Denon SC-C3 (1982)
The Denon SC-C3 is a compact two-way bookshelf speaker that Denon released in 1982 at ¥17,000 per unit. It's a bass-reflex design with a 16 cm pulp-cone woofer and a 2.5 cm hard-dome tweeter. The tweeter uses Denon's alpha-boron diaphragm - a boron compound fused to aluminum foil via plasma jet, said to be roughly three times stiffer than titanium with about ten times the internal loss of a conventional metal diaphragm. The enclosure is hard particle board. Rated frequency response is 45 Hz to 40 kHz, maximum input 60W (program source), sensitivity 91 dB/W/m, impedance 6 Ω, and the crossover sits at 4 kHz. Dimensions are 210 × 355 × 194 mm and each speaker weighs 4.5 kg.
Two finish variants exist: the SC-C3 with wood-grain finish and the SC-C3s with metallic silver. You'll also see SC-C3L in some listings, but the sources don't say whether that's a real variant or just inconsistent labeling.
The documented record on the SC-C3 is otherwise thin. No period reviews have surfaced, and the only owner commentary comes from classified ads and personal blogs. Russian sellers have described them as "excellent bookshelf speakers" with "very accurate and interesting sound like expensive studio monitors." One Japanese blog mentions using a pair in a cafeteria and hallway, driven by a Lepai LP-2020A+ amp. A Vietnamese listing praises them as small but formidable, easy to pair with amplifiers. One Russian seller notes the item appears on the market only about every 440 days, which suggests they're not common on the secondary market.
eBay Listings
As an eBay Partner, we earn from qualifying purchases. This helps support our independent vintage technology research.
Related Models
- Denon D-5
- Denon D-9
- Denon DL-103 (1962)
- Denon DL-303 (1980)
- Denon DR-M1 (1985)
- Braun AUDIO-1 (1965)
- Braun AUDIO-250 (1965)
- Magnavox Component Systems (1972)
- Acoustic Research AR (1967-1976)
- Acoustic Research 11