Is Sansui still around?

Yes, you would connect it to the tape recording/playbacks jacks of your preamp or receiver.

Sansui made two other reverb units after this model, the RA-700, and RA-900. The RA-700 still looks a bit like the RA-500, but the RA-900 is all black.

 

This unit probably has a number of settings such as stadium, cathedral, etc and each setting provides a different time-delay.

 

No, not at all. These reverb units such as the RA-500 date back to the early 70's, so there are no 'stadium', 'cathedral', etc.., settings. It simply has a knob that you turn either clockwise or counterclockwise to vary the amount of reverbation being applied to what you're listening to. The unit also gives off a 70's era multicolored 'psychedelic' display.

 

Right on the money. Here's a report back:

I've plugged it into my home theater setup, and it seem to work fine. Yes, it was designed to run on a tape loop, but that's not how I connected it. My home theater is a rather primitive setup by modern standards: a pretty good hi-fi VCR and a really cheap hi-fi VCR/DVD combo operating in "cable ready" mode (no HDTV or digital cable for *this* cheapskate) selectable with cheap Radio Shack switch boxes to feed video to the TV and audio to an Onkyo oubtoard Dolby Pro Logic adapter. The Onkyo drives the front center and rear speakers; it provides the signal for the front R and L to a little Technics receiver. To incorporate the Sansui, I simply put the audio cable formerly leading to the Onkyo into its "input" jacks and ran a new cable from the main output to the Onkyo. Voila--reverb!

By the by, the thing would have been worth what I paid for it even if it didn't work--our 19-month-old had a grand time playing with it last night as soon as the pretty lights came on.

 

Sansui Sound

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh Sansui Sound Forever!!!!!!!!

 

And why, I should ask, did you decide to revive this old thread? Looks like you had no intention of truly sharing your love for Sansui products.

It would also help us to know a little bit about you by filling your equipment profile.

Come on, don't be shy...

 

I think if you Check out the archives I remember this being discussed before.

I believe not as we remember them. In the late 1990s, the company's brand was used on video equipment manufactured by other companies. The current manufacturer of the rebranded sets is Orion Electric, based in Osaka and Fukui, Japan. Its U.S. subsidiary markets products under the Sansui brand, among others. Sansui is thus a mere umbrella brand at present. This radical change in Sansui's corporate identity has resulted in a notable change in its product quality as consumers now tend to consider Sansui a mass-market brand rather than a maker of high-end electronics.

 

I just realized this from an old thread