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Post by PhantomWolf on Mar 4, 2019 23:39:09 GMT -5
Definitely an audiophile. I wouldn't brag about my setup though... My guitar collection/Amps etc have always been where my fun money goes. Now that I am set on gear, a home stereo is something I'm very much interested in.
I currently make do with my Bose 30. I think it's great for filling small spaces with decent sound. It also has great wireless capabilities and I can toss it in the trunk when I go to camp or whatnot. That being said, when I really wanna crank it and drown in a song, it's limitations show...
Another issue is that I only use it with digital media. I have a pretty killer collection of vinyl that rarely gets played. I know you'll all laugh at that setup. hahaha Sony turntable into a cheap PA system I bought at Guitar Center. Harbiger120..
But yeah. I will certainly be revisiting this thread later this spring. I may even have to message some of you wizards with some annoying questions.
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Post by headrott on Mar 5, 2019 3:52:42 GMT -5
My first exposure to a quadrophonic system was at a Who concert at the Cow Palace in SF back in the early 1970s. It was the "Quadrophenia" album tour, the one where Keith Moon collapsed twice, and they pulled a kid out of the audience to play drums until Moon could be revived. The sound was LOUD but clear. My ears rang for days. VERY cool story Martin. How did the kid from the audience do?  |
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Post by Dramatwist on Mar 5, 2019 12:02:37 GMT -5
My first exposure to a quadrophonic system was at a Who concert at the Cow Palace in SF back in the early 1970s. It was the "Quadrophenia" album tour, the one where Keith Moon collapsed twice, and they pulled a kid out of the audience to play drums until Moon could be revived. The sound was LOUD but clear. My ears rang for days. VERY cool story Martin. How did the kid from the audience do? ...he was actually quite good... I forget his name... something like Scott Halprin... this was... good grief, 45 years ago!!! |
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Post by urbino on Nov 9, 2021 23:45:30 GMT -5
So it seems a few of us, at least, have the particular neurosis known as audiophilia. Here's a place to confess our sins.
I've been into it since high school in the 80s. My interest was very much aspirational then. I had no money, and my folks certainly weren't going to spend money on that stuff. I had an all-in-one dual-tape stereo (not a boombox, it wasn't portable) from Sears, which I got for my birthday when I was 14 or 15. I was a Stereo Review subscriber, and then I noticed an ad in the back for another magazine called "Stereophile." That led to an entire world of stuff I could never have imagined.
Anyway, I've owned a variety of stuff over the years. I even owned one of the first 17 home DAT matchines from Sony to arrive in the US.
What got you guys into it, and what have you tried?
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Post by Legend Lover on Nov 10, 2021 8:50:53 GMT -5
I have the tastes of an audiophile, but not the wallet to back up those tastes. Decent headphones for me.
I did notice that Amazon music now plays some songs in 360 degree spacial audio - makes a big difference.
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Post by Plainsman on Nov 10, 2021 9:04:56 GMT -5
With my hearing, or lack of it, I have NO qualifications for audiophilia. Close as I can get is the Bluetooth of my new hearing aids. Ironically, I always wanted to do foley for films. Go figger.
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Post by Legend Lover on Nov 10, 2021 9:39:34 GMT -5
With my hearing, or lack of it, I have NO qualifications for audiophilia. Close as I can get is the Bluetooth of my new hearing aids. Ironically, I always wanted to do foley for films. Go figger. So can your hearing aids also double up as earphones via bluetooth? |
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Post by Plainsman on Nov 10, 2021 10:37:09 GMT -5
With my hearing, or lack of it, I have NO qualifications for audiophilia. Close as I can get is the Bluetooth of my new hearing aids. Ironically, I always wanted to do foley for films. Go figger. So can your hearing aids also double up as earphones via bluetooth? Yes. They are remarkable instruments. I replaced my "old" ones by the same Danish maker. They were only 8 years old but SIX generations behind. These new ones are simply amazing. |
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Post by toshtego on Nov 10, 2021 10:43:40 GMT -5
In my day it was all McIntosh. Some vacuum tube, some solid state. Most all sold off years back. Still have a nice pair of Vandersteen speakers.
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Post by urbino on Nov 10, 2021 14:44:55 GMT -5
I have the tastes of an audiophile, but not the wallet to back up those tastes. Decent headphones for me. I did notice that Amazon music now plays some songs in 360 degree spacial audio - makes a big difference. One can get pretty good kit, these days, for less money than used to be possible. Of course, one can also still spend $100k on a pair of speakers. I'm not that guy. They're doing amazing things with headphones, these days, too. I just can't wear the things. Wasn't aware of that on Amazon. Interesting. I use Qobuz for all my music streaming. |
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Post by urbino on Nov 10, 2021 14:47:41 GMT -5
In my day it was all McIntosh. Some vacuum tube, some solid state. Most all sold off years back. Still have a nice pair of Vandersteen speakers. McIntosh solid-state is what I currently have. I have had some tube gear in the past (not MacIntosh). I like the sound, but found the gear too fussy for me. |
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Post by Ronv69 on Nov 10, 2021 15:04:23 GMT -5
I've had Klipsch LaScalas and Heresys, Acustat Model 3s,KEFs, Polk and more. Right now I have Klipsch towers now with dual 8" woofers. They are better than my hearing now. I have a 45 year old Technics SL-1300 with a Shure V-15 type IV cartridge, and a Rega Planet CD player going into a Yamaha AV receiver. 300 vinyl albums and about 350 CDs. Nothing fancy, but better than average. My best friend has the Klipschorns in a new house that was built around them.
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Post by urbino on Nov 10, 2021 15:10:17 GMT -5
In my day it was all McIntosh. Some vacuum tube, some solid state. Most all sold off years back. Still have a nice pair of Vandersteen speakers. And I completely forgot to say I *love* Vandersteens. Fell in love with the 2Ce's the first time I heard them. Silkiest sounding speakers I ever heard. I never owned a pair, though. |
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Post by toshtego on Nov 10, 2021 15:16:24 GMT -5
In my day it was all McIntosh. Some vacuum tube, some solid state. Most all sold off years back. Still have a nice pair of Vandersteen speakers. And I completely forgot to say I *love* Vandersteens. Fell in love with the 2Ce's the first time I heard them. Silkiest sounding speakers I ever heard. I never owned a pair, though. 2Ce are what I have. They filled the space. Our old living room was acoustically perfect. Forty Feet Long, 20 feet wide, apex of the barrel vault ceiling was 13 feet. Hard plaster on wood lath with a thick oak floor. Built in 1924. Never experienced the like anywhere else. Those 2Ce speakers filled the room. |
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Post by urbino on Nov 10, 2021 15:28:19 GMT -5
I've had Klipsch LaScalas and Heresys, Acustat Model 3s,KEFs, Polk and more. Right now I have Klipsch towers now with dual 8" woofers. They are better than my hearing now. I have a 45 year old Technics SL-1300 with a Shure V-15 type IV cartridge, and a Rega Planet CD player going into a Yamaha AV receiver. 300 vinyl albums and about 350 CDs. Nothing fancy, but better than average. My best friend has the Klipschorns in a new house that was built around them. That's a very nice setup. That Technics and Shure, that's some classic kit. My first "real" stereo consisted of a Yamaha integrated and tape deck, with a pair of Polk 5B's. That was in, like, 1989. I was still using that integrated and those speakers in my bedroom in around 2015. More than 25 years of enjoyment. (The tape deck died several years earlier.) Wow, I hadn't thought about Acustats in a minute. Used to see them all the time in Stereophile. I've never owned or even heard any electrostats or ribbons. Just never had a room where they would be practical. I've owned a lot of different speakers over the years -- I'm kind of a speaker slut -- but they've all been dynamics. My current setup is Tannoy Stirlings with a Mac amp and pre-amp, and a Michell Gyrodec SE with an Ortofon 2M Red cartridge. I didn't bother replacing my CD player when it pooped out a couple years ago. I just use streaming for digital. I got the Gyrodec 2nd hand off a guy who had to sell it because his cats couldn't leave the spinning platter weights alone. |
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Post by urbino on Nov 10, 2021 15:30:01 GMT -5
And I completely forgot to say I *love* Vandersteens. Fell in love with the 2Ce's the first time I heard them. Silkiest sounding speakers I ever heard. I never owned a pair, though. 2Ce are what I have. They filled the space. Our old living room was acoustically perfect. Forty Feet Long, 20 feet wide, apex of the barrel vault ceiling was 13 feet. Hard plaster on wood lath with a thick oak floor. Built in 1924. Never experienced the like anywhere else. Those 2Ce speakers filled the room. Sounds like a sweet setup. I'm envious of those 2Ce's. |
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Post by Ronv69 on Nov 10, 2021 16:26:44 GMT -5
The Accustats were amazing for symphonic music, opera, vocals, string quartet, etc. They don't rock well, although they have plenty of bass. They do require a big room. Mine was 18x29. When I started my business I had to divide the room to make an office. I basically gave them away. They needed recapped anyway. There are still people keeping them up and running. The Klipsch Heritage series just keep speaking, decade after decade.
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Post by Gandalf on Nov 10, 2021 22:17:51 GMT -5
I was a "wannabe" audiophile in my younger days. I finally amassed a fair setup given my financial means at the time.
Nothing super high end, but infinitely better than most stuff available now.
Stuff by Pioneer (amps and speakers), Technics (linear tracking turntable, dual cassette tape player/recorder, and speakers), Sharp (programable cassette tape player), Bose (speakers), TEAC (graphic equalizer).
I'm still running a Sony CD player that holds 300 CD's (from the 80's or 90's), a Sherwood AM/FM receiver amplifier and Pioneer speakers I bought ~1978. God, those speakers sound good!
Recently 2 Pioneers AM/FM amps had died on me, and the rubber belts in the CD player had to be replaced, but it's running fine now with my last AM/FM Receiver/Amp from "the old days".
Beats the hell out of MP3 music files - but I have several thousand of them too.
I play them through an old laptop attached to amplified speakers. Makes a nice "juke box".
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Post by urbino on Nov 10, 2021 22:32:50 GMT -5
Nice, Monty! A lot of audiophiles are constantly chasing the next better thing, and they never actually enjoy what they have now. You found a system that gave you joy, and you stuck with it.
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Post by Gandalf on Nov 10, 2021 22:50:47 GMT -5
Nice, Monty! A lot of audiophiles are constantly chasing the next better thing, and they never actually enjoy what they have now. You found a system that gave you joy, and you stuck with it. I started looking at the spec's on some of the equipment and decided the human ear couldn't "comprehend" the difference between much of the "good" equipment and the ultra high end stuff - or at least my ears couldn't - because even then I was a "gun nut" too. |
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Post by urbino on Nov 10, 2021 23:06:52 GMT -5
The [bad] engineer in me enjoys all the different ways people come up with to attack problems, many of which are insoluble, physics being what it is. The creativity people bring to different ways of solving the same problems, none of which solve the problems, but the different compromises produce different results.
The same thing happens in audio, ballistics, pipes, watches, software, filmmaking, even literature (though the limits there aren't down to physics).
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Post by qmechanics on Nov 11, 2021 0:59:54 GMT -5
Upon request the thread has been bumped....
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Post by urbino on Nov 11, 2021 1:19:40 GMT -5
Well, I mean, you could've done it before I started a new one.  At least mine is in the right sub-forum. |
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Post by Legend Lover on Nov 11, 2021 2:12:39 GMT -5
Well, I mean, you could've done it before I started a new one. At least mine is in the right sub-forum. happy to merge them if you want. |
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Post by Ronv69 on Nov 11, 2021 10:03:27 GMT -5
Nice, Monty! A lot of audiophiles are constantly chasing the next better thing, and they never actually enjoy what they have now. You found a system that gave you joy, and you stuck with it. Don't ever listen to a system you can't afford. |
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Post by Ronv69 on Nov 11, 2021 10:09:08 GMT -5
I don't believe in a lot of the Stereophile stuff. $1k/ft speaker cables, $250 power cords, $150 wall sockets, etc. It takes big things to make a difference. Big speakers sound better than small speakers. Other than that you're on your own.
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Post by urbino on Nov 11, 2021 14:44:23 GMT -5
Yeah, the high-dollar cables, etc., hold no interest for me. I do think a clean power source makes a difference, given how amplifiers work, but a couple feet of spendy power cable is going to make no difference to that. That's a problem an electrician would have to address.
Small speakers do some things better than big ones, but they aren't going to fill a large room with sound or rock out or produce bass like a big one.
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Post by terrapinflyer on Nov 11, 2021 15:17:42 GMT -5
Did someone say, "aururophilia borealis?" No?
I was too poor to get into high end stuff and now too deaf to bother. I had a hodge-podge of mostly Technics stuff with Marantz receiver. I eventually got a decent Sony A/V receiver when 4-channel Dolby Surround became a thing. My first pair of speakers was Realistic--gasp--a Radio Shack brand. Those were replaced by Yamaha towers and some forgettable brand of rear speakers, eventually working up to Boston Acoustics all around. Original Technics turntable through it all. When digital became a thing, I railed against lossy formats (a majority of my listening is concert amateur recordings), .shn or .flac only. Now, not so much a concern about mp3.
Now the only thing I'm using is a Magnavox all-in-one shelf thingie for CD, my Zune (cutting edge!), and Bluetooth link.
I was listening to a friend's system one time and she asked, But how real do you want it to get? I took her point that at some level, you can surpass the limits of your own ears, so more $ doesn't buy you anything more.
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Post by qmechanics on Nov 11, 2021 18:08:23 GMT -5
Hi I would be fine with that Legend Lover .. Well you could have waited until I got around to it, urbino , before starting another thread.....     It is all good my friends., no worries ... Let's see if the Legend can shift, merge and purge or is that merge, shift, and purge, maybe merge, purge and shift..... Well we will let Legend Lover decide.... I would be curious to see what has transpired through the audiophile years..... or is that ears?? Boy I have to stop swilling from that hooch....
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Post by urbino on Nov 11, 2021 18:28:27 GMT -5
I believe you mean 'stop, drop, and roll.'
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