The first system you had that was "high end/audiophile", by you standards

@tomic601: I discovered the high end in 1971 (Infinity Servo-Static’s, ESS TranStatics, SAE electronics, then ARC), and commenced visiting every HE shop in the Bay Area. One was The Audio Clinic in Berkeley, which I visited to hear the Dayton Wright ESL’s. The proprietor was David Fletcher, who later was one of the principles of both Sumiko and SOTA.

David’s shop was a mess, as was his personal appearance ;-) . In speaking with him, I instantly realized this was no ordinary hi-fi salesman, or even human being. The current status of the shop made an audition of the ESL’s impossible, David asking if I could check back with him in a while.

Before that could happen I visited Audio Arts in Livermore, where Bill Johnson just happened to be setting up a complete ARC/Magneplanar Tympani system. Sorry David, I’m going in THIS direction instead. ;-)

Rega Planar 2
Dynevector 10x
Hegeman Hapi 2
Magneplanar MG I
Hafler DH 500

Bought the above turntable & preamp from HiFi Buys when Underwood Wally was working there!

In early days don't recall an entire system I'd call high end/audiophile. I always had pieces of a high end system, early on had AR 3A, then Dahlquist DQ10, never had top of line amplification or source equipment to use with them. Only when I rediscovered tube amplification in form of Conrad Johnson MV55 did I really move into what I considered high end territory.

2003 I jumped in w/ Silverline Sonatina speakers (still using and loving them), Classe CP-50 pre-amp, Adcom 5500 amp, Cal Audio 5 disc cd player and denon CD player/recorder, Transparent music link interconnects and signal cable power cords, although the power cords came a little later.