[Pez]

When I was 16 years old my 2nd job was working at Sears in the electronics department. I was young and naive and thought the end all be all of hifi was Bose. One day we got in AR speakers and I realized they sounded about 1000 times better.

 I ended up buying a set of Bookshelves who's model number escapes me (Edit found them! AR-216PS). they sounded pretty nice, lots of bass, polycarbonite tweeter was bad, but far from the worst and the midrange sucked. Soon after (being that I worked there) I returned them in favor of a pair of Polk Audio bookshelves. RT5s



I was happy with them for about 2-3 years until I discovered real hifi! I found a high end store in FT Collins called Audio Alternative (perhaps you've been to there rooms at RMAF, I still say hi to Rick the owner every chance I get) and ended up getting some Acoustic Energy Aegis 3s which were floorstanding speakers that had very good sound for the relatively small price I paid.


If I recall correctly they were a 2.5 way speaker and I thought they were amazing! Great bass, smooth midrange and great treble clarity. Overall probably one of the better choices I could have made for the dough.

Next.... nOrh 9.0! I still pine for these speakers. I sometimes wish I still had them, if for anything just to look at!



I have owned quite a few speakers and setups since then, but that's what I consider my hifi beginnngs.

Any way, Tyson and I thought it would be interesting to start a "how I got in this mess" thread. 

[Tyson]

For me, it was a pair of Boston Acoustic bookshelves:



Then the real "death blow" came with the NHT 2.5i's:



After that it was a move to nOrh, the 7.0's and 9.0's:



Then it was VMPS RM40's after I got hooked on Ribbon/planar sound:



I also ran the 40's active for a while, which I really liked.  Unfortunately, we moved to a new place and the 40's were just too big for the new living room.  So, I sold them and decided to build a pair of speakers, the "Elsinore" speakers documented on DIYaudio.com -



Finally, even with running the Ella's with a DEQX I was not fully happy with the sound.  I began to suspect that the problem was that I sit off axis and near field most of the time, so a point source with a waveguide would probably be a better fit to how I listen.  Plus, my room is very uneven with how bass loads, so an open baffle setup would probably be the way to go.  So, next up is a DIY build of the GR Research V2 speakers:



I ran them passive for a while, but after trying out active once again, I'm running them fully active now.

[JLM]

Nice pics guys 

I started about 1968 with a portable cassette deck and my Mom's AM table radio.

Moved up to a Panasonic AM/FM/cassette unit (roughly 10" tall, 20" long, 5" deep) with matching crap speakers about 1970.  Upgraded the speakers to large standmount JBLs that used an 8" full range driver with 8" passive radiator a couple of year later.

In 1975 (in college) dumped the Panasonic for Pioneer 626 receiver and shared equipment with my stereophile roommate.  Then we got serious about hi-fi.

In 1976 found I. M. Fried speakers (the Model H "coffin" dual woofer transmission line cabinet with LS35a satellites) which pointed me to the true high-end musical reproduction.  Picked up a McIntosh 6100 integrated amp and Nakamichi 700 cassette deck. 

The rest, as they say, is history.

[WGH]

It all started in the 60's with a Heathkit AA14 all transistor integrated amp (the one on the right)


I remember some home made speakers with a whizzer cone but eventually I upgraded to a pair of KLH 17's.


The KLH were replaced by the JBL L88's in July 1972, they are still going strong as my shop speakers.


The JBL were replaced by Von Schweikert VR-2's in 2006.

And that is the complete list of all the speakers I have owned. I've changed electronics more often.
Starting with the Heathkit I moved on to a:
Dynaco SCA-80
Yamaha CR-820 Receiver
NAD 7155 Receiver
Adcom GTP-400 with a GFA-535 amp
Anthem
Van Alstine

Turntables include a:
Zenith with 2g tonearm (1962), my Dad and I picked it up because I didn't drive yet.
Dual 1009F
Mitsubishi DP-EC2
Harman Kardon T55C

And I'm still having fun.

Wayne

[Delta Wave]

For me it was actually a love of music and playing in garage bands as a teen. Why doesn't my parents Soundesign stereo sound anything like the music we actually play? So I worked as a teen and made just enough to keep my pocket full of weed, have new records and a decent stereo system.

My first real system was all second hand, I was 16ish.

Some sort of crappy plastic Pioneer turntable.

Yamaha CA1010 integrated amp


Sony CDP101 CD player


Cerwin Vega D-10? (10" drivers) speakers circa 1985ish

Something like that...

 

[Pez]

Interesting, is it just me, or are most 'philes starting in their teens?

[gooberdude]

Yup, but the bug hit me when i was 16. I mounted (4) 15" subs mounted isobarically into the back of a rusty '86 Nissan extended cab 4x4   

ok, not quite into hi-fi at that time...but that's when 'it' started for me.

[Wind Chaser]

I was 11 when first started looking and a year later I bought this...








God only knows how much mid-fi I went through after that until I turned 18.  Then with a union job and zero expenses living at home with my parents it was time to choose... my first Porsche or go off into the deep end of audio.  I chose to spend everything including money I didn't have on audio.  1982 interest rates were 22.9%!  I remember that well because 20K later my audio dealer and buddy cosigned the loan my parents wouldn't.

[lonewolfny42]

It all started with this ......in the 60's...bought it with my own money....



It's a GE AM-FM.....and I still have it....

[nodiak]

~ 64 we got our parents to buy us a Garrard suitcase system so we could buy lp's of Donovan, Beatles, Stones etc. A few years later after my older siblings moved out I had control of that fine thang and promptly cut the speakers off and put them in the back of my Datsun 411 so I could rock 8 tracks while cruising the countryside. Sweet ride!
In 86 a friend introduced me to Speaker Builder mag and we spent the next 3 years making kits and experimental tl's. Used sonotube sometimes, weird/wild paint jobs, just had lots of fun. Thought my Dual integrated amp was nice...but it wasn't actually 
Then the internet...

[TheChairGuy]

Interesting, is it just me, or are most 'philes starting in their teens?

Yup here - 13 or so.

Marantz 2216B receiver, JVC JL-A20 turntable and 3D Acoustics 3D610B speakers (replacing some terrible Wharfedale's before them).

Bought at Battling Barry's (if any of you old enough and grew up in the NY Metro area)

John

[mcgsxr]

My first radio came as an AM grey plastic robot, and the red eyes would glow to the beat.  Had to be around 1977 when I was 7.  I started playing violin the year before, and that continued for 9 years.

Somewhere around 1982 my parents bought me a Sony small format blaster with AM/FM/tape.

I started saving money in high school.  In the middle of high school, 2 of my buddies and I went to a local audio store, and worked a deal where we bought the last 3 Sony mini systems (not a blaster, a small system) for around 30% off each.  Used a line in for cd etc.  That one had a line out too, a rare feature it seems, but it would prove useful for what would come next...

As I went off to university, I bought a Yamaha AX500U integrated, some Technics floorstanders, and a Sony cd player.  I used the Sony mini system as the line in for tapes.  2 years later I sold it all off and bought my first HT system - Yamaha and Boston Acoustics.  2 years later I sold that all off and bought Totem Rokk speakers, a Sugden integrated.  10 years after that I found this website....

[Delta Wave]

Interesting, is it just me, or are most 'philes starting in their teens?

Jenny said when she was just five years old
There was nothin' happenin' at all
Every time she puts on a radio
There was nothin' goin' down at all,
Not at all
Then one fine mornin' she puts on a New York station
You know, she don't believe what she heard at all
She started shakin' to that fine fine music
You know her life was saved by rock 'n' roll

- The Velvet Underground

[woodsyi]

Not me.  When I was sixteen I worked in a houseware section in an upscale department store.  I got me a Quisinart food processor which was just being introduced to public in'79 and julienned my own fries.  I was past 30 before I got into this mess.

[Wayner]

I was about 14 when I bought my first real receiver, a Kenwood with 22 watts per channel. I didn't have enough money for speakers, so I borrowed some car speakers from my dad and stuck them in the corners of my bedroom. I guess I was running single, open drivers back then. Anyway, enough money was saved up mowing lawns and bailing hay, and I eventually bought an AR turntable. Later, a pair of AR-2ax speakers.

This was not how I got interested in hifi however. We were in 8th grade shop class, and our instructor decided we needed an electronics education, so we all had to buy a 2 band Graymark radio kit, for about $17. That was a shit load of money back then, but we all got one.

So for many nights, I would follow the kit instructions and slowly assemble all the parts to the chassis, including tube sockets, soldering lugs and volume controls, and eventually was soldering in tube circuits.

Well, low and behold, I was finally done. I did one last check and decided to plug the damn thing in. This radio had AM and shortwave so I set it to AM and fired it up. Tubes began to glow, and static started to come out of the speaker and soon I had WCCO tuned in. How did I ever get this thing going?

Well after that, I tried the SW, but needed an antenna, so my dad hooked it up to our 50' tower and soon I was listening to radio free Europe and radio Havana Cuba. I also started to send away post-cards to some of the stations and even got some replies with their call letters on them. This was way cool for a brat 8th grader.

And so the road to hifi began. Lots of money later and I'm still at it.

Wayner

[TomS]

As a wee teen I started working part time in a (at the time) very big local electronics wholesale/retail parts distributor. They always sold a little "hifi" on the side because they had to. There were wise old electronics distributor guys who worked the front counter (jawed with buddies, mostly) with the trade bidness and OEM types, but they started to look to me as the youngster to deal with the hifi section, because it was an annoyance to them. They sold some decent lines for the time (70's) - Pioneer, Marantz, Dual, Empire, McIntosh, Soundcraftsman, SAE, Advent, JBL L100's/200's/Paragon, Bose 901's, etc. I was lucky enough to sell, install, and tweak a few of the first Advent VideoBeam projection TV's for those that might know what that is. I even met Henry Kloss himself in the store as we sold a bunch of those monster guns.

Eventually they opened a mall store so I worked there through high school and college summers/breaks. I spent every dime I made leveraging the very generous salesman comp programs (40-50 off) from Mac, Bose, Advent. I worked a gazillion overtime hours whenever I could and managed to roll into the freshman dorm with a McIntosh C28 preamp, MC2105 amp, MR78 tuna, Soundcraftsman eq, Revox A77, a pair of 901's hung from chains on a 2x4 between 2 loft bunks, and eventually double Large Advents. The RA on my floor was the only one not impressed. Many many Peaches crates stuffed with vinyl under the bunk bed. 

During college I moved on to some finer stuff as the opportunity presented itself so I definitely had the disease by then. Part time gigs with a couple of local college hifi stores kept my salesman's comp status intact so if I could find the cash or sell/trade up, I could get about anything. Between my roommate (who was better funded) and me, a Cotter preamp system, Quatre Gain Cell, HK Citation 16, Phase Linear 400, Ampzilla, Advent 300, Electrocompaniet, DQ10's, and a few others followed that I can't remember. 

I landed on a SOTA Star/ET2 with CJ PV5/MV50 and Martin Logan CLS's that stayed a long time. A truly heavenly setup that served me well.

And on it went ... at least until I had kids, then about 15 years off 

[philipp]

I used to spend all of my money on music and settled for listening on whatever. I got interested in a real stereo after subscribing to Cadence magazine in 1991. I was heavily into avantgarde jazz at the time and they reviewed tons of records and sold them directly. There was a one page article each month about audio equipment and the impact of room, setup, and gear on your enjoyment of the recordings written by a guy named Vladimir. After reading his essays for many months, I was convinced to invest in a 'real' stereo and set it up properly.

I waited until I had bought over 300 CDs and 100 records before I decided I had spent enough on music to justify saving up for a stereo system. Since Vladimir's articles got me interested in the first place, I trusted him to put together a system for me -- NAD CD, Arcam integrated, Synthesis speakers, Rega P2, Kimber cables.

Once everything arrived, I set it up as he recommended in so many articles and popped in my 'test' CD. It was Emergency Peace by Marty Erhlich. I chose it because there was lots of interplay between a bass and cello and when things heated up I had a hard time discerning who was playing what. I was hoping my new audiophile-approved stereo would help sort things out. I hit play, listened for a minute and burst out laughing because it was now OBVIOUS who was playing what. It was the first time I heard a real soundstage because the bassist was clearly on the left and the cellist was clearly on the right. The musicians were present in my living room.

From that moment, I was hooked and realized that my gear was just as important as my record collection. Since that time, I've improved my stereo as funds permit and enjoyed every dime spent and every minute listening to beautiful music.

[thunderbrick]

After building little crystal radios as a kid, my first radio was a Bradford AM/FM portable.  Sounded really warm and nice. I remember sitting on a corner of my bedroom listening to the British Invasion late at night on a massive 1930s/1940s floor standing radio.  When we got our (used) Magnavox color TV console in '66, my father gave me his 1957 system of University 6201 3-way, a Grommes (or Pilot, don't remember) integrated, and a brown Garrard TT (Model 88?), and the disease was terminal.  From then out it was military surplus radio speakers, converting the old TT to stereo, trying to find another 6201 cheap, getting Dynaco A25s, HK receiver, a bunch of other stuff, then got a job in a stereo/photo shop.  DQ10s, Crown, Tandberg, B&O, then Yamaha separates from the PX, Thorens, Sequerra tweeters and stacked DQ 10s, Cary, Mac, CJ, Thiel, Vandy, ADS and whatever else I could stumble on used.  Divorce held things up for awhile, but now have Maggie 1.6s, but the DQ10s are stored in the basement.  Just in case.   


I wonder what's next?

[timind]

Was probably 14 when my dad brought home an Eico integrated amp and an old Garrard turntable he had picked up at a "yard"sale. I had an old pa speaker so built the other side with one driver. My brother and I were in heaven with that rig. A couple years later I bought a Harman Kardon 330A receiver and a pair of TDC (Tech Hifi store brand) speakers. Those were the days.
Just the other day my little brother asked me if I wanted those old TCDs. 

[Sam-fi]

I loved music. 

That's how it started.

Sam