Yamaha's Annual Bargain!
Written: May 18 '03 (Updated Apr 20 '05)
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Pros: Super cheap speakers! Good sound! Great looks!
Cons: Lacks extreme ends of audio spectrum.Not audiophile quality.
The Bottom Line: At $100 per pair, the speakers would be hard to fault but do listen to competing models from Bose, JBL, AR, KLH and Radio Shack.
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| sam-pro's Full Review: Yamaha NS-A738 Bookshelf Speakers |
Back in the day...as my children constantly refer to the time I was in my prime...I used to be a salesman at the local Radio Shack. Every year the co. would offer their three-way 8" speaker system at half price as the holidays would approach. The success of this particular sale was ever outstanding year after year! Apparently Yamaha caught wind of the success and has been offering their rather compact 8" three-way speaker system at half price during the holidays and sometimes beyond.
I happened on this one occasion to stroll into one of my favorite audio salons where my friend Peter is the top salesman and supervisor. I had no plans for purchasing anything as my wife and six children were shopping next door at the A&P. Peter was cool with this as it wasn't particularly busy and we proceeded to have some fellow audiophile fun by auditioning various Bose's, NHT's, Definitives, Paradigms, AR's and other various makes and models of respected transducers.
The various speakers were displayed in neat and orderly fashion with the typical showroom arrangement... Floorstanders down below and three levels of shelving supporting the smaller units with the smallest and lightest on the very top. Obviously prices varied from the most expensive [about $2,000 per pair] to this quite attractive model by Yamaha clocking in at a mere $58. The somewhat small unit caught both my eye and my ear! I proceeded to tell Peter that $58 was a reasonable price but noticed other stores selling the speakers for slightly less at $50 each and $100 the pair. My good friend then informed me that the $58 price tag was on the pair NOT FOR ONE!! These were demos being sold as is with the fact that one of the attractive grills was MIA. Peter assured me that the manufacturer would replace the missing grill free of charge!
After carefully auditioning the bargain speaker system I felt that it deserved a good home. So without too much adew I purchased the beautiful oak speaker complimented with a gorgeous brown grill in record setting time!! I figured at least I could have some fun for awhile living with the system before selling it to a deserving college student.
The Yamaha NS-A738 speaker system is a three-way design comprised of an 8" paper woofer, a 4" midrange and a 2" cone/domed tweeter. The beautiful oak enclosure is complimented by the dark brown speaker grill that snaps into place. It is easily removeable. The system is vented through the rear of its 16" H x 10" D x 11" W enclosure. EFFICIENCY is rated at 91 db @ 1 watt 1 meter. The speaker is magnetically shielded to prevent interference when closely placed near a tv. Each speaker weighs about 18 lbs. and can handle 70 watts of clean amplifier input with no distress. MSRP is $200 per pair.
I hooked up the pair of A738's to my Parasound CA-250 integrated amplifier which is very conservatively rated at 25 watts per ch. and double that on a moment's demand. Although the speakers did not sound strained at high levels they simply did not open up on complex musical passages. The overall character of sound was quite neutral but limited in FREQUENCY RESPONSE. IMAGING is fair but not great by any means lacking depth and space! There was a somewhat punchy upper bass but real lows were noticeably lacking. The highs were also very limited! I would venture to say that the speaker is incapable of reproducing much above 10KHz and anything below 100 Hz is non-existent! The sound is very well balanced!
The speakers are still quite nice sounding and would do well in a modest or starter hifi system. HOME THEATER lovers will find good use for them in the REAR CHANNELS of a serious HT experience. Ya gotta believe that they were a steal at the $58 a pair price tag that I paid for them!!
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 58/pr.
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Epinions.com ID:
sam-pro
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 - Top 500 |
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Member: Peter J Sammon II
Location: The Bloomfield Burying Ground, USA
Reviews written: 218
Trusted by: 122 members
About Me:
Every once in awhile something great arrives at relatively low cost to you...Priceless!
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