How old were you when audio gear first caught your interest?

I remember very early on maybe 5 yr old , playing my cousins 45s.  She gave me Sonny James Young Love, along with others. My uncle built Dynaco amp and preamp and I was hooked by 11 yrs old 1964 and the Beatles and especially The Rolling Stones fueled the fire.  I got a part time after school job at a local hi end stereo shop on Long Island.  We had Infinity Servo Stactic 1 on display, along with JBL, SAE Phase Liner Domestic and imported Marantz, Revox B&O.  Along with a speaker called LWE,  Been enjoying it for 68 of my 73 years 

@elliottbnewcombjr -

"I started smoking full time age 10; drinking beer age 13, so all my newspaper route money and recycling bottles for 2c and 5c for quart bottles, and coat hangers 1c for 2 hangers, went for beer and cigarettes. "

Your story cracks me up. Not sure of your age, but sounds like you and I were able to either find someone's brother to buy us beer, or there was a soused deli owner who wanted to pay his bills and figured why not sell to minors, because that's the age he started drinking.

David

I listened to my records on my parents console when I was a teenager.  I became interested in a better system when I went away to college, and I bought my first system when I was about 19.  I became interested in better sound quality in my early to mid 20's.  My first component with audiophile pretensions was a Musical Fidelity A1, which was a 20 watt amp that played in pure class A.  I purchased my first top-notch component, which was a VPI TNT III turntable when I was about 40, which I still use in my current system.

@wharfy 

77, Born in 1948.

Dixie Liquors, right across the G. W. Bridge from Virginia. into Wash. DC. 

Drinking age in DC was 18, VA. was 21. The joke was, if you could reach the counter, you could buy anything.

I was short for my age, only 5’-1" my freshman year (finished 6-0" senior year) it used to crack my friends up when I’d come out carrying two big bags of beer.

We all lived in McLean, VA., 8 miles from Dixie Liquors, get some gas money, get some beer money, get going, get back to the party! I remember, gas and cigarettes were the same price: .23c/gal; .23c/pack.

A lot of Military there. One of my Motley Crew stole blank IDs from his father, and we all were Drivers for the Army Motor Pool, they were green I remember.

Bars in DC, they would glance at the IDs, my normal sized friends, in we went, then at me, 5’-1", baby face, in I went. The problem was when we started going into Georgetown and those clubs had College Students. They were not happy with us showing attention to the girls, fights, arguments with the doormen, .....

That was the era of Muscle Cars, OMG, flying down the Geo. Wash. Parkway, music BLASTING!

I was 15 during XMas 1976 when I purchased my first system. It was an inexpensive no-brand name system consisting of a turntable, receiver and really cheesy cloth grilled speakers. My gateway drug into all this.