Do you have any gear that was outright given to you?


I was fortunate enough to have been gifted a McIntosh PS112 subwoofer. They are quite old now, but it continues to perform. It needed some repairs when it was given to me- a total of not quite $300 put it back into good working order. 
 

zavato

Does inherited count? If so, I inherited my father’s Thorens TD-124 and his Bozak B-302 Urban speakers, and a Pilot amplifier. I refurbished the speakers by adding the 5” mids and having the woofers reconed. I changed out the 3-way crossover to a Bozak 3-way with the Pat Tobin (sp?) mod and refinished the cabinets. I had the Thorens completely refurbished with new motor, etc. and bought a Grado wooden tone arm for it that has a Shure V15 cartridge. The Pilot amplifier may be too far gone to restore as it had a mouse or two nesting in it for awhile. 

if inherited doesn’t count, then, no one has given me anything.

I inherit music.  As a few friends and neighbors know of my interest in music, and either wisher to shed their physical media or pass on their deceased loved ones media.  I had a neighbor whom I had only recently begun to become friends with who developed pancreatic cancer.  He had been a prominent advertising executive in Chicago and had written a few jingles himself.  He had learned of my taste in music and gear and a few weeks before he passed showed up at my house with a trunk full of complete opera boxes of LPs.  Opera isn’t my main interest and I didn’t have room the LPs, but I didn’t have the heart to turn him away.  These LPs were the most immaculate that I hade ever seen and I did play through them .  After he died I discreetly enquired of his daughter at the memorial service as to whether he had left a system behind, but it turned out that yes he had a high end system and had sold it off as soon as he was diagnosed because he didn’t want his family to have to deal with it.

  A family friend sold her home and moved to a Nursing Home before she passed.  She was a hoarder and the house was filled with stuff that she had inherited from others.  There were multiple refrigerators, sets of silver, etc.  Her kids insisted I take a reel to reel which I really didn’t want.  It wasn’t one of the prestige R2R brands.  So I tried to restore it, and bought a pre recorded tape from a resale shop.  The machine at the tape which became hopelessly twisted and broke off when I attempted to extract 

@tksteingraber 

If you restore 1 thing, and think of him every time you see or touch it, that's a gift.

@buellrider97 

Might as well have given you an invoice for 3K.

I inherited a 47 ft Yacht, like the saying goes, a boat is a hole in the water that you throw money into. There's more to the story, but you get the drift.