Meanwhile let's talk about 78 rpm LP player. Are you also an audiophile?

 

During LP, cassette or CD era? Any good component (pre amp, amp, speakers, players) that you still maintain?
During my teenage years I was amazed with Nakamichi Dragon series owned by my uncle with high grade Technics pre & amp plus B&W speakers.
I can't believe that kind of sound could come out from cheap cassette medium.
When I was in undergrad my system limited only to low end Technics, Pioneer & Onkyo because of budget limit. Sometimes I wnet to my friends house just for listening music in higher quality standard. Somehow after 30's I lost interest in audio anymore. My hearing just not as sensitive as before.

Now I don't follow audio technology anymore, but it seems the MP3 standard lowering the audio source quality even worse than CD.

 

Unfortunately Nakamichi just become hollow brand right now, unlike then a respected heavy brand in audio industry back then.

 

Respectable Member Privateday7

I am sorry for the late response to your post.

Two days of continuous heavy downpour in Sydney caused me to lose the telephone and internet connections. I had to go to the internet-cafe, to reply to a few emails. The keyboard at the cafe is so small and it is just impossible to type. I am used to the old-fashioned fourteen year old one, which is relatively huge. Apparently the underground telephone cables were hibernating in a pool of muddy water. A technician showed up yesterday to repair the faulty cables and we managed to get back all the connections, today. It is better to have a slow site than no internet, at all. Very frustrating.

Regarding the 78 rpm records, most of them belong to my late father and we are still keeping his wooden box HMV gramophone, using HMV stainless-steel needle - a needle each time we played a song. We still keep some of his old Indonesian records with songs by S Abdullah, Koesbini and Soelami, etc.

Long after we finished school and started to work, we bought audio equipments. We then had the vinyl records with a speed of 45 rpm and later the LP - I cannot remember its speed. I can still recall, we had the powerful black color US made SAE amplifier (the step-up or step-down transformer is long gone), Soundcraftsmen equalizer, an open-reel tape-recorder by Revox, a Thorens turntable using diamond stylus instead of stainless-steel needles, as well as, a pair of huge JBL Studio Monitor 4333 speakers. The songs we often played were 'Congratulations' by Cliff Richard and also, another entitled 'Theme from Caravans' by Mike Batt, as well as, 'On Top of The World' by the Carpenters, amongst many others. Later on, we added a casette-deck by Nakamichi. Virtually all the equipments are now long gone. However, we still keep our pair of JBL speakers in the lounge room, not used for several years - they are still in top original condition but so heavy and quite impossible to cart them, in case we have inter-state or overseas buyers. The amplifier is in storage. The speakers of today are so small and very light but sound good, too. Today, the young people use DVD and the vinyl records are obsolete.

Later on we were so happy, when we could play the small vinyl records in the car. We had a 'Philips' record player in the car dashboard. We had to cut a big hole in the center of each record - the record shop did it, for us.

Thank-you.

 

Lovely story.........most of what we love today start when we were a kid. Cars, watch, audio etc. I bet many in here also have similar growing up hobby which passed from our family or relatives.
Your audio choice were top notch. Even your vintage JBL could be sold in 3K-5K now looking at eBay.
Today's speakers are following Bose foot step in using 'airwave' engineering rather than design & material engineering.
It sounds good but lose the Grandeur of big speaker in the past. I remembered watching planar speaker with awe. Higher than me, more expensive than a car, totally impractical but truly amazing. Like warmth of LP vinyl or Cassete deck lost to MP3 player, Big speakers doomed to become dinosaurs, only appreciated by few connoisseurs.

 

My amp and cassette deck shot craps years ago, I still have my Garrard Zero-100 turntable, Acoustic Research AR-5 speakers and a Teac 4010sl reel to reel. I used to share a vinyl collection with my brother-in-law of over 2000 lp's (33 1/3, Seamonster) but we have been raped and pillaged by sons,daughters and grandkids who prefer the sound of vinyl.
I am sad to say music doesn't play as major a part in my life as it used to and my ipod gets 90% of my ear.
Aaah the good old days, a tasty buzz, a little wine and some King Crimson or Emerson, Lake & Palmer.

 

I was fond of the mega rock band era from Led Zeppelin, Scorpion, Genesis up to Gun n Roses.
But to test the audio system, nothing could beat Royal Philharmonic playing Queen.

 

Or accompanying the Moody Blues, I am with you up to Guns, but I never appreciated them, I skipped to Alice in Chains.
I was listening to a little Peter Gabriel this morning.
Genesis' Abacab may be the ultimate fidelity tester.

 

Respectable Member UncleBuck

I appreciate your reminding me of the speed of the LP. Indeed, the AR is a very lovely speaker, while the Teac open-reel deck is very reliable.

Thank-you.

 

Respectable Member Privateday7

Planar speakers are good and if well taken care of, they will virtually last forever.

Items of the 50's, 60's and early 70's have built-in quality and character that we can appreciate till today. Just look at those American cars of yesterday, with chromed parts inside out. They are just beautiful and real classics and not plastics.

I see no beauty in MP3 players but practical.

Thank-you.

 

Before there was Dolby Theater there was the Carver Sonic Hologram Generator, with an appropriate pair of speakers you'd be amazed at what that little grey box would do.

And back when Yamaha was made in Japan, there was the DSP-100U, Digital Sound Field Processor, again very impressive.

Still have my Yamaha M80 amp and its as sweet as ever as is my M & K S-1B satellite / V-2B 200 watt sub-woofer system.

 

Apt-Holman pre-amp (all-time classic); Dahlquist DQ-10 speakers (ditto); Bryston 4B amp; B&O Beogram 4000 Linear Tracking Turntable (work of art, in terms of aesthetics); Nakamichi 600 (ditto); Accuphase T-100, etc.

Ah, those were the days. I was an audiophile from the mid–'70s on, for some time. I no longer have any of the classics noted above, but couldn't be happier with the small system that I have had for many years (Jeff Rowland Concentra; Electrocompaniet EMC-1UP CD player; Green Mountain Audio Castillos; Virtual Dynamics David cables).

 

That's awesome Adam. Not the kind of audio system in my mind, but not less stunning.

 

Yamaha probably the most advanced sound processor of the time.

 

Yours looks like more exotic genre (except B&O & Nakamichi). Most famous high end audio pre amp & amp in Jakarta those days are MacIntosh and Mark Levinson. Its way out of league for ordinary folks, just like Patek & Breguet.

 

Levinson amps were really nice. Best system I ever heard was a pair of monobloc Perraux's powering Acoustats. Blew my bi-amp Adcoms powering 12" Infinity Beta subs and B&W's out of the water.

Not dissing the B&W's, but a silly mistake I made years ago was not buying a near mint set of Magnapan's for a measly $500.

The GOOD ones.
Oh yeah, forgot this one: