My first stereo setup was purchased after a long hot summer of waiting tables at a big local seaside joint. Where I come from the equipment of the day came in the form of receivers - Pioneer, Marantz, Sansui.
I saved. When that glorious day came that I finally had the scratch it went toward a Sansui 9090db receiver, a nice pair of rather large Advent bookshelf speakers, and a Garrard turntable. Odd that I don't recall how much I spent on it, but it was substantial enough for me at the time.
While I don't remember what happened to the Sansui,. I still own and at times listen to my Pioneer SX1050 purchased sometime during the same era. I would many years later purchase a Marantz 2252b on eBay just for the hell of it. I've spent but a few hundred dollars over the years to keep the Pioneer operable, an investment well worth it simply because it's a great looking piece. It sounds pretty damn good, too.
Currently I'm listening to a simple setup;. McIntosh MC275 MkVI amplifier, Audio Research LS3 solid state preamplifier, Marantz TT-15 turntable with a Primare R32 phono stage, and a pair of Thiel CS3.5 loudspeakers. |
First system was 1968 with a Marantz 8B amp, Dyna PAS 3x preamp, Rek-O-Kut turntable with Empire arm and Altec A7 speakers. I was 15 and my father was a long term audiophile back to 1949. He went through everything from Cook binaural records and tubes to transistor and back to tubes. |
JVC R-S77 Receiver
Infinity RS-2000 Speakers
Yamaha PF-30 TT
Nakamichi BX-125 cassette deck |
1965. AR-3 speakers; AR turntable; Shure V-15 cartridge; Dynaco PAS-3 preamplifier; Dynaco Stereo 70 amplifier. |
Bdp24, Your system had been in my dreams serious! |
Let's see.....
There was a Marantz receiver with a horizontal thumb wheel. The was a BIC turntable. Strange, but I can't recall the speakers.
I do remember that my first high end speaker was the Kef Corelli and my first separates were from Audire. I bought the Audire Diffet Pre and ? Power amp at a steep discount from Crazy Eddie, a NYC based big box store that somehow briefly got hold of an Audire franchise.
There was also a Dual turntable in that system. |
I must have been half asleep when I wrote that, it was an Audio Techica cartridge. But reading most of the other entries, it does seem to be a trend. Almost all of us started out in the mid-fi stereo of the 70's. I remember stores like Sight and Sound, Harvey's Warehouse, and later Circuit City, that sold good mid-fi equipment at affordable prices, perhaps this has something to do with why our hobby is dropping off? This starting point is missing. It's either surround sound systems for movie sound tracks, or nothing, until you jump straight into the big money stuff? Even though there may be affordable systems at your local salon, these shops that were in every local shopping center are gone, and one must seek out the rare salon, which can be intimidating to the uninitiated. |
I was 13 in 1975, and as many of you from that period have already said, I had a Technics 25wpc receiver, worked construction during the summer and bought a BIC turntable, with a $35 Altec Lansing cartridge. I was using some super cheap speakers from my dad's quadraphonic system (blew them up) until the end of summer when I bought some AKL towers at Harvey's Warehouse! I did replace the turntable with an ADC unit at some later date. But that system lasted me until after I was grown and married, I was probably 23 before I moved into the high end of audio. Or at least attempted to. |
I remember it very well, though it was way back in '69. A Garrard SL55 turntable with a Shure M91e cartridge, plugged into a Fisher X-100A integrated amp (tubed, of course), powering a pair of Acoustic Research 4ax's. I could actually still enjoy music through that system today! |
At my very early age I had phonograph with spring and one day I couldn't dial the spring and was listening to my records by simply spinning at near correct speed with my finger. Than I tried to fix it by taking it apart by putting together collapsed spring back into coils kneat, but it jumped out of chassis high up the ceiling. I was probably 5...6 and was VERY upset to tears that I wouldn't ever be able to spin my records manually. My dad than managed to get old WW2 times Telefunken console unit. After some small research he managed to get all tubes in place and start it up and it worked! Few to several years later I was able to troubleshoot it myself and replace tubes as necessary as this console I was using till my youth. The console had tuner, record player and 7" r2r tape player. By that time I learned circuits and kinematics of all 3 console components and knew how to fix issues. |
Given to me by my parents as a high school graduation present in 1975: BIC turntable with Shure V15III cartridge, Pioneer SX-838 receiver, pair of Sylvania AS 125B speakers. Still use receiver and speakers as a garage system! |
I built my first system when I was 15; I'm 72 now. My first amp was a Heathkit that took me a week to build. My first enclosure was a thick cardboard box with a coax speaker because I couldn't wait to hear my amp. The source was a cheap turntable. As an improvement to my speaker I found plans in a Popular Electronics magazine for a "sweet sixteen" enclosure with 16 RadioShack 4" drivers which were modified to increase their excursion. I added a 12" speaker in the attic access hatch turning the attic into an "infinite baffle". The last improvement was the addition was a piezoelectric driver as a tweeter. I'm sure it would sound terrible today but I thought it was the best system I'd ever heard at the time. |
In the late 70's I had a beautiful new Schwinn Varsity ten speed bike that held my first REAL audio system.
I was 12 or so and it was an AudioVox cassette player that had a built in amplifier and volume control. I attached it to the back bike rack powered by a motorcycle battery that was in a bike seat bag hanging from the back of the seat. I had 5 1/4 inch speakers attached to mirrors that rose a few inches off the bars that I super glued the magnets to. This was my first system and it sounded awesome! Boz Scaggs, Steely Dan... I was in heaven. Two of my favorite things together, so cool. |
Wow,I remember how proud I was when I first bought the KLH 17's I think they were $69. a pair new in the 60's.That Garrard syncrolab was a rumble box full of bass feedback,I hated that thing.Then I bought a new Dual 1019 which I still have.I remember listening to the Beatles Sgt. Peppers when it first came out and all of my friends systems we would listen and compare out treble on our systems. |
KLH 17 is STILL a good sounding box ! |
I built an Eico integrated amp kit,KHL model 17's,and a Garrard syncrolab and Statton 500e cartridge.I just looked in my cartridge box yesterday and the Statton is still there!My brother built his Eico which he still has.Wow,that was back in the mid to later 1960's.I still have LP's I bought from the 60's like my Doors Soft Parade.Somehow a box of about a 100 45's survived all the moves. |
During the time that a graduate course credit was $35 at Penn State, I walked into Watson Equipment Sales (WES) in State College, PA, and was soon drooling over an array of speakers and integrated amps. I took home to my apartment a Pioneer SX-626 receiver and a pair of Altec 887a's, to be matched with a used AR XA turntable. It was that first term that my roommate introduced me to post-Peter Green, pre-Buckingham/Nicks Fleetwood Mac. When my apartment was ransacked over Christmas break I lost the turntable, but had the wisdom to move the receiver and speakers to a friend's for safe keeping. |
There was a Sony outlet that sold refurbished equipment in Kenosha, WS-about an hour away from my parent's house. In high school my first component was Sony's first Dolby Pro-Logic receiver. I remember it required a separate amp to drive the center channel which was kind of ridiculous and therefore never used for surround. That drove my dad's Sony speakers from the 70's for a few months until, with the help of my dad, I did a 12 month free financing deal on a pair of giant Cerwin Vega speakers with 15" woofers and a heavy pair of Monster Speaker cables. All this time I was using a Sony D-35 Discman (second only to their flagship D- 555). Within the next year or so I bought a Sony ES single cassette deck and the very first 100 disc changer Sony made which was much more well made than subsequent "mega changers". With the exception of the receiver all the equipment is still in working order and cosmetically almost flawless. My brother-in-law re-foamed the speakers and is using them for his "party house" and the rest sits in retirement in my basement much to my wife's discontent. I got years of service from this equipment which was mixed and matched in HT systems and secondary rigs as I built up my 2 channel main rig. |
Coming from Denmark my first system was truly a designer show piece consisting of Bang & Olufsen Beomaster 1200 receiver with a Beogram 1200 turntable. http://arcamadeus.simplesite.com/305336804
These components have been on permanent display at the Museum for Modern Art in New York for over 40 years. |
Fun thread. My first "real" component system ~1970:
Minerva receiver - couldn't afford the big names
AR turntable with Signet cartridge - still have
Soundesign 8 track player/recorder - yeah baby
Utah speakers - honking big mothers with horn tweeters |
My first system that consisted of separate components would be Phase Linear Series II amp & preamp driving Bose 901 speakers w/Technics SL1200 tt. Around 79-80.
First system was a Sansui G-9000 Receiver driving the same 901's along with that Technics tt. Around 1978? |
Heathkit AR1500 that I built, original large Advent speakers, Dual turntable but I can't remember the model or the cartridge (probably a Shure). I lost it all when I got divorced, sad to say. |
NAD 7020 with ESS speakers (2 way w/Heil transformer) Rotel turntable and Tandberg cassette deck...survived multiple moves and med school |
1977..Large pair of walnut Advents..Sansui AU-7900 intergrated..75 watts into 8ohms..Dual 701 turntable with Shure V15 cartridge.. |
Nine years later, this thread is still going, because none of us who loves music forgets that first system...and the joys of getting it home and taking it out of its boxes. I have two "first" systems.....as a high school freshman in 1971, bought a super-cheapo from a company called "Soundesign:" it may have pumped out two channels of sound, but even to my very untrained teenage ears, it was lacking. (After I went to school, my brother and sister played it to death.) Fast forward to 1980, a fresh college graduate in Washington, DC... bought my first system from a stereo dealer long-gone: Myer-Emco. My receiver was a Toshiba SA-725; my speakers were a pair of Avid 102A's; my turntable, which lasted me for years, was a Yamaha YPB2....which came with a Signet TK3C cartridge. I'll never forget calling a cab, loading in the boxes, and taking it back to my DC apartment. When I finally got it all set up, I put on Rickie Lee Jones and thought I'd never heard anything sound so good. The whole thing cost me $750 dollars in 1980.
In the 33 years since, I've been through several changes of systems.....but still have that Rickie Lee Jones (now CD); it's my ritual.....it's the first album I put on whenever I have a major system upgrade. It's my tradition.
Jeff |
My first system which I bought from a hifi store on Sunset Blvd. in Hollywood the first week after enrolling in college consisted of an Onkyo TX-1500 mkii receiver (which I still have and other than a missing power button, works great!) that put out a whopping 17 watts per channel, a pair of Bose 301 speakers (how I envied the Navy ROTC guys who bought their Bose 901's in Japan at great discounts), an Akai tape deck, a Technics SL-Q2 turntable with an Audio Technica MM cartridge (couldn't afford a Shure V-15 Type IV back then), out of the box RCA interconnects and "honking big" (at that time LOL) Monster Cable speaker wires. I used this system up until 2005 when I finally focused my energies on upgrading to my present system. I'd ship that college system back and forth between Hawaii and Southern California and fortunately, never had any issues with the US Postal Service (I must have been born under a lucky star). Good times! |
Sansui speakers,recviever and AR turntable brought it back from Nam,Dude!! |
Sansui QR500 four channel receiver, Lafayette four channel 8-track deck, Dual 1229 turntable, four Sylvania bookshelf speakers, Lafayette headphones.
After having an 8-track player at home and In the car, it seemed like I was In the big time. I just KNEW quadraphonic was here to stay! |
AR-XA turntable
Dynaco SCA-35 integrated amp
AR 4x speakers |
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What is the solution then? Is there a way to recapture that excitement again or is it gone for good? Please enlighten me... |
Liquid-Smooth, I was just reading your last paragraph and thinking back how much I enjoyed my first system. I seem to remember enjoying it as much, if not more than my current systems. I guess it may seem that way because it was a starter system and the real attention grabber, whereas now I'm more accustomed to having great sound as the norm. Great memories though! |
GE 8 track. It actually had ok sound for what it is. I enjoyed Beethoven symphonies and the sound of music when I was a teenager...
Brings me back memories of grateful parents who have given me all my toys... then they bought me a complete Pioneer system which sounded much better - I thought it was sonic heaven then...
Strange how much I enjoyed that system, even more than I am doing now with my 60k+ system... Is it my age, or do we simply get used to higher quality, and it stops being amazing after awhile? |
In 2004 I put together my first sound system: a Marantz SR4200 with Paradigm Monitor 5 v3's, Titans for surrounds, a CC350, and a PS1000 sub, and a Panasonic DV-578. The only changes I ended up making in 8 years was adding a PS3 for blu rays more than games, replacing the Marantz with an Onkyo TX-SR805, and replacing the DV-578 with a Panasonic DMP-BDT210. It was a reliable mancave HT setup, but too ugly to have in the living room. |
Back in 1996 I bought a JVC digital front (CD player don't remember the model) but it was about 150 $; JVC receiver RX 316 R (about 250 $). Before almost immediately switching to Magnat Transpuls 3000 3-way speakers that I bought on sale in Vienna, Austria for only 100 $ (MSRP of 600 $), I used an old ReVox monitor speakers (don't remember the number) 25 Watts only. |
In 1975 I turned 16, other kids bought their first car, I bought a Phase Linear 4000 preamp, 400 amp, Bose 901 Series II Speakers, Thorens TD-124 turntable with (I think) a Grado cartridge.
By 1977 I graduated High School was selling gear for a local high end shop and had moved up to Quad ESL-57 electrostats, Audio Research SP3A preamp + D76A amp, Panasonic SP10 turntable with Rabco SL-8E arm and Denon DL-103S Moving Coil Cartridge.
Today I have kids, my system is mainly for Home Theater, all Martin Logan's (Prodigy R/L, Theater CTR, Request SIDE, Aerius REAR, Descents) with Lexicon MC-12 preamp, Bryston amps, and a modified Oppo bdp-95 blue ray player. For fun I just built two Danley Sound Labs DTS-10 tapped horn subwoofers driven by a QSC RMX 4050HD on a dedicated 20 amp circuit. (I've been lurking on audiogon to pick up a used turntable and get back to vinyl)
However to this day I can still remember the thrill of sitting in front of my Quads, mesmerized by the most incredible detail, ambience and soundstage I'd ever heard. It hooked me for a lifetime of audio enjoyment. |
I can't remember. It was good. |
First system was a piece of crap, but i loved it anyway.
Radio Shack receiver, crappy speakers, and a turntable with a chipped needle.
I've since built my own speakers, upgraded to decent components over the past 30 years. |
Curtis Mathis HiFi around 1960 |
In 1982, I was 13, I got a Technics SA-222 receiver (30wpc), a Denon DP-31L turntable with a Micro-Acoustics cartridge, a Sony cassette deck and some "AES - Audio Electronics Systems 3-way speakers. Pretty sweet sound for a 13 year old kid. And by "sweet" I mean that it could play unbelievably loud!
The Sony conked out after a few years and I replaced it with a Denon 3-head cassette deck. I gave away the speakers years ago. I recently pulled the rest of the components out of the attic and discovered they still worked perfectly, so I sold them for a few bucks on eBay, which was more trouble than it was worth. Should have donated it to Goodwill. |
1989, I was 14. Kenwood cdp, techniques turntable, Pioneer receiver, Advent BabyII speakers. And like the OP, I felt like the biggest badass on the block. |
kenwood ka 5500 amp, sanyo turntable,panasonics top loading cassette deck,and kenwood speaker k555
thses were in 1978. |
Mine was a Heathkit AR-1500 receiver (built it myself) and Advent large loudspeakers. I also had a Dual turntable with Shure cartridge but I can't remember the model numbers. I loved it but lost it all upon my divorce. |
In 1979 I sold all my silver coin collection, and with birthday and X-mas money i had around $500. Wanted a Pioneer system which included a PL-200 table and F-500 cassette deck. Wanted 50w/ch so a Toshiba SA-750 was found at clearence price. With not enough left for Pioneer speakers I purchase 12 inch 3 way Omega speakers. The speakers played loud but were junk they lasted less then 2 years. Replaced them with small Advents with money from my first job(parents were not as generous 30 years ago)lol. |
Wind-up WW II olive drab suitcase 78 player. Built a Dynaco SCA-35 in 1964, to go with new AR speakers, and a turntable cobbled together from a Motorola mono system of my parent's. Not loud, but quite a bit better than the 78. Wish I still had all of them. |
AR Receiver, AR XA Turntable w/Shure V15 Type II cartridge,
Dynaco A25 speakers, Superex ProB-V headphones.
Lamp cord for speakers, captive power cords and captive IC on the turntable. |
My first system was a Panasonic Panapet Ball Radio. I remember buying it for $10 back in 1971 with money from mowing lawns. I then expanded the system with a Portable Panasonic Tape Recorder that my Uncle bought for me for $20 at the army PX in 1972. I recorded songs off the air though the internal mic. |
Kenwood receiver, small Advent speakers, and a Fisher turntable back in 1972.--Mrmitch |
It was 1973 I was 14, pioneer amp pioneer turntable radio shack speakers |
My first system (not counting the Sears system) was purchased used as a system. It included a Pro-Linear turntable with an Empire cartridge, Technics SU-7700 amp, and Optimus 5 speakers. |
