Biggest impact on you?




Curious: I’ve gone through a lot of gear over the years. In reflecting upon this, a Conrad Johnson MV-45A1 power amplifier I bought back in 1983 had the biggest impact on me. This includes consideration of the many preamps, speakers, cables, CD players, and so on that I’ve owned through the years.

Has that piece been the best I’ve ever had or heard? Absolutely not. But, it was the first high end piece I’ve owned and it wowed me big time. Ran it with Vandersteens, CJ’s PV4 preamp, and a Sonograph TT – loved it!

So, what component (power, pre, speaker, TT, CD, etc.) has had the biggest impact on you?
rbschauman
I installed a quieting transformer, a sub panel and 4 dedicated 20A circuits. Wow, the presence of the musicians and the listening space jumped out of my Avalons. This approx $600 expenditure did more to make the system sound like real live music than 10's of thousands of dollars on spent on equipment. It was a good thing too, because installing that 80lb chunk of metal in the attic was pain in the butt!!!
Soundlab Ultimate II which I still own.
Audio Research LS-5mkII long gone but lovingly remembered.
Coincident Frankenstein 300b SET amplifier.
This introduced me to a new level of sheer unadulterated musical realism and pure palpable pressence.
Nottingham Spacedeck/Spacearm
Purist Audio cables
Custom Power Cord Co. Top Gun power cord
Maxell Metal Vertex cassette tape