I don’t know about you…but I love to rock out some serious “tunage” when I am hanging out in the game room.
Especially if I am cleaning it, decorating it, fixing a pinball machine, and stuff like that.
Music is what keeps me moving and it is pretty vital for a good game room party as well.
My game room is separated from my home theater — so I like to just have a good old-fashioned stereo going on in there. Preferably one pushing some classic vintage speakers.
So what do you play your gameroom tunes on? You could get some great deals on recent surround receivers — especially ones that are missing HDMI inputs (or are obsolete for home theater use in other ways).
But there are a few issues with these modern receivers.
For one I have a huge vinyl collection — most receivers from the past ten years do not have phonograph capability built-in. You would need to buy extra equipment to play your wonderfully dynamic vinyl.
Many of these modern receivers are also underpowered and have cheap amplifiers.
So I prefer to go vintage when it comes to powering my tunes in the game room. These receivers are cheaper than something new and many easily out-perform modern equipment.
So what is the ultimate game room audio receiver? There are plenty of great ones out there for sure.
I am a big Pioneer fan. I great up listening to my Dad’s Pioneer receiver and 40 years later this thing is still pushing out serious volume.
These things were just built to last and are complete beasts. So that is where I turn. One vintage Pioneer receiver stands head and shoulders above the rest.
The ultimate Pioneer beast is the SX-1980 — from way back in 1978. This thing weighs a hefty 78 pounds and puts out an amazing 270 watts of power per channel! That was a record for Pioneer and is over double what you typically see in high-end receivers today.
The SX-1980 was the largest and heaviest receiver Pioneer had ever built.
Being that it is a vintage receiver, it is not loaded with computer chips, decoders, various input connectors, etc. They just focused on putting out good, clean, and powerful sound. It makes great common sense if you think about it.
In a recent blind sound-off, this receiver topped a very nice new receiver. It won the event quite handily.
If you are lucky, maybe you can spot one of these cheap at your local Goodwill or on Craigslist.
They are available on eBay, but there they typically go for around $1000. Still a great deal considering what you are getting.
Forgive me now, while I go turn that shiny silver knob all the way up and get the Led out!
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