Any audiophile types...or (like me) just wannabees?

I have always wanted to get into vinyl...i have a cheaper music hall record player, but my used lp's all have dust on them. the parasound has either a mm or mc don't remember phono amp. it always seemed too much work or money to get it right.

 

I love the old Pioneer Spec stuff... Spec 1, 2, 4's... stuff was LOUD!

 

Firecracker... Rush fan here as well!

I have a decent collection of their vinyl. Love the first album, sounds raw and gutsy.

 

When my fathers B&O tt took a crap, I influenced him to get a Music Hall. It's a great piece but he's wishing it was auto. I recently had his old Marantz serviced. Needed a new power switch and a full cleaning. I auditioned it for a few days in my system and really loved it!

He bought it new back in the day.

 

I bought my first piece of vintage audio equipment the other day. It's just an old Lafayette LR 3030 30 watt receiver but it's a good buy for $40. I just sprayed some of the noisy pots and it works great now. I have it in the bedroom with some Klipsch bookshelf speakers. In the living room I have a NAD 100 watt AV receiver and a pair of Paradigm floor standing speakers. I'd like to get one of the old Marantz integrated amps and a pair of dynaudio speakers down the road.

I've never been into vinyl and don't think I ever will be. It may be a sin but all of my music has gone from CDs to MP3s 9high bit rate). I've never really heard tube/records but the sound I get out of what I have is good enough for me. I think the vast majority of people can't tell the difference in sound quality in most cases. I'm more about finding new and different bands/music to listen to than spending my last dollar on high end components and music media. I have a very eclectic taste in music and there are very few genres that I dislike on the whole such as death metal and new age jazz.

 

Found some real high quality audio at a boot sale today.

 

here's a couple of my classics...........

 

Beautiful units! Love the Heathkit stuff! I worked in the HH Scott building on Powder Mill Road in Maynard Mass, when they went out of business and DEC bought it.

 

very cool, (well, unless the job sucked).............i really love how good these early solid state Scotts sound, IMHO one of the best.........

 

Actually the job was pretty cool too. I was a field service tech for DEC and DEC was my account in the greater Maynard area, also Acton and Hanscom field where I supported their PDP 11/34 that ran the scheduling application for their 12 helicopters and two turbo prop Saab planes, plus Ken's twin engine Cesna.

I loved the job, but when I was in that HH Scott building I knew I was on hallowed ground because I was a beginning Audiophile, and also an electronics geek. GenRad was up the road and they made a lot of the test gear we used and I had previously worked for MaBell and they made tons of their test gear.. another great American electronics company. Lot's of great tech history around here.

 

some seriously sweet looking equipment there!

I love the old school pioneer stuff and the marantz too. Would love a pioneer spec 1-2 type setup....

 

I'm not really an audiophile, although I'd really like to have a decent tube based stereo amp. All of my guitar amps are tube based and it's taken me a while to find a few that I really like. The dynamics of a good tube amp are just incredible. There's a guy in Windsor, Can. that makes great handwired amps at an affordable price. I ordered one back in 2012 and liked it so much that I got a second. They're both Marshall amp clones, but he'll make pretty much whatever you want. I built my own cabs and amp shells too, which was a lot of fun and makes the amps more personal.

The head shell on this one is solid oak.


I call this my barnyard amp


Both amps are EL84 based and 18 little watts that will rip your face off.


Phaez Amps

 

My Mom & Dad had this set way back! Late 60's?
Do you guy's with this "old stuff" think is has a better sound then the newer electronic's?
I'm the last guy to jump on new technology, no smart phone, no GPS, and this forum stuff is about the extent of my comupter abilities and use, and I don't text), but I am amazed hearing the sound that comes out of the little 3" square Bose speakers with the seperate bass speaker for sure.

 

1963 actually, any of this vintage audio, IMHO, it's what ever you think sounds best, i personally like the early solid state amps/receivers, gotta watch tough, the earliest used germanium transistors rather than silicon transistors, both sound great, but germanium transistors run at different voltages and are hard to find when needed, the heathkit shown uses germanium transistors........

 

Agreed. Your ears are the judge.

 

This is the time of year I am digging out my vinyl. The only piece of it that is vintage anymore isn't even all that vintage because I've become hooked on HomeTheater as well. But I am still buying vinyl and have a newish old United Audio Dual Turntable I play them with.

Hooked up to my Onkyou NR-809 and with all that Dolby surround sound stuff it sounds even better than it did on my old KLY Model 5s.

This is a Windham Hill Sampler LP that is just beautiful

 

i have a nice vintage pioneer pl-41 i need to dig back out and give it a go-over..........

 

That's a nice turntable!

 

After college I bought a stereo system from one of my classmates who had joined the service and was going overseas. The system consisted of a Marantz 1120 Integrated Amp, a Dual 1218 turntable with a Stanton cartridge, and a set of KLH Model 5s. Having a system like this was something most guys my age didn't have. Most of the system components I replaced over the years until finally all I had left was the speakers.

So a couple years ago my daughter and SIL got married and I built her a small system around the speakers. Pioneer Receiver and Pioneer turntable like the one in your picture.

It is incredible how good that system still sounds. The picked up one of they also picked up one of those small "Pandora" boxes that can tune in various internet streaming sites and use the tape inputs for that.

They love this system and I prolly put it together for under a couple hundred bucks. Of course I already had the speakers. The only problem is the speakers are a tad large for most young people apartments.

So now I'm looking to put together a small system for my son and his wife. My ideal system would be one of those neat KLH integrated systems like this one Model 24. Mut really any turntable/receiver/small speaker combo would be just as good. These little KLH systems were "the balls" for ricjh kids in college dorms in the Boston area in the late 60s/early 70s. I keep looking for one, but they are usually pretty beat.

If anyone has anything for sale, or any pointers to something that might get me part way there, please let me know.

 

A couple of years back I was looking for some cheap speakers for out in the garage. I passed a yard sale down the street and saw they had a complete stereo system for sale, they were playing the tuner for the background music. JVC Tuner, JVC CD player, Pioneer 2 deck cassette player, and 4 KLH speakers. I recognized JVC and Pioneer but never heard of KLH. I asked the women (our age) how much for the speakers? She hesitated for a bit and then said "Oh, I don't know, I was only trying to get $10 for the whole system, it was my dads and were just trying to get rid of all this old stuff". I was shell shocked and could barely contain my usual yard sale coolness! So I managed to contain myself, hesitated for a bit, and said "Ok".

To make matters better, when I got back home to try everything out I noticed it was missing the cord for the CD player, it had a removable one that plugged into the back. I went back down the street to see if they had the cord. They looked around a bit in some boxes and couldn't find it. While they were looking I noticed 2 what appeared to be decent looking 26" bikes all covered in thick dust that were not there earlier. My girls were about ready to move up from some older 20" ones so I asked what they wanted for the bikes. The woman again hesitated for a bit and said "I don't know, how about $10 each, we bought those for when the grandkids visited but they moved away and they never got ridden much. Needless to say I bagged those too. After hosing off the heavy dust back home they were indeed like brand new! I love yard sales!

These babies sounded so good I put them in the house and moved my others out to the garage!