Pictures of your first system

[carewser]

I expect most of you will be like me and not have pictures of your first system so i'd like you to piece them together from the internet to make this thread so this will take a bit of work but I remember as a budding teenage audiophile having no money yet really wanting some decent gear. When I finally got some as a gift, I was beyond excited. My first receiver was a Yamaha R-300 to go with my Yamaha NS-55 speakers and a cheap old BSR turntable. It took me awhile before I finally got a Sanyo cassette deck that had Dolby C which I really liked. The speakers were the worst part because they weren't actually the speakers pictured, at least not the woofer, the ones I had had a really cheap, short-throw woofer that barely moved and the grilles didn't come off. I expect Yamaha didn't want anyone to see the POS woofer they put in these otherwise decent speakers so I had to pry the grilles off and then they had nails sticking out of them. The timing for my first receiver was a bummer because it was the last of the analog receivers in the early '80's, just when everyone was going digital but it was still a nice looking, well built unit, I used to love playing with the loudness contour knob because it was amazing what a difference it made to the sound.

[Teresa]

My first audio system, purchased around 1970 with money I made from babysitting was a Realistic 8 Track Stereo Tape Player/Amp with two bookshelf speakers Model 14-913 for $89.95.

 

It had a "fine track adjustment" which I used if I heard any reverse channel crosstalk. The speakers were small, 8 inches by 11 inches. All of my 8 track tapes were played at home and never in a car, and during the years I owned it I never had a tape go bad. This is, believe it or not, when I first started to notice differences in sound quality by different recording companies.

 

This is the best picture I could find on the internet, it is the 8-track player/amp, I couldn't find a picture of the bookshelf speakers. The side panels actually looked much nicer, this one appears repaired.

 

[Oystein]

I collected some pictures from the internet from my 2 first system components.

 

I guess I was 15 (1982) when I started with my first stereo

 

Speakers - Jamo Compact 70

Receiver - Akai AM-M3 - from the compact "Clarity" series

Cassette - Akai GX-A5

 

 

I realised soon (and spoiled by my best friend who had some serious equipment) that I wanted better.

I guess I started in 1985 to buy some proper stereo equipment.

The main reason to do so was that I could buy the absolute crazy mega speakers Wharfedale E-90 from my best friend who stepped up into real high-end by a Tube amplifier and Spica TC-50 speakers.

 

Speakers - Wharfedale E-90

Integrated - Onkyo A-8057

CD player - Denon DCD-800

Tuner - Onkyo T-4027

Cassette - Nakamishi CR-1 (this came a few years later to replace the earlier Akai deck)

 

 

The fun we had at that time ... we could listen for days going through the whole CD collection forth and back ...

[Oystein]

Downsizing is not only with car engines but I guess when we grow up (and/or getting a partner) size does not matter anymore ... haha.

 

After the Wharfedale speakers I went smaller and after that even more smaller.

 

The black speakers are a Dutch brand "Master" model Three built by Dynamic Solutions.

After these I "upgraded" ;-) to the very small Boenicke W5.

[StephenJK]

Sorry, no pictures. My first system was a portable Sony cassette player/recorder (with a built in microphone!) that I wired to a couple of small car speakers from the headphone jack.

 

It wasn't much, but it played music. I ended up taking that headphone output and connected it to the headshell wires of a portable GE record player and used that as an amplifier.

 

Ah, the good old days......

[RedFuneral]

I'm young but my stereo went through a phase where all my components were vintage(not counting DAC) so that'll have to do.

STAX SR-5 Headphones

Sherwood S6000 Reciever

Tandberg TCD300 Cassette Deck

Dual 1209/701 Tables

[Doak]

My First "Real" Audio System (circa 1977)

Infinity Tower II speakers

Sansui integrated amp

Kenwood tuner

Sony turntable

Within 2 years I "upgraded" everything but the tuner.......and the rest is history!

[sdolezalek]

Nice idea for a post! I'm can't remember the pieces of my earliest systems, but I clearly remember the system that I lusted for throughout my college years and finally acquired during and after law school. Just thinking back on it makes me wish I had kept all of it, unfortunately I only kept the speakers and they are today in storage. But I specifically remember how long it took me to save for this Yahama 1020 Receiver, my Nakamichi Dragon deck, my B&O Beogram 4000 turntable and my MGIIIa Magnepan speakers. Almost forgot, I also still have my old Nakamichi FM tuner. I think I kept that system together for 15 plus years.

 

[carewser]

My first audio system, purchased around 1970 with money I made from babysitting was a Realistic 8 Track Stereo Tape Player/Amp with two bookshelf speakers Model 14-913 for $89.95.

 

To make $90 back in those days you must have done a lot of babysitting

[wwaldmanfan]

My first stereo was a Garrard SL-65 turntable with an Empire cartridge, a Lafayette Radio 30w stereo amp, and a pair of Criterion (Lafayette) 2-way bookshelf speakers, all purchased in 1967 with $150 of my Bar Mitzvah money.

 

[jcn3]

First system was so fun to put together. In retrospect, the receiver was quite beautiful. Paid for it by cutting yards and collecting bottles to recycle. Circa 1975/6 . . .

 

receiver: Kenwwod KR-2600

speakers: Smaller Advents

turntable: Pioneer PL-112D

cartridge: Empire (of some sort)

 

 

 

 

Soon after, upgraditous set in with:

 

receiver: Kenwwod KR-6600

cassette deck: Nakamichi BX-1

 

 

[gmgraves]

I expect most of you will be like me and not have pictures of your first system so i'd like you to piece them together from the internet to make this thread so this will take a bit of work but I remember as a budding teenage audiophile having no money yet really wanting some decent gear. When I finally got some as a gift, I was beyond excited. My first receiver was a Yamaha R-300 to go with my Yamaha NS-55 speakers and a cheap old BSR turntable. It took me awhile before I finally got a Sanyo cassette deck that had Dolby C which I really liked. The speakers were the worst part because they weren't actually the speakers pictured, at least not the woofer, the ones I had had a really cheap, short-throw woofer that barely moved and the grilles didn't come off. I expect Yamaha didn't want anyone to see the POS woofer they put in these otherwise decent speakers so I had to pry the grilles off and then they had nails sticking out of them. The timing for my first receiver was a bummer because it was the last of the analog receivers in the early '80's, just when everyone was going digital but it was still a nice looking, well built unit, I used to love playing with the loudness contour knob because it was amazing what a difference it made to the sound.

 

 

OK here goes my first stereo system:

 

Amplifier: Two of these (for stereo): Knight 18 Watt mono integrated amplifiers

 

FM Tuner: Eico HFT-90

 

 

 

Stereo Multiplex decoder: Knight KG-12

 

 

 

 

Speakers: 2 of these: Knight KN-820 12-inch speakers in bass-reflex cabinets (built by my father) and with $5 Lafayette horn tweeters.

 

 

Phono: Beogram 1000

 

We're talking roughly 1962, here. Later I added a Viking model 86 3- head tape deck with a Knight-Kit KT-70 record/playback electronics unit:

 

 

 

Sorry about the quality of some of these pictures. But I consider myself lucky to find any of them at all!

 

For a teenager in the early 1960's, everything was pretty-much do-it-yourself. Luckily the stuff was cheap - even by those financial standards: The amps were (IIRC) $40 ea., The FM Tuner was ditto (an excellent tuner BTW). The Multiplex adapter was $20, the 12" speakers were $20 each, the turntable with arm and SP-12 B&O cartridge was $60, the KT-70 tape electronics unit was $90, and the tape deck was, (again IIRC) $75. IOW, about $400 for the entire system and it was all a 16-year-old budding audiophile could hope for!

[wgscott]

I had two of these speakers:

 

 

driven by a Scott (no relation) receiver:

 

 

I had a turntable, but can't remember what it was, and a cassette tape deck.

 

I had a subscription to Stereo Review.

[Blake]

 

 

Dead serious.

 

The lights would blink to the beat of the music and it even had 8-track. My dad won it in a golf tournament and gave it to me when I was around 12 years old. I had dance parties with my friends in my bedroom. I thought is was incredible- and I was right. So did the babes.

[jcn3]

I had a subscription to Stereo Review.

 

Me, too. Memorized every spec in them and requested tons of literature from the cards in the back. Also maintained a Rolling Stone subscription for many, many years (back when it was really about music).

[carewser]

 

 

Dead serious.

 

The lights would blink to the beat of the music and it even had 8-track. My dad won it in a golf tournament and gave it to me when I was around 12 years old. I had dance parties with my friends in my bedroom. I thought is was incredible- and I was right. So did the babes.

 

I can imagine having a machine like that would be just like having keys to the playboy mansion but since you were only 12 i'm sure your dad kept the condoms that came with it.

 

It was obviously pretty durable too judging by the number of CD's in the picture.

[gmgraves]

Me, too. Memorized every spec in them and requested tons of literature from the cards in the back. Also maintained a Rolling Stone subscription for many, many years (back when it was really about music).

 

Stereo Review, High-Fidelity, and Audio Magazine too. In the early 1960's, High-Fidelity was a really classy publication. It had a gorgeous matt finished cover that looked more like it belonged on a copy of Architectural Digest than on a hi-fi rag. And it had great articles on music as well as equipment. Articles were by such famous and authoritative authors as musicologist Nicholas Slonimski and Gene Lees to name two. The only problem with all of these rags at the time was that all of their equipment reviews were of the: "out-of-all-of-the-amplifiers-(tuners, turntables, speakers, tape-decks, or what have you)-that-we-have-ever-reviewed,-this-has-been-one-of-them" variety. IOW, "Yes, we have no opinion." The reason that Gordon Holt left High-Fidelity to start Stereophile in those days was for the very reason that their editorial policy was that everything sounded the same, and Gordon's ears told him differently.

[med_designer]

This is a great thread. My mom liked going to this cosmetics shop in a strip mall. At one end was a decent hi-fi site simply called "The Hi-Fi House". This store carried all sorts of things like Magnepan, Luxman, Phase Linear, Thorens, Adcom, and Tandberg. It was this store that set me on my hi-fi journey. While mom was at her cosmetics store, I spent time in this store learning and listening. When it came time to get a system I know what i wanted but the parents would not spring for the Magnepan, Thorens, Threshold setup. However they did go for this:

 

 

1. Turntable: Dual 508

 

 

2. Receiver : JVC RX80

 

 

3. Tape Deck: JVC KD D140

 

 

4. EQ: JVC SEA80

 

 

5. Speakers: Infinity RSa

 

 

 

6. 1st Major Upgrade: Denon DP35F

 

 

 

7. 2nd Major Upgrade: Denon DCD-1500 CD Player (Actually my 2nd CD player - the first was a Fisher right when CD's came out)

 

 

8. 1st gear bought with my owe money after collage

 

 

 

Despite this being an expensive hobby I really love getting new or pre-loved gear, learning about it and listening to it. I still have the Sonic Frontiers and Aragon in a bedroom system with this CD player hooked up to it:

 

 

 

Hope folks will continue the thread. I really like seeing where folks have started. Perhaps include a photo of where you are now. My most resent piece is this tube integrated and I truly love it.

 

 

Enjoy the musc.

[carewser]

^Thanks for reminding me of my first EQ and CD player. I've never been able to track down my first equalizer although the fact I can't remember the maker doesn't help. My first CD player was also a Fisher, in the mid eighties:

[DigiPete]

1977, 11 year old, I worked all day all summer and saved every penny.

It cost DKK 700 or more than USD 100 back then.

I made the money and I made the purchase, no parent supervision!

I played my ABBA tapes thin and my mother mad.

 

1 x 2.25w and build in speaker.

 

 

 

Those were the days!

Our hipsters we were much sexier ;-)

 

 

[new_media]

Sorry for the triple post. The website was running awfully slow there for awhile.

[new_media]

Well, I though my JVC dual auto reverse cassette boom box was the bees knees in junior high. You could even detach the speakers to get a bigger "soundstage."

 

[new_media]

I do wish I had some pictures of my first "real" system.

 

I worked summers during college to put together my first component system, which included.

 

Denon DCM-460 CD Changer

 

JVC TD-V541 cassette deck

 

Adcom GTP 400 Tuner/Preamp

 

Adcom GFA 555 II Amplifier

 

Advent Heritage floorstanders

 

A ginormous dbx 15" sub/end table which came with an outboard amp

 

I also kept the turntable from my Fischer rack system, but I don't recall the model number. Looked something like this one.

 

I sold the whole lot when I was an intern in the Bay Area. I had a small apartment and couldn't even set it all up. Sometimes wish I had kept it, though.

[wwaldmanfan]

My dad was an accountant, and one of his clients' sons owned a local radio station in Hackettstown, NJ. In a barter arrangement for my dad's services, the guy hooked him up with, what was at the time (1961), a very good component stereo system, which my parents housed in a custom walnut bar/storage console in our living room. The funny thing was, my parents were not into music at all, and only owned a handful of records, mostly show tunes.

 

So, after a while, I decided to upgrade my Lafayette stuff, and "borrowed" everything, and moved it into my bedroom. my original Garrard turntable, a Sony/Superscope stereo tape recorder, a H.H. Scott 299c integrated amp, matching Scott 350 multiplex FM tuner, and a pair of AR-2a speakers. I used it well until I went away to college in 1972.

 

[gmgraves]

This is a great thread. My mom liked going to this cosmetics shop in a strip mall. At one end was a decent hi-fi site simply called "The Hi-Fi House". This store carried all sorts of things like Magnepan, Luxman, Phase Linear, Thorens, Adcom, and Tandberg. It was this store that set me on my hi-fi journey. While mom was at her cosmetics store, I spent time in this store learning and listening. When it came time to get a system I know what i wanted but the parents would not spring for the Magnepan, Thorens, Threshold setup. However they did go for this:

 

 

 

Despite this being an expensive hobby I really love getting new or pre-loved gear, learning about it and listening to it. I still have the Sonic Frontiers and Aragon in a bedroom system with this CD player hooked up to it:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]23521[/ATTACH]

 

 

Enjoy the musc.

 

If this is the pioneer Elite CD Deck with the miniature turntable in it where you inserted the disk label-side down, I had one of those. It was built like a tank. While the DAC is probably, by now, pretty mediocre, the transport was really high-end and it did have a digital output. Connected to a modern DAC, I suspect that it would still perform very well. I wished I hadn't sold mine.