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Wow! Beautiful beasts.

I remember sony's version was "Gibraltar". They were supposed to have a slab of rock in the chassis. I had a pioneer elite LDP very elegant and capable,. It got smashed into oblivion when I came back from overseas. A forklift rammed it. I was poorly compensated for my loss. They paid me just under half replacement cost, because in the USA, prices were higher than in Asia.

As an aside, the Hartsfield and Klipschorn suffer from a rather noticeable timing miss alignment from low end to the 375 driver, the crossover does not delay the signal to the 375 to bring it all back into time alignment. That’s the reason Bell Labs/WE developed the large format Voice of the Theater A4/2/1 bass cabinets to help mitigate that aspect of the fabulous Shear Bass Horn speaker. It was done by utilizing a front loaded horn with a bass reflex cabinet with a port (s) so the diaphragm of the 288(s) could be physically aligned using a RTA versus a folded back horn

They also offered the Hartsfield with an 8 inch “full range” JBL speaker driver that utilized the folded bass horn plus the acoustic 537(?) lens. The Paragon to me is still the top dog from JBL. You should seek at a pair of Altec 820s for a listen, preferably with 803 low end drivers with the paper rolls for the edge suspension, they are decently sublime because they do mid-bass into midrange very nicely.

Great video! Something to add to the timeline was the whole cassette tape and boom box phase, some of those units were pretty amazing. BTW, I still have my 1977 Pioneer SX-950 receiver which has been super reliable and continues to front my system in my home office. In terms of future, I wonder if I could get used to not having buttons and lights that I can physically touch? Of course, I said that same thing about my iphone, so I guess the answer is "yes". Time will tell.

Great review of a true classic speaker , Altec 604 and Stax crossover. I’m solidly in the Altec camp however I did notice the iMF Reference speaker next to Big Red. I still have a pair of IMF TLS-50, similar to the big boys but instead of the KEF oval bass driver mine has a 10in driver

NICE!!

I have many pieces that need work! I can't find someone competent (tech) to fix them. I'm in so.california

No, I love vintage audio, it's the ultimate combo of electronics and machinery!

The trouble with collecting things is there is always someone who wants you to sell them something. There are also those who will ask you to let them have what you worked hard to get. That works my last nerve, SMH.

I had a 2325 in high school, but I sold it in the early 1990s. I bought a 2275 not too many years ago. 😢😢 The burned-out dial light adds to the provenance of your unit.

Well, these speakers sounded amazing, I miss them.

"Sansui" is the old japanese art of ink paintings that look black and white.

Not everyone can dedicate a room for theatre,...but a relatively simple surround system in the basic home can be amazing,...large TV, 2 pairs speakers,,focus on the stereo pair,...you will have great music and amazing movie nights, in your living room with happy other half ...😄

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I would like to see a video on these speakers. I wonder what kind of wood they used how they were put together. Good video. Thanks for sharing.

You’re gonna want to leave those pieces on for about two or three days to give the capacitors a little bit of stability after being off for so long. Huge pioneer fan from the 70s and 80s.

Sorry, but I couldn't get through the 10 minute dissertation about the history of home entertainment. I scanned ahead but lost interest by that time.

Beautiful

Absolutely correct without any question. Period

It took the first 8 minutes to talk about the history of home sound reproduction from the late 1800s and every generation of innovation, before starting to mention about home theatre after the 8 minute mark . This video has no chapters so you can't skip ahead. This video has the title to ask one big question, which is why home theatre died (or the market of), and i have no idea when that's going to be answered in the video . The speaker speaks in a relative slow pace also. Sorry i just can't finish this video. You should have chapters or let us know when you are going to answer that question you posed and not going to give us a lesson in home audio production history.

Lenny's videos can be pretty entertaining, and he shows a lot of neat vintage stuff. That said, he seems to be a sucker for lots of knobs, buttons, meters and lights (I know - we all are to some extent) and doesn't always talk in depth about sound quality, design differences, or audio engineering philosophies. There's nothing wrong with that approach, but when judgements on what's "the best" are based on size and looks more than performance or value, I have some doubts. In any case, I enjoy your channel - keep up the great work. 👍

Hi I,m looking for ma 2285b marantz. You got one?

super cool seeing the auction stuff, I would have payed double for the tannoy,s they look like the cheetah brand.

If anyone has something from the Pioneer Elite brand, do your best to keep it. They have great sound and have a tendency to last a very long time. I was surprised that Pioneer also had an Elite line for DVD and Blu-Ray players as well.

We have a Pioneer 7 channel receiver hooked up to a sub-woofer and 6 speakers. When we watch tv at our place, then at someone else's place, what a difference!! We have a 65in Samsung TV that has a beautiful picture.

The Pioneer Elite Series, are they still made in Japan at this point ?

Is this your basement? It's very nice.

1 speaker 🔊 to 9 speakers and 1 subwoofer. CD does 9 speakers sound.

Hi and thanks for the great review. One question; can the "Dolby NR/ 4-CH ADAPTOR" jacks be used to add an additional input device such as a streamer/DAC or a third tape deck? I have a Marantz 2325 receiver that I really like but it only has a single AUX input. Another input would really come in handy. Thanks again.

People like to get too technical.. I can just enjoy a song whether its on a phone speaker or my KLH system. A good EQ can get you where you like on most 3 way speakers at normal listening volume. Before you get too wrapped up in specs, remember its about a song taking your mind somewhere. You really dont have to spend more than $300 on good sound. Kinda like spending $50000 on a watch. It just doesn't add up to anything but LOOK AT ME!!

I have never seen or heard of this line mentioned in any magazine. If they were mine, I would never part with them voluntarily

This is from the Black man O.G. and music loving audiophile(my full title🤣)The build quality and looks of the Pioneer Elite, the Onkyo Integre and Sony ES were great. The preamps and power amps from these and others however, were no match sonically for the humble looking NAD and Hafler 120a preamp/power amp combo I was using at the time. I still have the Hafler 120a and use it during the spring and summer to biamp the midrange and treble of my Maggie 1.6's It has the classic Dynaco tube sound in abundance!(love the sound of mosfets!). During the fall and winter I use the Conrad Johnson mv55 in its place. That Pioneer Elite turntable( which I would have loved to own)was the one standout piece at the time and it's still cutting edge today. Also the Rotel 955ax cd player I was using was superior to to those offered by these companies at the time.

Great video Scott, Enjoyed it

Although a very pretty receiver, I always tell people to go for a Sansui QRX-x001 series receiver if they're looking to get into quad. The matrix decoders in Pioneer stuff were always lackluster, with obvious pumping and steering effects when decoding SQ material. Sure, Sansuis only had center front/back logic when it came to SQ decoding but at least the second generation Vario-Matrix circuits can hold you over with QS-encoded material until you found an external SQ decoder (Lafayette, Sony, Tate or even a newer digital Surround Master). CD-4 is something I never dealt with. Too much hassle when you can just grab the quad 8 track or reel version of an RCA/JVC/Warner album.

I truly believe we hit a plateau in overall loudspeaker performance in the 80's weve been gently coasting going on almost 40 years now. Those Altec 505's at the top of the ad @ 2:00 are of the same model line as mine. Mine being the 501 featuring a second 10" woofer per cabinet. Carbon Fiber cones, Diamond Desposited tweeters. Still "bleeding edge" materials used in a considerable number of speakers currently in production! And they were doing it in 1986!

That's a beautiful set Scott! Also another great video. JVC was also making some high end gear at that time. I owned a stack of 1010 series pieces that I will send you some pics of.

I remember these. Your collection is awesome! Really love they made a laser disc player!

Unfortunately like many Pioneer amps and preamps were laced with ICs replacing the discreet components of their 70s gear and this provide a significant cost saving. Also power supplies were somewhat shrunken compared to past units, also for costs saving. Yes emphasis was put into the cosmetics perhaps a bit too much at the expense of the all important circuitry inside. Also Japanese firms adopted the unfortunate trick of apply too much global feedabck in the amp/preamp designs which gives great paper specs but under dynamic conditions driving speaker loads tends to sound harsh. In my opinion based on experience with many Pioneer components the the high end products they made mid 70s (eg., Spec 1, Spec 2, etc) sounded superior. Bottom line... discreet circuits, beefed up power supplies and moderate use of feedback produces superior sounding amps/preamps. Something that most Japanese components of the 80s had abandoned to save money and fool the consumer with superficially great paper specs measured by steady state sine waves into an 8 ohm resistor.

Those chassis elements are not copper. It's copper plated steel. Copper plated steel chassis were used by Sherwood among others in the late 1950's / early 1960's; for example the Sherwood S5500 integrated amplifier. The concept was that the copper plating has higher conductivity than plain steel, thus draining away noise currents better. You see this in shortwave and ham radio gear sometimes too. Solid copper chassis parts are not used because it would be incredibly expensive and copper is too soft to cut threads into for fasteners, the thing would fall apart when handled. Also, a lot of self-tapping screws are used in chassis construction, and they would just strip out in copper unless the copper was over 1/8" thick. Some companies went a step further and SILVER plated certain steel pieces - H.H. Scott had silver plated shield panels on the front end of their FM tuners; silver is even a better electrical conductor than copper. It does speak of an attempt to improve product quality, but I doubt it has any actual electronic impact on sound performance. Good marketing, though.

Had no idea. I thought pioneers quality fell off the cliff after the 70s. I like what I'm seeing here. Don't see much of it for sale on market place

Wow, nice video! I’m a Pioneer collector from Europe. In Europe these series called: Urushi. The Urushi C-90(a) pre amp has no remote and video inputs, that’s why I purchased a Japanese C-90a.

Thanks for this video. I have the Elite receiver/ theater surround sound A/V pre amp unit. It was my grandfather's he bought new when I was just out of high school. He had a very nice system and he had a full size satellite dish with a top end Chapparal satellite tuner. Only very wealthy people had full size auto tuning motor driven sat dishes in those days. He bought that because he lived in Beverly Hills but was a huge S.F. 49ers football fan and wanted to be able to watch every game no matter where they were playing. But my brother and I ended up with his audio system after he passed away. My brother has the Elite set up in one room and he has MacIntosh system in another room. I have a Sound Craftsmen receiver, pre amp equalizer ready to be set up and I have a late 1980s Yamaha DSP - A3090 amp theater surround unit a Pioneer PLX turntable and Sony and Elac shelf speakers and tube amp turntable pre amp and a tube driven Bluetooth receiver set up in my bedroom. I like the high end audio from the '80s. My dad had a Fischer system in the '80s. Before that he had high end system when I was very young in the mid - late 1960s with Fischer speakers Gerard turntable I can't remember what receiver and amp he had back then anrba Teac reel to reel

Some of the Fischer gear from the 80's is very good. I just picked up a Fischer receiver from the mid 80's from a thrift store for $15 and the build quality and sound quality is very good. It is very similar to some of the late 70's JVC gear that I have internally and I wonder if it was made by JVC? ( I love the USA Fischer gear from the 60's and used to collect that. )

No Scott you rock!!!😅

I had the Pioneer C90 with a Onkyo M508. Traded the c90 for a Carver preamp. WOW! I was right that c90 wasn't very good.

You have an amazing collection! These look fantastic. I had heard of the Pioneer Elite but never heard them play. BPC did dominate the decade and I lost interest because of that and the high cost of the nicer gear. Marriage and kids and destitution 😂killed hifi for me for nearly 30 years.

I own a 1983 Harman Kardon PM-650 amplifier and I would put it's sound and performance against anything. It's silver finish is beautiful too. I owned a pair of 1984 DCM Time Window speakers for 34 years and I loved them too. Great info Scott, and an incredible system! BTW How did they keep the copper from turning green?

This system is a great find👍- 👍

I was in high school in the late 80’s and would salivate over this gear. We only had a Circuit City back then, so they only carried so much Elite gear, but it was way out of my price range. A lot of this top of the line gear from this era is fairly reasonable these days and I’ve been able to pick up some nice stuff for fairly cheap, at least compared the silver era, 70’s gear that has skyrocketed.