Show us your former equipment/kit !!

[Ralf11]

What you used to have - as a child/teen/or any larval/pupal stage...

 

related thread:

 

[Ralf11]

[Racerxnet]

Ralf,

 

Is your dog OK????

 

MAK

[Ralf11]

that pic is from ~~ 13 yrs ago but thx for asking

 

Golden #3 also enjoys being a diffuser

[rando]

I hope @Shadders was pretty swole before he had some work done. Only excuse for having equipment in the state he described in the other thread. 

[kumakuma]

 

Got a couple of these somewhere in the closet.

[AnotherSpin]

My first piece of equipment was similar to this (pic from the net). The music from VOA, Radio Free Europe, etc. was awesome, when it was not jammed by russian military units.

[jcbenten]

This is what I used in college (or one very similar...who can remember)...I used to fall asleep studying with my ear on the speaker:

[gmgraves]

On 3/17/2019 at 1:29 PM, Ralf11 said:

What you used to have - as a child/teen/or any larval/pupal stage...

 

related thread:

 

I have catalog pictures. My dad built the speaker cabinets, and the bookshelves for the system, as well as the stand and plinth for the record changer. I was about 16 when I had this system. There were two of the mono integrated amps and two of the speakers. Not shown are the two horn tweeters that I bought from Lafayette Radio. Most of these components came from Allied Radio in Chicago. The exception is the Koss Headphones. I bought those from Audio Fidelity in Richmond, Virginia.

[STC]

Was given this by my uncle when I was four or five. Used it more to play than for listening. Loved the way the toy soldiers spinned on them. Taken by a family friend who promised to get it repaired and repainted. Never saw it again.

 

Picture form Picclick.co.uk

 

[clipper]

On 3/17/2019 at 4:02 PM, Ralf11 said:

that pic is from ~~ 13 yrs ago but thx for asking

 

Golden #3 also enjoys being a diffuser

Ralf, great maggies!

 

Here's the oldest pic I could find.  It's from 2001.

 

 

[Ralf11]

nice - are those 3.6's?

[clipper]

Just now, Ralf11 said:

nice - are those 3.6's?

Thanks!

 

Nope.  3.3.

 

I have 3.6s now (all these years later) and am always thinking about moving up to 3.7...

[Ralf11]

I had 1.5's (in the pic above) and listened to the 1.7's, which are a big jump in SQ.  But I decided to get an octave or so more bass with the 1.7i's.  here is a thread on them:

 

 

[Ajax]

Below is my first "real" hifi purchased in 1984 from Graham's hifi in London.

 

Although a very simple system it cost me a years salary at a time when I was struggling to feed myself. However, it provided me with some 15 years of unbridled joy in various incarnations including adding a Linn LK1 & LK11 Pre-Power Amp and Tannoy 15" Ardent Speakers. The Linn LP12 turntable was the consistent thread throughout until I stupidly traded it for a pair of very ordinary speakers in the early 2000s. 

 

- Linn LP12 turntable with Ittok arm

- Naim Nait Amp

- Linn Kann Speakers ... combined later with a Tannoy Sub

 

Just superb.

 

 

[gmgraves]

18 hours ago, Ajax said:

Below is my first "real" hifi purchased in 1984 from Graham's hifi in London.

 

Although a very simple system it cost me a years salary at a time when I was struggling to feed myself. However, it provided me with some 15 years of unbridled joy in various incarnations including adding a Linn LK1 & LK11 Pre-Power Amp and Tannoy 15" Ardent Speakers. The Linn LP12 turntable was the consistent thread throughout until I stupidly traded it for a pair of very ordinary speakers in the early 2000s. 

 

- Linn LP12 turntable with Ittok arm

- Naim Nait Amp

- Linn Kann Speakers ... combined later with a Tannoy Sub

 

Just superb.

 

 

Nice system! Naim amps are really good and a Linn LP 12 Is beyond reproach! I’ve heard good things about the Kann speakers too but I’ve never auditioned them, personally!

[ipeverywhere]

http://www.hifi-classic.net/review/cambridge-soundworks-ensemble-ii-98.html 

 

After putting away the boomboxes this was the first "pair" of speakers I purchased. Connected it up to a Pioneer receiver and a portable CD player. Was good for still living at home. 

[Superdad]

Here are photos of some of the pieces I had in my system in the years 1976 to 1980, at ages 14-18 years old.  Note that the pics are not of my actual units--I just grabbed them off Google--but they are the actual models.  Some of these pieces--and a few others, I still have in my "audio museum."  I also had a few different reel-to-reel decks (various Revox, Tandberg, Teac, Akai), and several other Nakamichi pieces, most nattily the wonderful 700MkII.

The speakers, HK amp, and Kenwood turntable all got heavily modified.

 

The HK Citation 12 (above and below) was dual-mono.  Its chassis and transformers became the basis for years of experimentation and reach among the Hovland gang--in the two decades before we became an official company with our own products.

 

I still have my Marantz 20B tuner in walnut case.  Dick Sequerra designed--and custom tweaked by Bob Hovland.  Considered one of the best sounding tuners in the world. (And its for sale! $1,250 plus shipping.)  No radio stations worth listening to where I live.

 

 

 

This was American-made Marantz at its finest.  I also have the even better Model 19 (seen below).  It too works and looks perfect (I use it daily in our workshop and is for sale ($1,600).  These are heavy beasts.

 

This pic is from my media vestibule a few years ago (when we were short for space I turned it into a bookkeeping office for a part-time hire.)

 

[flummoxe]

This was my first proper system at the age of 16.

• Rega Planar 2 + R100 Cartridge
• Marantz PM350
• KEF Chorale III

I saved hard doing a number of Saturday jobs until it got there. I distinctly remember collecting the turntable from Billy Vee in Lewisham in around 1983. What an exciting and proud day. My Step Father thought I was completely crazy spending so much money. As I recall £185.

 

 

[gmgraves]

1 hour ago, Superdad said:

Here are photos of some of the pieces I had in my system in the years 1976 to 1980, at ages 14-18 years old.  Note that the pics are not of my actual units--I just grabbed them off Google--but they are the actual models.  Some of these pieces--and a few others, I still have in my "audio museum."  I also had a few different reel-to-reel decks (various Revox, Tandberg, Teac, Akai), and several other Nakamichi pieces, most nattily the wonderful 700MkII.

The speakers, HK amp, and Kenwood turntable all got heavily modified.

 

The HK Citation 12 (above and below) was dual-mono.  Its chassis and transformers became the basis for years of experimentation and reach among the Hovland gang--in the two decades before we became an official company with our own products.

 

I still have my Marantz 20B tuner in walnut case.  Dick Sequerra designed--and custom tweaked by Bob Hovland.  Considered one of the best sounding tuners in the world. (And its for sale! $1,250 plus shipping.)  No radio stations worth listening to where I live.

 

 

 

This was American-made Marantz at its finest.  I also have the even better Model 19 (seen below).  It too works and looks perfect (I use it daily in our workshop and is for sale ($1,600).  These are heavy beasts.

 

This pic is from my media vestibule a few years ago (when we were short for space I turned it into a bookkeeping office for a part-time hire.)

 

I had a Citation 12 for years. l bought it as a kit. When I worked for Fujitsu Semiconductor, I replaced the bipolar output transistors (2n3055s IIRC) with FETs made by Fujitsu. The Citation 12 sounded much better with the FETs.

 

As for your Marantz Model 20 tuner, there are no FM stations in the United States period worth listening to. They are all so heavily compressed and hard limited as to be virtually unlistenable on good equipment. I was in Boston a couple of years ago, and I figured that the Boston classical station WCRB would probably sound good because they have what is probably the highest-FI of any Internet Radio Station with their 192 Kbps mp3 streaming, but their FM signal did not impress. 

 

I too have a highly regarded FM tuner, the fabulous Yamaha T-85. It sets in a closet, forelorne and unused because there hasn’t been any FM worth listening to in decades. When I bought it, this was not the case. I was living in the San Francisco Bay Area at the time and there were three great sounding classical stations (KPEN, KKHI, and KDFC) as well as a great jazz station, KJAZ.

 

KPEN, KKHI, and KJAZ are gone now, and KDFC has become a mere shadow of it’s former self. I live in the Reno Nevada area now. When I first moved here in 2015, there was no classical music or jazz station here but two years ago, station KNCJ went on the air, it plays classical during the week and Jazz on weekends. I have my car radio tuned to it perpetually, and I am thankful that we have such a station (many much larger radio markets have no classical music FM or jazz FM for that matter). Unfortunately, it too sounds extremely mediocre.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[flummoxe]

After a few years I moved on to my next system in a number of stages, ending up with the below.

• Linn LP12 + LVX arm + Linn Basic Cartridge
• Mission Cyrus One
• Musical Fidelity MC-2 

[rando]

[flummoxe]

The next move was a big step-up in sound quality thanks to the amazing PT Anniversary. I so regret selling it now!

• Pink Triangle - Anniversary + Roksan Tabriz t + Shure VST-V 
• Marantz CD63
• Audiolab 8000C & 8000P
• SD Acoustics SD-3

 

[Ralf11]

George, I'll take that T-85 off your hands.

[fas42]

This is what I grew up with as a kiddy, ours had no autochanger:

 

 

Mum loved music, bought records by the score - everything from Supraphon imports to all the current hits on 45s, all the good stuff happening in the mid 60's ...