What started you on the path to being audionut?

Stereo5, I really liked the way the Rectilinears sounded too. In my mind, they had a sense of the sound of electrostatics, which were out of my price range. They were airy and the sound seemed to be emitted from the entire baffle, given their 4 tweeters. And the ported woofer went lower than most others.

Looking at Wikipedia, a list of key people at the company has notable designers: Arnold Schwartz, James Bongiorno, Marty Gersten, Jon Dahlquist, Richard Shahinian

A visit to the Electronic Workshop in Greenwich Village when I was 16 years old. The K-Horn (mono days) and tube electronics, and Thorens took my breath away. Soon I was buying Marantz and McIntosh. I still remember that visit.

My story started like Jameswei's. My folks bought a large Magnavox console in the sixties with 15" woofers, horn highend and 100 watt amp. I thought it sounded better than anything I had ever heard, until the guy in the room next to mine in the dorm played his bookshelf system. It was a three-piece system with the turntable on top of the receiver and small speakers. When I went home at Easter that year, my Dad's Magnavox sounded terrible with overpowering, boomy bass.

The next year, another college friend showed up with his new "college speakers" that he had constructed during the summer. These were 8 cubic foot cabinets with a 15" JBL pro woofer and a 15" passive radiator in each, actively biamped to a pair of 5" JBL mids and a JBL tweeter. A revelation in what recorded music could sound like.

The bug bit hard.

Bill

I was chatting with neighbors in their living room when someone started playing a trumpet over in the corner. I looked to see who it was but the only thing over there was a Vienna Acoustics Beethoven.

Stumbled into it when had to replace a CD player. Started poking around the 'net and discovered this whole new (to me) crazy world of high-end audio. Been insane about it ever since.