To those who once had a Pioneer 'silver series' audio receiver, seeing them on Ebay certainly brings back some fond memories of these great sounding powerhouses.  To those that don't know what the term 'silver series' means - it was a period of nearly 10 years when the front panels of the units were silver in color from the wonderfully burnished aluminum.

Pioneer went from a hack company to a real player in the audio market during the 70's.  Pioneer tuning sections are generally remembered as being better than they had to be.  The controls feel great and sturdy - something about those meaty knobs and flip switches.  And they packed some serious clean power in the upper end models.  The 70's were a great time to find a stereo from just about anyone who could solder.  I remember each christmas as I got older my peers bragging about 'THE FIRST STEREO' they got.  Some got these (seemingly) 3ft wide all in 1 units with turntables and 8-track players built in.  But the ones who bragged the most, got component systems.

So lets define the silver series...typically they have model numbers such as SX-nnn or SX-nnnn.

You will see some people group then as '500 series' or '800 series' which is partially accurate - between each product line the '500 series' unit would typically have similar wattage, the '600' a little more, the '700' more still - and so forth.

I think it is better to group them by the last 2 digits.  For example, the SX-580, SX-680, 780, 880 etc came out in the same year range with the first digit giving indication of the total output power.  By doing a grouping like this, when buying, you also steer into a class of specifications and technology.

For example, the '50' series (650, 750, 850 etc) have a look very similar to the '80' series, however the 80 series is when Pioneer went to a non-switching type amp.  If you google on the 'net for one of the pages that gives the tech specs, you find that the 50 series units had distortion around 'tenths of a percent' (.1%, .2%) but the 80 series units were 'hundreths of a percent' (.02%, .03%).  This is an order of magnitude and easily discernable by a human. 

Granted, most of the units today have distortion once again in the tenths or WHOLE NUMBERS because this 'surround sound' crap is just that - crap.  When the amps are phased to give the delays and effects of different processing schemes- noise has creeped in.  As an example, my current 'main' unit is a 1993 Pioneer VSX-D602S.  It has 110W into 2 channels at .03% distortion.  Kick in into a sound field like dolby 3-ch and it loses power and distortion climbs to .1%.  Many units don't get better when in 2-ch mode!

Above I mentioned 3 digit model number units and alluded to a 4 digit number.  The last analog tuner of the silver series era had a digital display - but just the display.  It was not a fully synthesized tuner.  These were the SX-3x00 series.  The 'x' was 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 or 9 and yes, this digit corresponded power-class wise.  My FIRST STEREO (whoo hoo) was a 1981 SX-3700.  I have owned 3 since and just got my first 3800 - 25 years later!

A couple units stand out for honorable mention.  The 'monsters' of the silver era were the 1250, 1280 and the blue ribbon - the 1980.  Yes, the 1280 is superior over the 1250, but the 1980 is something unique in of itself.  First off its a 270W powerhouse with distortion in the THOUSANDTHS.  When running it draws as much as a hair dryer on high.  Long term usage will affect your electric bill.  If you want a good shape 1980 bring 4 digits worth of cash.  (Hint:  1980's do not sell or start for $15 or something absurd like that.  There seems to be a number of scam auctions for these, with wording like "This was in Falls Church Virginia blah blah blah".  They are bogus auctions and Ebay will cancel them off.)

Now for the important tips - how much should you pay?  As little as possible.  Not that that is flippant, but the retail price of these items in the 70's is irrelevant.  First off, they typically sold for half of retail on sale - my brothers and my SX-3700 came from a Pittsburgh area place called the 'Sound Store' that put that $375 price tag on sale for $188 (4-5 per store) a couple times a year.  Other places would come close but not quite.

Second, technology has improved.  I am not talking getting a boom box with some monolithic amp section containing the pre-amp and bias all on 1 chip but rather the componentry and assembly.  CNC machines finish our plastics and metal parts now.  Automated 'Parts Pickers' put the little resistor thingies and capacitor thingies on the board, solder them in and bake them.  All of those electronics assembly jobs lost were lost due to lower cost.  Just because something is not assembled by a human does not mean it is not quality.  A Lexus automobile is almost completely assembled by robots.

Third - bulk volume.  In the 70's a couple people on your block had a stereo.  Today - everyone has one.  The hundreds of millions of electronic units sold drive down cost.  And the internet even more.  Plenty a store will sell a $500 unit for $5 over cost if they never have to see it or stock it.

That said, in most cases for a 600-700 series unit - the most popular - do not pay more than $50-75.  That might seem low but a lot of these webpages also list price ranges.  If the unit has been refurbished by a guy who does it for a living (or fun) and he can prove it, and will WARRANT his work, then by all means consider the $120-ish 'buy it now'.  But if the auction has the ole 'as is' wording or 'powered up but not tested' - caveat emptor.  There is no lemon law with private sales.

In most cases, the seller stumbled across this at an auction for a song, or pulled it out of a garage sale.  Having some lights come on is not a test.  Ok, its a very BASIC test.  You want to make sure that your $50-$75 plus the inevitable $35 shipping (these suckers are heavy, even if the seller is honest) does something useful, not hums and consumes current.

Things I always ask for:  does the balance, bass, treble or volume controls 'scratch' when turned while playing music.  This is typical of older equipment where there was humidity and ozone (meaning everywhere outside of Tempe AZ).  It in most cases CAN be fixed with a spray or two of DeOxIT (available from Radio Shack).  But if the seller says its clean as is - chances are the unit is ok.

Next, ask about missing knobs or controls.  A toaster timer knob will look stupid on that silver face.

Then ask about the tuner.  Most of the units had a center channel meter and some had signal strength.  Ask if the unit can (with FM muting OFF) tune center channel and when FM muting turned on, lock onto the station.  This is a MUST for all of the units with a PLL circuit.  For example, on a 4-5 bar strength FM station the SX-3700 - once locked on - will let you tune about 5 steps away (each step in the USA is .2MHz, i.e. 99.1 to 99.3, so 5 steps would be 99.1 to 100.1) before it drops lock.  If the tuner sounds like 'soft fuzz' for static when in the low range of the scale - don't panic, just ground the tuning capacitor, unplug the whole unit and shop vac the years of dust from the capacitor blades.  Those big amps have big grates over the electronic gizmos and simple space dust gets in there.

Lastly, ask about all the operation of the function switches and the lighting - Pioneer it seems bought a boatload of LEDs and 8v bulbs and used them.  They are replaceable, but if you are a listener and not a Jr. Tech - it can be daunting and most stereo shops are going to charge $50 to walk in and simply point out the burned lights.

When you ask all of these questions, if the seller goes 'I live in an area where there are no stations', talk a walk.  If he has internet access he has FM stations.  And if he cannot hook up 5 feet of speaker wire to the unbalanced FM antenna screw, then it is fairly unlikely he knows much else about the unit other than what he read off a webpage.

Now the best way to bid on one of these?  Either bid low early or do a 'watch' so that 'My Ebay' has notation of the unit.  Be serious and make note of the end time.  REALLY focus in on the units that end in the middle of the night in the middle of the week - less competition.  At 10 minutes before the end, get online and bring up 4 or more explorer windows on Ebay.  Set a session cookie for each window by going into 'My Ebay' and entering your password.  Now go to the target auction.  If the price is already more - just leave.  If not, save one window for watching and 3 for bidding.  Set the first window to 'bid' about $40 less than your personal max.  The next, $20 less, and the 3rd - your personal max.  Now on the 4th window keep refreshing until 1 minute remains.  Then goto the first and place the bid and confirm it.  Wait 10 and do for the second.  Wait 10 seconds more and hit the last.  Then goto your refresh window and watch the last 30 seconds.  If you get outbid, it means someone wanted it more or panic'd.  If you see someone bidding $1 at a time - they are just trying to push you up to cost you money - the theory being most people bid by $10's.

For the record, the SX-3800 I just got?  $79 doing just that at 3am on a thursday.  2 of my SX-3700's?  in the $40-50 range.  My last 3 SX-3600's I got for $19-$26.