The Allure of Vintage Audio Gear

Vintage gear can provide an affordable platform for mods and updates that can give stellar performance for a fraction of the cost of comparable new gear. My system is largely modded vintage tube gear, but the remote on my DAC brings me into this century!

God forbid I should ever have a fire or a theft, because I’d be hard pressed to duplicate the sound I get with whatever an insurance company would offer in compensation.

Top quality vintage tube gear has a sweet, musical tone which newer stuff doesn’t quite deliver. But for unhindered bass slam in the lowest octaves, that’s best served by solid state.

My Marantz 7 preamp got the Pooge upgrades plus solid state power supply regulation. The sound sparkles. It is engaging and even seductive and it lost its slightly wooly sonic signature. My power amps are biamped; A Citation II with modern caps and Hexfreds in the power supply works above 400Hz and delivers the musical harmonics and the most fragile upper frequency details flawlessly. For the bass, a Carver 2.0 pro amp delivers effortless energy to a pair of custom speakers made from Boxer components formerly at the Hit Factory.

And for all these parts to sound their best, I use interconnects that don’t get in the way: Pure solid core silver unshielded Silver Solids.

https://silversolids.com/

Only vintage gear I am really interested in, is tube gear. And mainly for the iron. I have a pair of Heathkit UA-1’s I’m about to do a ground up rebuild of. Also have iron from a Sony TC500A I will be using to build a type 45 amp with. 
 

There are pieces out there that are amazingly good - but…

It is so simple to change the sound of an preamp or amplifier so if you have a vintage component, you can change the sound to your liking so easily.

I have a "vintage" Sonic Frontiers SFP1 PHONO PREAMP that I bought  here on the 'gon in 2007.  I bought it as a relatively "newbie" that I paired  with a Benz Micro Glider MC cartridge, 1.1mv. it sounded great for years. I upgraded several components around it since then. 2 years ago I had it modified at Parts Connexion by Glenn and Chris. The unit sounded even better. Very smooth, clear, focused and dynamic, with plenty of slam. My point? Good luck adjusting it for resistance or capacitance (mm) if you want to swap carts. It involves soldering resisters on the circuit board, that's after you remove the screws and the top cover. Big PITA(SS). Modern gear lets you adjust everything on dials on the faceplate. Vintage great sound? Yes! Huge inconvenience? Yes!