Best "Bang for the Buck" you have owned?

Philharmonic Audio Affordable Accuracy speakers....$230 delivered!

Last year I bought an immaculate pair of Klipsch Forte II for $450 from the original owner.

$720 for 4  NOS tubes for my Aesthetixs Pandora DAC, took that dac to a new level I never thought was possible. 

KZ zs pro iems stunning sound for 40 quid..
Mint Sony Dtc 750 £50 non working Ebay purchase, recapped the rf board for pennies now works fine sounds great...

My first nice piece of audio gear way back when was my Marantz 2265B  Also I bought 
a used pair ( like new) of Dunlavy SC lll that l really enjoyed!! Just recently I found a used Spectron musical MK ll class D amp to drive my Maggie's The 54 lb beast was delivered to my door for less than $900! As for my rubber band collection I get mine from the ones that hold my broccoli together

Dodd Audio Battery Powered Preamp. Zero noise; infinite detail.

@condosound 

i remember the dodd

in my experience battery powered stuff is awesomely sweet and quiet, but can lack in dynamics/punch - but what they do well really leaves an impression and sets a bar for regular AC powered gear to strive for

tough tradeoff

Bought a McIntosh MX-118 for $300 in mint condition at work (I sold HiFi and we took it on trade). Used it for 2-3 years and later flipped it for almost $2k on eBay. At the time I didn’t see much use for it as it was a lowly Pro Logic surround receiver, but it was pretty and sounded good.


Probably should have kept it as a preamp.

B&W DM-12 for $99.00 on eBay.

It really is amazing what a great system you can put together buying older stuff on eBay.

A Belles Research II preamp for $195 in the early 80's. Could not believe how much better it sounded than the NAD one I had. Couldn't bear to part with it after it had been in a closet for 15 years hoping my son would catch the audio bug. When I finally realized it wasn't going to happen, I traded it with my B&K 202 amp which is my second best bargain. That was from the mid 90's for $400 was going to keep it and replace the Belles for a preamp with a remote, but was able to get an incredible (3rd best) deal on a Plinius integrated 8200MKII ($1600 with a volume/mute only remote) that is now 15 years old. Can't see ever getting rid of it. 

4th is a Music Hall MMF 5 in early 2000's that introduced me to the belt drive world which sounded so much cleaner and alive than a Phase Linear 8000 that cost way more than that 15 years earlier. Thankfully, that broke or else I might still have that and not know what I am missing. My Rega's since then have been unfortunately at list or within 10% of it, but I still consider them killer values.

Ohm c2 speakers ($600 new in 1968) when I was 16 and advised to put the most $ into the sound-producing component and used (now refurbished) Ohm Walsh 4’s ($400 used) bought last year.   
Oh, I also had a rather wonderful Pamela in my youth ... thanks for stirring those memories!

Naim Nait 2 and MD Étude tuner. Bought new in 86 and still using them

Auralic Aries Mini open box for $499 from Audio Advisor. They included a whole year of Tidal free! It probably got discontinued as its margin was not as high as the higher end Auralic options.

AR Turntable as I recall it was about $80, Dyna Mark III 60 watt power amps as a kit they were $80. I got two of them. The two used McIntosh 240 amps I got later, sounded a little better but cost about $400 each. I also bought two McIntosh 225s for a little less money. Phil Hale gave me a McIntosh 40 mono-block that I used for years on my "big foot" sub-woofer that I built. It is hard to beat free things. I got a new Linn Sondek from Britain's Audio T in 1977 for $250. I got a pair of Rogers LS3/5a speakers about the same time from the same source for $200 new. I still have them and they sound really good with the REL Stentor III subwoofer that I got for free from Rex.

The Sony HD Radio tuner I got new for under $100 is still in heavy use. Of course, Sony no longer makes these. They were going for about $500 on the used market last time I looked.

AR11 in the late '70s and then a custom speaker made by alternative audio in portland oregon called LGT (little great towers)

An Arcam FMJ integrated from about 10-15 years ago. I’m thinking it was the A18. Anyway, it really sounded great on vocals

Clearwave Audio Duet 6 Monitors. I paid $1000 for these speakers but once I received them one clearly had a bent grill which the driver would vibrate against at loud volume. The seller refunded me $200 and got me a replacement grill so I paid $800 for these.

They use Accuton ceramic drivers, top notch xover parts (mundorf, clarity caps, supra wiring, cardas solder, etc.), and a 2" baffle and rock solid cabinet. They retailed for $3k direct from Clearwave, but if sold through retail channels they would likely be $4-5k. I bought them on a whim driven by Covid-19 boredom/anxiety and once paired with dual REL T5i subs that I also got used they wound up replacing my Salk Song3’s which are now in another room. Total with the subs I paid less than $2k. No way I can do better at that price and based on the value alone I don’t think I’d ever sell them.

RPi 4
Allo DigiOne Signature Player
SMSL SU8
Crown xls 2001 amp

All for under $1,000 and the sound is phenomenal

Marantz 8 $250.
Quad 57 $500 including shipping crates.
, 

I'm pretty shocked by the price / performance of the mhdt labs "orchid" dac I purchased this year ( with tube adapter to 6922 ).

Reference  3A Decapo 40th yr Anniversary  edition  has gotten me off the upgrade path. They are incredibly  good music makers  

Also, the Deulund oil impregnated tinned speaker wire is beyond great at the price

Boston Acoustics A40 speakers - amazingly decent for the very modest price  1980s

Spica speakers, whether TC50 (needed the right stands) or Angelus, gave excellent performance at a bargain price with then state of the art imaging  1980s

Arcam Delta 70 CD player + Black Box DA converter c. 1990 the first reasonably priced CD combo that offered reasonable digital sound.

Adcom GFA-535 integrated amp

My whole system is "poor man’s highend". All excellent bang for the buck, and had most of it for 30 years. Dynaco/VTA ST-70, Lazarus preamp, AT-LP120XUSB w/AT-VM95 shibata, DIY cables, Sterling Acoustics speakers ....a taste of good champagne for the cost of good beer.

I bought a house from an engineer  who briefly worked at AR in the sixties.  He left a bunch of stuff in the attic including some eico el84 "integrated monoblocks" an eico tuner with a cats eye rectifier and a bag of vintage tubes.  Also some open back Tannoy Reds with deteriorated surroundd but he came back for those. The amps sounded great with some old Cornwalls 

For my grad school system, my stacked wood Advents powered by my Phase Liner 400 worked so well that the local Infinity dealer had me bring it to his outdoor, overnight party.  He furnished an Ariston RD 80, with a Mark Levinson head amp and Signet two wand turntable, that I bought from him for $150.  I still have those pieces, with the Supex 900Mark IV, plus my old Kenwood marble TT used with an SME, at the time.

Combination of NAD 326BEE amp and Monitor Audio GR10 speakers - Amazingly good sound for the price. Still kind of wish I hadn't sold them, but, unfortunately, don't have the space for more than one system.

A recent upgrade to a pair of SVS woofers added to existing full range floor standing speaker's!
Both for under a grand!

There are 2 that stand out. Both are amps. The 1st was in 1978, I bought a Harmon Kardon 730 receiver with Original large advents. I never realized how good that thing was until I went to replace it. The Luxman I bought to do so was so anemic, I ended up selling it and repairing the HK which was still going up to about 2000. I powered ut up a while back and was shocked at how BIG the sound was. It will still better a lot of separates today.

The 2nd is a Bob Latino "Dynaco" ST-70. I bought it because it was cheap and I wanted to try a tube amp to see what all the fuss was about. It replaced a $4300 CJ SS amp. That was 10 yrs ago. It STILL in my system today. Looking at my system it is totally outclassed. I just knew that the CJ CT5 preamp was going to show all the flaws of this little amp. Nope. It sounds even better.

Original AR Turntable (1973)
Jolida Glass FX Tube DAC
Tannoy XT 8F Loudspeakers

Recently bought lightly used magnepan 1.7i for $1450. Even at brand new pricing, great bang for buck. Even bigger bang with this deal. Soooo...nice!

Superphon revelation preamp I traded an ice fishing tent for that I had in 1990 and now a Job 225 amp-  bought a HH Scott LK72 that was recapped etc in 2019 for $500.  Beautiful piece.

What a great question.  
I've been very lucky finding outstanding used equipment.  in no particular order -- and this spans the past 30 years:

Magnepan MG-1 speakers
Apt-Holman pre=amp
Technics SL-1200 turntable (the original; just purchased a new one for $1,000)
Sonographe SA-400 amp
Marantz UD-7007 BluRay player (used for SACD's)

What a great question.  
I've been very lucky finding outstanding used equipment.  in no particular order -- and this spans the past 30 years:

Magnepan MG-1 speakers
Apt-Holman pre=amp
Technics SL-1200 turntable (the original; just purchased a new one for $1,000)
Sonographe SA-400 amp
Marantz UD-7007 BluRay player (used for SACD's)

Here goes:
 A pair of Celestion  66 Studio Monitors: $5 at a Goodwill Outlet center with one missing stock tweeter that had been replaced with a $2.00 tweeter, but still sound very, very good. I replaced the $2 tweeter with a rare find stock unit (s) ($180 for a pair) and 10 hours of work on the cabinets and grills. They are really an amazing speaker (Abbey Road Studios had used Celestion  66 Studio Monitor for years.
and perhaps better bang for buck for me was:
A pair of Linn Isobarik DMS's I got at a town wide garage sale for $150 with custom Kimber cables, that I listened to for 5 years and am still reluctant to,  sell them.
between the Isobarik's and the Celestions was a pair of Acoustat III 's 
2 more:
Paragon Acoustics "The Regent"  My current speakers  rare find for currently under $1000 but was an accidental purchase keystroke from eBay 
 Infinity Prelude MTS  but the WAF  in our house didn't work.  $10k when new with center channel and a Stereophile Class "A" rating for under $2K and a  Floyd Toole design

OPPO UDP205

Roon

Phase Technologies PC 9.5 floor standing speakers.

I remember putting a nickle on top of the tonearm head shell and getting much better sound. Total cost? You guessed it.

Used B&W Matrix 805, Bryston 1B Preamp

These have never failed, and remain very true to the music. 

Teac A-H01 integrated amp for $330 new. I needed a small, versatile amp for a new living room setup. I tried to replace its built-in DAC with a $299 Musical Fidelity V-90 but the Teac held its own. Before I remembered that incident I was going to nominate the V-90, which likewise held its own in another setup until I replaced it with a PS Audio Directstream. 

AVA super PAS from a kit.  I paid $20.00 for the stock PAS at a pawn shop (Brass Faceplate) in 1987.  The kit was under $200...traded it to Frank for something “higher end” In the mid 1990z. 

My best affordable gear ever:
Moscode 600 power amp.
Al'on 2 loudspeakers
Anything made by Monarchy Audio.
And a very old Hafler [I think] pre amp from the 80s' that hade an actual volume knob on the remote.. Way before anyone was making remote control pre amps...
All the above could be purchased for under 1k when pre owned...

Harman Kardon PM665 integrated amp late 80s $850 at Wall to Wall Sound.  150Wx2 80amp instantaneous current capability. MC capable. 
$/value could not be better, unless your drinking, with all due respect bro, MillerCarbon koolAide. 😎😎😎 

Luxman L580 Integrated Amp. From 1981.
took it around, same reaction, how could it be?
Even from the amps are amps there is no difference, crowd.Let it go during some hard times, wish I had it back.

Regarding AR turntables, way back when, a friend had one.
didn't know what I was looking at, tonearm looking precariously balanced on the plinth, he had an old Tube Integrated Amp wish I had paid more attention to amp and speakers. When he played a record was blown away. Been searching for that sound since. That was 1976.
 AR Turntables are the bomb.

Dynaco Stereo 70 ($99) and PS 2 Preamp. ($59) purchased along with a Thorens 121 turntable with ADC-1 arm and cartridge and a pair of KLH 7s.  I don’t remember the cost for the latter components, but the 7s were on sale at the time for less than the 6s. It was 1963, and I nearly flunked my college math course because I so much more enjoyed building the kits.  The reward was great tube and vinyl sound that has been superseded only marginally by my newer Mac equipment.  I sold the Dynaco and Thorens when I returned home from Australia in 1976.  My eldest son still owns the KLHs.

In the mid to late 90's or early 2000’s , a radio station decommissioned some Technics SL-1200 Turntables with Stanton cartridges, a friend who worked there got one, he was going to sell it to me cheap, but after he heard it he decided to keep it.
This was my first experience with these turntables, but this combo was another epiphany for me. Never new how good these direct drive turntables were. I had been using a Linn Sondek and Systemdek belt drives. This Technics blo them both, out of the water. Had high end Ortophon , Shure, Goldman, AT, Nagoaka and other cartridges over the years, but this combo.
So Technics SL-1200 and Stanton cartridge, the ones that got away!

Dynaco was the name of the Tube Amp with the AR Turntable experience.Bang for the buck, system. That influenced my search, for sound.
 Dynaco Tube Amp.
AR Turntables