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the gateway product that turned you into an audiophile

@foggyus91 suggested/pushed/encouraged me to start a thread about this. It was related to Darko's post about 12 audiophile misconceptions. One was that we are all about music - vs gear. I think that subject has been chewed up already a 100 times. I am not sure anyone has anything new to say. 

However, that made me think about the day I turned into an audiophile.

It was when I bought my first "gateway" product that was affordable but audiophile quality and led me to explore more and tweak and switch and experiment and never be fully content but always be smiling when I turned the power on. It's been about the sound and not the music and that's fine. But I realize now that those Monitor Audio speakers I bought from craigslist were my gateway drug  devil

Were you always an audiophile or was there such a moment and a piece of hardware that made the difference?

 

(Lastly, I am very uneasy and on the fence about this forum and starting a thread - for my last correspondence with the moderators. What I learned should bother anyone who cares about fairness or even the appearance of it. I can't discuss it because it will get removed - I tried, my comment lived for less than 5 minutes, )

 

gano
superblueapm's avatar
superblueapm
12 posts
 

I'm not an audiophile according to many definitions. But if I was, it would be due to Magenpan LRS+ speakers.

mitch2
4,283 posts
 

It started with the music of the late 1960s and early 1970s and progressed from car stereos to a pair of 12-inch Jensen triaxial drivers that I mounted into self-made birch-ply enclosures.  Those big speakers (that I still own) travelled with me from dorms to homes for about 7 years until they were replaced by a pair of A/D/S L810s.

dayglow
2,068 posts
 

JBL L-110 at Tech Hi Fi in 1979. conrad-johnson Premier One in 1982 solidified my passion for HEA. Returned to Tech Hi Fi in 1982 and came home with a pair of Ohm Walsh 2’s. FWIW the salesman would not sell me the speakers until I brought a parent with me. I was 17 but could easily have passed for 14.

pryso
1,982 posts
 

This has been interesting, particularly how influential the '70s decade has been in the audio hobby.

For me there was no identifiable time I became an "audiophile".  But it started with music, Vaughn Monroe's "Ghost Riders In The Sky" when I was 7.  Growing up there was often music in the house from my parent's consoles.  In junior high I got a portable (suitcase style) mono player with BSR changer and AM, when I began collecting 45s.  That survived through high school when I began buying LPs, and on until half way through college when I built my first stereo system - Dynakit ST-70, PAS-3, FM-3, and Dual 1009 with Empire cartridge.

Over the years I've owned an uncounted number of components but music always came first, with an effort to simply have a system which maximized the listening experience.

mapman's avatar
mapman
22,842 posts
 

JBL L-110 at Tech Hi Fi in 1979

Which TEch Hifi?   I worked there around then in New Brunswick NJ store.  I remember those JBL well.

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