love the thing for its build quality, its FM sensitivity and the fact that it really does get the best out of my favourite TDK SA tapes, but today, for no reason other than because I could, I connected it to the speakers from the Technics. Wow! So that's how good those can sound. Remarkable! I might just go to the hut and make myself some brackets.

 

[oldskool69]

Beosystem...the one thing you will find with the PC-11 (and some other JVC's of this type) is that somehow the got it wrong with the speakers. Don't get me wrong, they sound great but very bass shy. Plus, the only model I know of where JVC got it right with a single full range driver was the PC-5.

Sawpping speakers is pretty common for the PC-11. Regardless, you have a good looking one so have fun with it which I know you will.

 

[Beosystem10]

....have fun with it which I know you will.

Oh Hell yeah, I'm loving the thing already. It's a curate's egg if compared to my B&O but the thing with that is that those good parts make it all worth owning the JVC; the cassette transport and quality of the head, plus that ANRS which I love about JVC kit, make the deck itself the equal in most ways to my old Aiwa ADF 410 Hi-Fi separate cassette deck. The tuner is even more sensitive on FM than that found in my best multiband Grundig radio and the audio amp has been showing me what it can do when connected to a pair of Wharfdale Delta 50s that I have as part of my TV surround sound setup.
So if I can replace the existing speakers with a two way arrangement like that in the Technics, reversible and invisible of course, then I'll give it what it deserves otherwise, it's an excellent piece of engineering whose build quality makes even the big Sharp look average. Little details like the feel of the controls and the way it's all laid out internally are impressive. Darn it, I just fell in love again.

 

[floyd]

....have fun with it which I know you will.

Oh Hell yeah, I'm loving the thing already. It's a curate's egg if compared to my B&O but the thing with that is that those good parts make it all worth owning the JVC; the cassette transport and quality of the head, plus that ANRS which I love about JVC kit, make the deck itself the equal in most ways to my old Aiwa ADF 410 Hi-Fi separate cassette deck. The tuner is even more sensitive on FM than that found in my best multiband Grundig radio and the audio amp has been showing me what it can do when connected to a pair of Wharfdale Delta 50s that I have as part of my TV surround sound setup.
So if I can replace the existing speakers with a two way arrangement like that in the Technics, reversible and invisible of course, then I'll give it what it deserves otherwise, it's an excellent piece of engineering whose build quality makes even the big Sharp look average. Little details like the feel of the controls and the way it's all laid out internally are impressive. Darn it, I just fell in love again.

i love this jvc , i think it's the most over looked box in history .
every part of these are tank like in build quality . they have power but the woofers are full range and the cabinets are not well tuned for most modern music , when listening to 80's music on these sounds great .lil' wayne not so great just not made for that kind of bass . mids and highs though are killer.