Uploaded March 2024 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Onkyo A-RV400 100WPC amplifier from 1990. With a single line Speak and Spell VFD display.
Wow, is this a solid performer. What was a great brand until the 2010’s when everything fell apart for them. They had nothing but problems with their HDMI boards within many models up through around 2017.
I performed a bias adjustment on this tonight, it performed so well in the past I don’t have much improvement to report, but at least it’s now within factory spec.
So a good question comes up, how long do these units remain biased properly? Not sure, but my theory is if it’s done at least once in my lifetime, considering this unit is 34 years old, that’s good enough. It was working good as it was — but to bring it back into spec is only a good thing as the components will continue to drift with age.
I picked this up about 10 years ago on eBay for like 40 bucks and it came with the remote. This used to be a slave amplifier for patio speakers. I’ve since taken it out of daily service and it’s just part of the collection now.
Onkyo A-RV400 100WPC amplifier from 1990. With a single line Speak and Spell VFD display.
Wow, is this a solid performer. What was a great brand until the 2010’s when everything fell apart for them. They had nothing but problems with their HDMI boards within many models up through around 2017.
I performed a bias adjustment on this tonight, it performed so well in the past I don’t have much improvement to report, but at least it’s now within factory spec.
So a good question comes up, how long do these units remain biased properly? Not sure, but my theory is if it’s done at least once in my lifetime, considering this unit is 34 years old, that’s good enough. It was working good as it was — but to bring it back into spec is only a good thing as the components will continue to drift with age.
I picked this up about 10 years ago on eBay for like 40 bucks and it came with the remote. This used to be a slave amplifier for patio speakers. I’ve since taken it out of daily service and it’s just part of the collection now.
