Quad Adverts from the '70s - Fun for the old and new!

[MidiMagic]

Love the "joystick" balance control on a couple of those receivers!!! Question: Was this type of balance knob considered less desirable? Looks cool and, I suppose, the joystick maybe more-or-less worked; but I wonder if it might would've been easier to fine tune the balance using four separate knobs, instead?

I built one of those to be placed between decoder output and power amp. It uses the same principle as this crossfader circuit:

I used a Tandy joystick for a Color Computer:
- I relabeled so front was on one corner:
- I replaced the cable with a 4-wire shielded cable.
- It has one 10K linear pot for each joystick axis.
- I connected the shield to the slider terminal on each pot (as in diagram).
- Each pot has two voltage dividers for diagonally opposite channels.
- One pot controls LF and RB. The other (at right angles) controls RF and LB.
- Unlike the diagram. each side of the pot has a different channel input.

One drawback is that it does not provide complete balancing. If LF and RB are both louder than RF and LB, there is no way to correct that with the joystick. Additional controls are needed for this.

 

[JohnN]

 

[Doug G.]

Interesting reading the ‘Comments’ most folks just don’t “get” Quad unfortunately.

Many people, back then, had an automatic negative, cynical, attitude toward quad and condemned it even before they heard it. They claimed it was just a scheme by the manufacturers to sell more equipment and called quad a "gimmick"

Doug

 

[Doug G.]

The thing with the joysticks was, they were just four conventional pots connected to the lever with linkages. They were cool but all those linkages were another source for trouble and the imprecise nature of pots was exacerbated by the complexity.

Doug

 

[Mark Anderson]

I still use that receiver to this day to power the AFD scope

 

[TVB]

Luv old stereo mags and ads. I have a large collection of stereo review from the early 70's to the last year of 98. I like reading the record reviews but my favs are pionner, technics,dual, sansui, mfsl (including cassettes) and jbl ads from the mid/late 70's and early 80's. I cut my fav ads out and put them in a notebook with plastic protectors. In fact one of my fav ads was for jbl l110 speakers which I could never afford at the time but....earlier this year, I responded to a craigslist ad on a mint pair of L110's and now a dream is a dream no longer! Remember the ad by pioneer about the cassette deck "what does it take to get the best sound of a little thing like this (a cassette).. a great big beautiful thing like this (pioneer ctf 9191 cassette deck). Those were the days!. Thanks and keep those ads comin jon.