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'90's gear

Not a question, just a remark. Last week I finally fullfilled a longlasting wish for vinyl-playback: a Goldmund Studietto with T5 arm and a Kiseki Agaat Ruby cartridge. And it sounded even better as I imagined it would do. Suddenly it struck me that most of the 'serious' gear in my system is almost 20 years old: Threshold S/300 ('90 or something), Aragon 24K (?), the Goldmund ('91), Apogee Centaur Major ('92) etc. etc. Even my cd transport (recently revised with new spindle motor and laser, and some spares on the shelf) is from 1997. Only my dac is rather new: 2002.
Now as a moderator of a Dutch audioforum I heard many systems, and although mine is not thé best I've heard it still can shake it with the best.
So what's my point? A few actually. You can save a lot of money by buying older gear that was good in it's day. Yes, there may be culprits, some technical knowledge comes in handy. And the old guns still can do their trick today. And the third point is that matching is very, very important. I've heard systems with new and very expensive gear sounding dreadfull, while cheap and small systems may sound brilliant.
Well.... that's about it. I'm gonna play another record, most of them also dating from the beginning of the '90's... :)
satch

Showing 1 response by sugarbrie

sugarbrie
3,854 posts
 
The only thing that has shown a lot of improvement since the 1990's is digital playback, and probably more at the lower-end as the technology has trickled down.

In many ways speakers at the mid to lower-end have gotten worse for music playback. A lot of speakers mid-fi and lower are now tuned for digital surround home theater equipment.

How about vacuum tubes. My favorites are all from the 1940's. For the most part, the newer they are, the worse....
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