dizzy wrote:

[lots of arguing about not very much]

On 21 Jun 2005 04:13:10 -0700, wrote:
There's more functionality and acousticalt performance in a $400
boom box today than there was in a 1960's Magnavox stereo console.
Hell, there's even more magnet on them.

So what? That doesn't make the old stuff "junk".

Budget was what determined the size of the magnet then, and it is today.
One difference that has not been discussed is that the magnet probably
is alnico, even if small, and thus stronger pr. cubic inch of magnet
that the magnet in a boom box.

Just as today the component cost allowable was derived by the retail
price range specified for the product. The design process for such a box
was not based on theory, it was a "practitioners throw together" within
the frame defined by price and by outer design. A lot of old radios and
stuff actually do have a "good sound", they were often good
practitioners,
but theory - nah, not a part of the design and perhaps not really all
that well understood. My brothers father in law was a jukebox repairman
from that period in the audio industry and I know some of the people
from the quality part of danish audio manufacturing (Movic), I don't
think I am unfair to the state of the art of the general "audio
furniture" industry back then.

There are manufacturers still building the same general kind of
loudspeakers that the old Magnavox thing in question had. Efficiency pr.
currency unit of manufacturing costs is good, and they can have a decent
lower midrange, but they are not bass loudspeakers. If you want to use
them for something, they are perhaps best deployed on what they are
designed for: an open, or semi-open, baffle, powered by no more than 5
watts. It is possibly possible to get the innards of that old Magnavox
to do good "wall to wall music" in a living room by proper deployment
within their limits and design genre - it could even be fun - but they
are not for HiFi, and was not so then.

What you need to understand that the target frequency range for such a
product back then was from something 100 Hz to something 5000 Hz, the
main use for the Magnavox was assumed to be AM reception or similar
quality broadcasts. The state of the art of the Audio industry back then
was considerably more advanced, products like the Magnavox are mostly
from the furniture industry.


Kind regards

Peter Larsen

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