Man alive: you guys can really resurrect some old memories. I started taking apart radios (& clocks too, mom reminds me) before I could even read. Dad had a wire-recorder which always amazed me. Around age 6-7 I heard my first real audio at my cousin's place (he had brought back some '50's mono tube gear from overseas military duty) and I was Wow'd on-the-spot. Built me a crystal-set w/metal diaphragm headphone, & was fascinated that it worked with no battery or power source. Early 60's brought in the British Beatles invasion & of course I was hypnotized, despite dad's dire warnings of a 'commie plot' in progress. Glued my ears to the top-40 A.M. table radio in my bedroom, until the wee hours every night. Family friends got a Zenith portable & dad liked it, so we went for a big-old Zenith console tube stereo with 35 womping watts & a single 15" woofer. I then inherited the family's tube mono portable for my own, & gutted the cabinet. Setup speakers everywhere in my own room, mounted in cardboard boxes, coffee cans, you-name-it I tried it. Still blissfully ignorant, I obviously knew nothing about electronics, impedance matching, etc... A pre-teen then, I put together some more Allied Radio Knight-kits, & actually began to understand what I was doing. Early teens: I built a C.B. base station in my 'basement apartment' & worried all the neighbors with TVI. Built myself a mixing board & integrated in an FM tuner, tape decks, phone line, turntable, microphone & the phone line. It was all connected; at times I 'broadcasted' music illegally. Then built an all-tube low-power FM transmitter, & ran the only pirate radio station in town. Age 15: got a job at McDonalds & earned enough $ to build my own Utah bass-reflex 3-way's: zip corded to a 1959-vintage beam-power-pentode amp built from a kit. Got an old Rek-O-Kut belt-drive turntable + Schure M3D cartrdige for cheap, & I was in heaven. Age 19: Replaced the then-fried-out Utah 15's with 3-way CTS separates & home-brew crossover. Worked at the university radio station & discovered Klipschorns; swore I'd own a pair someday, now I do. Built my next amp, 120w/ch S.S. on breadboard from a schematic; didn't like the sound, so I taught myself how to tweak the component values. Been through a multitude of "real" equipment since then. The only time I wasn't seriously playing around & changing the system was 1984 thru 1997, when I had Luxman Ultimate series components (used, so they were affordable) THAT was the most musical my rig has ever been. The power amp finally failed; 3 years & $20K (retail) later, I'm still experimenting. This is still "more fun than a barrel of monkies" (yeah I had a couple of their LP's too). As Gunnar says: AMP ON!
How, all this obsession started
I remember in 70's, back in Yugoslavia, collecting the "catalogs" Technics, Tannoy McIntosh...i "knew" about belt drive t-table, being sonicaly "superior" to direct drive, i "knew" that "Revox" was the best reel-to-reel, Nacamichi best casset deck, and Thorens "best" turntable. Even i never had to chance to acctualy see it, never mind listened. never. Remembre the old "Grunding" "quadrofonic" reciever, that our family friend had it (after years of working in Germany)and listening for the first time "The Dark side of the moon". Than me "bulding" big boxes and mounting "low" quality car speakers inside them, than all hookin-it up with the lamp cord and "phono" jack, into the headphones output (mono of course)of the Radio-cassete deck. ...so i had chance to "finally' hear what is "all" about. The "New Year" 79-80, my brothers friend invited us to the party...and he had "classic" Marantz reciever (brand new)Technic's T-table and Wharfadale -70 speakers! WoW! I was blown away! Only when i moved to US, six years later i was able to seriously consider buying my first Hi-Fi system! And i did, in 1987 went to the best stereo shop in Las Vegas (the upper-ear) and bought me a NAD separates, and Klipch heresy II speakers! Well, my first "ex" took care of that after the divorce. However i still have a Nad cassete deck i was able to "save".