AR X-10 reciever

[Guest picasso928]

new to the forum. just bought AR X-10 reciever. being also new AR products, did i get a decent piece? Seems to work great w/ nice sound. to early to judge though. any feed back is great. thanks

[ar_pro]

Wasn't the X-10 receiver part of the late-'80s Asian-made electronics line that the (then) owners of Acoustic Research marketed under the AR brand? I believe there were integrated amplifiers, a cassette deck and a CD player, as well.

These shouldn't be confused with the original "AR Amplifier", "AR Tuner", and "AR Receiver" that date to the late '60s, and were very highly-regarded in the equipment reviews of that time.

[Guest picasso928]

thanks for the response. i didn't know about it's history. the reciever has a flip down face on the right to control th audio properties etc. i will say that even though it is a crapy reciever I paid $10 for @ a yard sale, it sounds very nice when connected to a pair of Bose Acoustimass subwoofers and a pair of 301's. a former friend of mine has a plinius integrated amp w/vienna speaker's {tower's}. he has over $6K invested and i think mine setup sounds better. am i wrong in assuming this reciever is junk?

[administrator]

I don't think I would call the X-10 "junk" .. for those more in the know, weren't the X-10 vintage AR products the precursors to NAD?

Mark

[Guest dogmeninreno]

>thanks for the response. i didn't know about it's history.

>the reciever has a flip down face on the right to control th

>audio properties etc. i will say that even though it is a

>crapy reciever I paid $10 for @ a yard sale, it sounds very

>nice when connected to a pair of Bose Acoustimass subwoofers

>and a pair of 301's. a former friend of mine has a plinius

>integrated amp w/vienna speaker's {tower's}. he has over $6K

>invested and i think mine setup sounds better. am i wrong in

>assuming this reciever is junk?

I wouldn't call it junk at all. I had one and really enjoyed it. Here is a link to the blue book on the X-10 if you are interested? Dale http://cgim.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/bb.pl?aco...zz24FzU1H8neBlg

[Steve F]

>I don't think I would call the X-10 "junk" .. for those more

>in the know, weren't the X-10 vintage AR products the

>precursors to NAD?

>

>Mark

>

This is the story of the AR-NAD connection as recounted to me by the founder of NAD America, who I know quite well.

In Europe, the manner in which Hi Fi equipment is delivered to the market is somewhat different than it is in the US. In the US, the really large speaker companies like Bose, JBL, Boston Acoustics, the Japanese electronics giants like Pioneer, Sony, Panasonic, Toshiba, etc. are all handled by a factory-direct sales force that calls on the retailers directly and sells them the products. A Bose salesperson calls on the buying office of Circuit City and presents the line. They negotiate terms, advertising money, etc. and Bose ships into Circuit’s warehouses accordingly.

The smaller companies like Denon or Rotel or Paradigm are handled by independent sales representative firms ("Reps") who call on the dealers, write the orders, and submit those orders to the US headquarters of those companies. The goods are then shipped from the company warehouses, and the rep is paid a commission on the sale. Reps may have several different lines of products that they represent. A good rep will have a major electronics line, a speaker line, maybe a car audio or radar detector line, some accessory or cable lines, etc. That way, they have all their bases covered and not too many "eggs in one basket." Various rep firms handled AR in the US across the country in the 1970’s.

In Europe, things work quite differently. Because the market is so much smaller in each given country compared to the US, the manufacturers can’t afford to set up their own expansive, elaborate warehouse/distribution centers in every country. Instead, the manufacturers set up what are known as "Rep-Distributors" to handle the different markets. The manufacturers sell their products directly to the rep-distributors, who stock it in their own warehouses, and then they sell it themselves to the dealers, using their own salespeople.

In the early-mid 1970’s, AR’s European rep-distributors had a very strong relationship with Marantz. It was a good combination. A salesperson calling on a major retailer in the UK or in France could offer that dealer ‘one-stop’ shopping: "Here’s a great speaker line for you (AR) and here’s a great line of electronics to go with it (Marantz). We can ship the whole order together on Tuesday. OK?"

Well, Japanese companies being what they are, pretty soon Marantz got jealous of all that profitable speaker business that AR was doing. So Marantz brought out a line of speakers and told their rep-distributors "Sell our speakers, or we’ll pull the Marantz line of electronics away from you." (Isn’t business fun? While we worry about the color of early 10Pi dome tweeters, this is how business is conducted in the real world.)

The European distributors told Marantz to take a hike. AR’s president at that time had long-standing contacts with several excellent Far-Eastern electronics OEM factories and together they formed a new company and designed a line of electronics to go with AR. There was some question as to whether it would be better to have it be AR-branded or an independent line, but the final decision was to call it NAD (New Acoustic Dimension). It was well-designed, high performance gear at a reasonable price.

It was introduced a short time later into the US under the NAD brand name, and several models—with strong US dealer input on features and pricing—followed quickly thereafter. So although NAD was created in response to the European AR distributors’ needs for a line of electronics to replace Marantz, it was never actually part of AR.

The X-10 receiver was part of the line of electronics that came out in the 1986-7 time frame (almost a decade after NAD came to the US market). The X-10 was a 100/100W unit; there were two other receivers, the X-06 and X-04 (60/60 and 40/40). Other models included two power amplifiers, a pre-amp, an integrated amp, a tuner, and a CD player. It was perfectly respectable equipment, well-designed and well-built, but it had absolutely nothing to do with NAD.

Steve F.

[Guest picasso928]

very interesting, as my father has 3 pair NAD tower speakers and a turntable i would guess date that age. He worked in Boston as vice pres. for a marketing firm. either NAD or a wholesaler had a office or something in the same building . one day thety were moving and my dad bought them. they still sound excellent.

my remote has a sticker on the back w/ company name Teledyne. following it is AR's name, and manufactured in Taiwan. Is this the partner company?

[Guest picasso928]

thanks for the info, looks like i have to resubscribe to audio gone. handy site don't you think?

[Guest picasso928]

thanks for the info, being in the Boston area, where might i find a retailer for AR's products? how would they compare to my current setup? and finally what price range am i looking at for a couple of sub's and larger bookshelf speakers as space is an issue in my apartment. plus, i don't want to fill a 10 by 8 living room so full of sound that you have to be in the next room to really enjoy it.

[ToastedAlmond]

Great story Steve!

TA

[Guest dogmeninreno]

Great, Bye Steve! Dale