As I bring this “Climbing to the Audio Summit” exercise to a close I am not just taken aback by the total amount of gear that I purchased over the years but also in the responses that many of you have contributed.
Because of some of your incredible lists I also have recalled items that I had forgotten.
In the amp list I forgot that I owned a Quad 405 amp/34 preamp combination (1983) . I also owned both a Crown DC 150 and a Crown DC 300 (1978). While Crowns have been shown to be reliable in professional sound reinforcement use, they were utterly terrible in regards to high end audio reproduction.
Having now just about ending this exercise, I have this observation:
Just look at how much money and time we have collectively spent in pursuing an the elusive “absolute sound”.
How much have we spent “lifting the veils”.
Wallowing in the latest “jaw-dropping” gear and tweak.
We just seemingly couldn’t wait to call our friends and have them come over to hear the latest awesome audio breakthrough.
And, while I have had fun remembering what I bought and when, I also realize that there are many other products that have not been cataloged in this exercise.
Items like CD Players, cassette decks, reel to reel tape decks, tuners, LaserDisc Players, isolation devices, compressors, expanders, Dolby devices, equalizers, dust bugs, fluids, sprays, pens, belts, record cleaning machines, record weights, isolation cones, sorbothane feet, power conditioners and power cables and, of course, speaker and interconnect cables.
Just casually listing all this ‘other’ stuff has my head spinning not to mention all the magazines that influenced us (and our buying habits) such as (to name a few)
Stereo Review, Audio, The Absolute Sound, Sound & Vision, Stereophile, The Audio Critic, Hi-Fi News & Record Review, What Hi-Fi?, Hi-Fi +….
Let me just quickly address some of the above gear which, most notably, also coincides with items that are (by and large) no longer relevant in the hi end pantheon (exception: reel to reel tape decks, like some insanely priced record players, appear to be rising like a very, very rare phoenix at the highest and most esoteric levels of hi end.
CD Players: First owned was a portable Sony Walkman (1984) and currently a Marantz SA-10
Cassette players: First owned was an Advent 201 (1974) and at the present time only have an ION tape to PC deck for archival purposes.
Reel to Reel tape recorders: Revox A77 mk. 3 1970
None owned at the moment
Tuners: Last one owned was a Sherwood. None owned at the moment.
Back to the list…
Speakers I have owned since 1967:
KLH 6 1967
KLH 5 1967
KLH 5—not seen very often these days.
AR 3A 1968
JBL L88 1970
JBL L100 1970
Double Advents (Large) 1970
Ohm Fs 1971
Think Stacked Advents are the bomb? Try Harry Weisfeld’s stacked Ohm Fs!
Bose 901’s 1972
Acutex 1977 (mini’s)
Altec Lansing 15 1977
Bertagni Geostatic panels 1977 (duct-taped above the Altec 15s, driven by twin Phase Linear 400s—crazy!)
B & W DM-16 1983
Acoustat 2+2 1984
Apogee Duettas 1985
Spendor LS35a 1986
Thiel 1.5 1994
Vandersteen 2C 1996
Thiel 3.6 1998
Monitor Audio Silver 7’s 2004
Genelec 8030A 2009 (for studio recording analysis)
Adam “Pencils” 2012
ZVOX Sound bar (for home video)
Peachtree Deep Blue (for home video) 2015
Audioengine 2+2 (for computer) 2016
Wilson Sabrinas 2017
Next up: Equalizers: why they should no longer be a dirty 10-letter word.
