Vintage Audio Pr0n

Technics SA-5470 Receiver (1977-1978)

I found this on Tumblr (or maybe it was Instagram) and it immediately sent me to eBay to see if any were available for sale. This is another piece of equipment that immediately conjures up memories of the Labelle's audio showroom of the mid-to-late 1970s for me.

These were impressive receivers when they arrived on the scene, but like I've written about before, I was too enamored of the shiny new Sony V-FET amps to pay anything else much mind. The original lighting of the dial and meters on these receivers had a very subtle greenish glow (something not easily restored unless you can source the special green-tinted incandescent bulbs these shipped with) that illuminated the dial itself and not the just the numbers; something that set Technics apart from the black-out dials of Marantz, Pioneer, and Sansui.

There are several currently available on eBay at very reasonable prices, but the absolute last thing I need right now is another receiver, so it wasn't a huge effort to eschew pressing the "Buy It Now" button.

But damn…it sure was tempting.

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