A very respectable FM tuner

S

Soundbaron

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Aug 19, 2025
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I've found, if you're still into it, is the Rotel T11. I realize the humble FM tuner for most people has gone the way of the Dinosaur, but if it hasn't for you this tuner is impressive, even if you're only using the supplied indoor antenna mast. It's very light weight and thin (about 3 inches) coming in silver or black.

In the late seventies, or early eighties I had a Tandberg stereo receiver which was beautiful to behold, but more importantly was renowned for the quality of the FM tuner built into it. As I recall it was very good at pulling in stations noticeably better than other units I had owned before it. This little Rotel T11 puts it to shame in comparison, and it's quite reasonably priced as well. I think their selling for around $500. but you may be able to get one for considerably less than that. If memory serves I got mine for around three hundred something or other.

It also comes with DBA (Digital Audio Broadcasting) for use in countries where it's supported. The sound quality it's capable of supplying is very good with stations close enough to provide good signal strength, which in my area is quite a few despite not being very close to any cities. With previous tuners built into the Receivers I had, such was not the case.

Anyway, I just thought I'd post this here for anyone that might be interested in a simple, good, inexpensive tuner in relative terms, and because there doesn't appear to be a tuner forum. Likely this is because so few are interested these days.
 
My last FM tuner in my main system was a Kenwood KT-3300. FM only and extremely good. I haven't had a tuner in my main system in over 20 years.

I have a Denon tuner in my workout room. It's HD and has slots for Sirius XM I don't use.

I grew up listening to FM and miss those days when stations actually played new music and knew what variety meant. I purposely don't listen to the classic rock station as to not get burned out on songs. Luckily we have a really good HD station that plays deeper tracks and don't repeat them that often.
 
Mr Peabody said:
My last FM tuner in my main system was a Kenwood KT-3300. FM only and extremely good. I haven't had a tuner in my main system in over 20 years.

I have a Denon tuner in my workout room. It's HD and has slots for Sirius XM I don't use.

I grew up listening to FM and miss those days when stations actually played new music and knew what variety meant. I purposely don't listen to the classic rock station as to not get burned out on songs. Luckily we have a really good HD station that plays deeper tracks and don't repeat them that often.
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Yeah, I miss the days when they actually played new music that didn't stink, and the DJ's were characters in themselves. I used to listen frequently to the "Night Bird" I think she called herself ( Alison Steele) and she played along with others of the time virtually everything I came to like. In fact come to think of it, that was the only way I had of learning about new music, other than my friends.

Well, as the old Eagles song say's "those days are gone forever, I should just let them go" but occasionally I'll hear something new and pretty good when I'm not in the mood for messing with LP's or cd's. Given that FM tuners are an important part of Audio history there might be a few still interested.
 
I remember when Apple (Jobs) de decided to drop CD trays form their computers. I thought they were crazy. But they were right. CD player, DVD/blu-Ray players are dead.
I thought tuners were dead long before that!
 
Well vinyl was dead until recently, and I'm not sure one can count cd players out either, given the resurgence of interest in cd's. I occasionally go to Dalton books near where I live and they have an impressive number of new and old music cd's and vinyl records on sale. There's also a place near me called Record Stop, which has a huge collection of cd's and records available. If you go to Crutchfield for example you'll find a very large number of cd players, and transports on sale, and that's just one store. Tubes looked dead for a time when solid state first came out, and look at them now.

Even in my other photography hobby film looked dead as a doornail, but then had a bit of a revival thanks to interest from young people who just though it was a cool way to make images.

So anyway, for old cheapskates like myself the advantage of an FM tuner is that it's free, and if you're lucky enough to have a good station near you, which admittedly is a big if, you're all set.
 
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Like others, I have fond memories of my FM tuner(Technics) from days past but my location without a decent antenna no longer makes much sense.
 
NewAlkyogre said:
Once, the FM signal is turned off. In Norway that is already the case. If you go on vacation to that country with an FM car radio you have completely silence.
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Wow, that is hard to imagine. I would hate to see FM disappear. Just speaking to my market they don't help themselves. Several stations are owned by the same corp and their sound quality is worse than Pandora. Programming is lazy same group of songs all the time. It's sad when I can turn on my local classic rock station and tell if they are doing some type of special programming because I hear a song I wouldn't normally hear. They do have a HD2 station I listen to occasionally when working out, no commercials and virtually no repeat, especially in the same day.

In my opinion FM was ruined by corporate take over who force feeds you the programming despite the market. You can really hear the difference in a privately owned station.
 
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