Teac PA-7

Very rare combo which apparently didn't sell much, whatever the country considered.

Endorsed in Japan by Tannoy (or vice-versa :) with several joint ads and even a true / false copy of a letter from Mr. N.G. Crocker (Managing Director of Tannoy) to Teac Corp., praising the quality of the new Teac separates.

A test I have at hand shows that the measured specs are actually way above the ones specified in the manuals, especially those of the MA-7. But I really don't know who built this rare combo for Teac... Maybe JVC ?
The silver strips that serve to indicate the source and record out selected are a bit reminiscent of the semi-reflective strip used in the contemporary JVC A-X9...

The front flap of the PA-7 holds the headphones jack & related volume pot, bass/treble pots, source/tape, monitoring, mono/stereo and subsonic switches, plus balance and phono cartridge selector (phono 1 MC, phono 1 MM, phono 2 MM.

The cartridge settings are, sadly, located at the back but they are very complete and doubled since there are two distinct phono inputs and dedicated Ohm, kOhm and pF settings.
Frequency response is ruler-flat up to 60Khz ; the phono response is less ruler-flat, though.

Full-DC structure, low-impedance outputs, beefy trafo, gold-plated terminals, select componentry, dedicated amplifier for the headphones' and, mostly, resistance array for the volume pot !

Useful (but rare) in the all-analog days : the tone controls can be routed toward the record loops to burn in your tone corrections ! Beware if your system changes later on :)


The top image is taken from a joint Tannoy/Teac ad (Stereo Sound #53, winter 1980) ; the black versions come from a german Teac catalog dated october 1981 ; service manuals are © from november 1979.

A real PA-7 here.