Vintage radio & hifi experience: Telefunken Superheterodyne Opus 7 tube radio 德律風根

I have always love listening to music and I have started March 2020 with a vintage Radio instead. Basically, there are three sizes of radios namely small, medium and large.

With the help of Mr. Eu (Dy111), I have managed to learn a great deal on the vintage Radio. There are many brands of vintage Radio and covering the UK, US, French, German made radio etc. As it will be a very tedious tasks to try every single radio, basing on the advice from the Hong Kong vintage radio audiophiles, I have decided to zoom in to the German made radio from the 1950s, which was the golden age for valve radio. My first contact with the German radio was the 1956 德國制 Graetz Sinfonia 古典旗艦. I was going to get it but the seller has refused my offer.

Basing on the feedback from HKG collectors, the three Kings of Vintage tube radios are :
三大名牌為:

Telefunken (德律風根) :Opus 52, Opus 55/TS, Opus 7. 三部都各有特色,好聲再加靚聲. 尤冠以Opus 7為德仔機皇.
Grundig (根德) : 4010 & 5010.兩部都靚聲,動態大.以 5010 用2支EL12推動更為澎湃.都可稱為機皇.
Siemens (西門子) : M57, M47, H52, H42. 四部為西門子頂級型號,各有其特有音色,高中低平均.另特有接門為西門子獨有.

In the end, I was very lucky to be able to find a TELEFUNKEN OPUS 7 HI-FI SYSTEM TUBE RADIO Telefunken Superheterodyne Opus 7 Hi-Fi system tube radio. It was made in West Germany from 1956/7.

This is considered a large radio and it is a very nice radio capable of great volume and room/house filling bass. I have decided to go straight for the top range as I don't want to go thorough the process of upgrading and selling away the medium and small size radios which will be very time consuming. It has a very nice look as well as 6 speakers giving it a warm and full sound. The 1950s were the golden age of vintage radio. Despite the so called improvement from the 1960-70s, for the true audiophiles, the 1950s made radio were still the best in sound, which I totally agree.

The Opus 7 was sold at DM519, which was considered very high end at that time. With its bigger size and complications from the additional speakers, it was for the people who is really interested in music and of course rich during the 1950s.

Opus 7 has at least the 5 additional push buttons for "Solo, Jazz, Orchester, Bass and Intim" in front of the normal 8 push buttons for Opus 6.

The Opus 7 has been made in two quite different cabinets. One has the usual textile speaker grille in front, the other has vertical wooden bars in front and only cut outs at the sides in the woods for the other speakers. Mine is the European versions. There is another Export versions with a straight box version as below. I prefer the European version with curved bevel edged sides which give it a grand look.