The Allure of Vintage Audio Gear

I have a high speed Revox B77 Reel to Reel from the 80s.  It doesnt get too much better than those decks.   I listened to a comparison between a revox deck, a $50000 turntable, and a highly regarded DAC.  The old revox blew them away.  Vinyl was second best.  Digital  was a distant 3rd place.  Tape is hard to beat.  Too bad the tapes are so damn expensive.  

Might be my ears, but to me my rebuilt Pioneer amp with HPM-100 sounds as pleasing as my modern system. Different - but equally pleasing.

It’s much cheaper too, so there’s a use case for vintage as far as I’m concerned..

I’ve been into audio gear about 50 years now, and I’ve heard a ton of gear over the years. There’s a great deal of vintage gear I would not bother with however there is some vintage gear that’s just stellar. I won’t list them all, but I will mention four pieces of equipment I own that is 53 or more years old. The youngest- a McIntosh MR78 tuner. Superb. Built in 1973. Marantz Model 20 tuner; also excellent, circa 1970. Now the old folks- Thorens TD124 and an SME 3009 arm, both from 1963 - I’m the 2nd owner and I knew the first owner. Stunning. All this older gear has been serviced and in excellent condition. All of these pieces are well placed in a modern high resolution system. This equipment are the exceptions though for their vintage.