Altec 711B (circa 1967–1968)

Not much is documented about the Altec 711B beyond a coordinated print ad campaign that ran in several audio magazines in late 1967 and early 1968.

The ad appeared in High Fidelity (November 1967, p.11) and HiFI-Stereo (December 1967, p.159) among others. It opens with the tagline “Our new 711B has been influenced by the company it keeps” - a reference to Altec’s deep roots in professional audio for recording studios, broadcast, concert halls, and stadiums. For the amplifier section, the ad claims 100 watts of all-silicon-transistor power and a frequency response of ±1 dB from 15 to 25,000 Hz. It also lists an “impressive 2.5 dB” ratio. That is likely signal-to-noise or a related noise figure, but the OCR of the period copy leaves the exact parameter ambiguous. The unit also had an automatic feature, and the text cuts off there. It was possibly auto-reset protection or automatic stereo/mono switching, which were common on high-end receivers of the era.

No service manual, schematic, or independent review has surfaced in the available record. The 711B appears to have been a short-lived model that brought Altec’s professional reputation into the early transistor home market. How it sold, how it performed in real-world use, and how many were built all remain unknown.