What sort of sound do Marantz amps offer?

Hi,

I currently have a Pioneer AX5ai which is very detailed, forward and punchy. I have likened the sound to Sony, only more detailed.

Anyway, last week, I was over at fellow forum member Sick Boys place. He has a budget Marantz amp running Mission M72 speakers and I have to say that the sound blew me away....

Any opinions on the sound offered by Marantz when compared to Denon, Pioneer or Sony.

I quite like the look of Kazmans amp...

Cheers,

Pete.

 

its the mission speakers

 

Pete, I love the Marantz sound - it's great with dialogue but has plenty of punch when it's needed. Also great with music.

Why not swing by mine and have a listen to mine? It's the SR7400 which is the predecessor to Kaz's SR7500. I've actually heard Kaz's system and they both sound very similar although the 7500 has a few extra features.

 

Sounds like a plan...I will look at the diary!

 

Excellent stuff, send me a PM with when you're free. Just bear in mind that you've only got until the end of June when I have to move back to Guildford.

 

The SR7500 does indeed rock

HCC reviewed it last month too, and they rated it very highly, it even made their shortlist for receiver of the year......for some strange reason they thought the musical ability of it wasn't that good (surprising when they its predecessor was the most musical one ). It made more sense when I found out they were using M&K K5's as the speakers, now these babies are superb, but movie focused, so I believe speaker choice is going to be very important if you wish to use the SR7500 for music as well as movies .

The reviewer said that for stereo music "all the detail is there, but I just couldn't warm to it". Get the speakers right, and you're laughing with the SR7500 , Quads work extremely well

 

Not for rock music they didn't.

 

BAH! next time, bring some decent CD's to listen to LOL!

 

Indeed I will, but the 2 I brought were as well recorded as you could possibly hope for. A Pitchshifter PSI (HDCD) and American Idiot for anyone else that's interested.

The speakers were certainly great for films though and the amp certainly wasn't at fault in either case.

 

Heh heh, I have to admit, I do not have many rock CD's, the closest I have is probably Linkin Park

Most of my stuff is dance, trance, classical, old school R&B and indeed some new school R&B, bit of pop, some instrumental stuff and quite a few ambient style CD's. So I guess it depends on ones musical tastes too

 

A bit OT I know but I'm not entirely sure you're right. I was tinkering about with American Idiot on a pair of "borrowed" 11L's and my rather lovely new Electrocompaniet and it was a thoroughly engaging experience. The 11L can certainly do the job- dare I say it maybe there is a chink in the 7500's armoury?

 

I think it may be a general chink in Marantz amps personally, Rock isn't their speciality, Marantz amps in my experience are just not aggressive in nature, and probably do not like heavy Rock, they can certainly handle the delicacies of any track, but perhaps aren't quite as fleet of foot with Rock tunes.

Saying that, my Linking Park DVD-A sounds AWESOME!!!! It's possibly only a few 'types' of Rock the Marantz doesn't like The fact it excels with all my preferred music styles is all I need to know

 

Think I should also add that Quad speakers are quite clinical, the source material has to be of a decent standard or the Quads will show it up A badly produced CD will be hung drawn and quartered

 

Marantz may not be any good with crap american rock, but mine works fine with the good old english variety

 

My Marantz is just great with all sorts of rock but that's paired with Mission 771e speakers. Clearly we're just going to have to wait for Pete's unbiased opinion.

 

The Marantz is on my shortlist for future upgrading, wonder what it will sound like with Folk music through a nice big pair of Polks