Your Private Audio Museum

my particular strain of the "museum bug" has resulted in my
getting FIVE reel-to-reel tape recorders- 4 teacs and
an otari. i also have two cases of GP-9 "platinum" tape-red painted aluminum reels in beautiful clamshell boxes.
i occasionally play a few tapes on one of them- the others are
for show although they are nicely maintained. i recently saw a Nagra-D-II on e-bay for $4000 (originally over $25k and pictured on a stereophile cover)-
a digital true-24 bit machine. i almost pulled the trigger, but with a strange looking rotary head and software meant to interface with a computer, i sadly looked away...

Jlind325is I became an instant audiophile in 1973 when I was in the 8th grade. I always loved music and had a little compact with speakers which folded into a suitcase-like rig. That fateful day occurred in the spring of '73 when I was going to a private school in NH. I went into the art house and found a Stereo Review magazine. I thumbed through it and was amazed by a turntable I saw. It was a Garrard Zero 100. Its main feature was a kind of dual (they called it articulated) arm. The main arm held the cartridge and the second part, a tube, made the headshell move to supposedly achieve zero tracking error. This was a revelation to me. Wow! Zero tracking error. So there is more to audio than I thought possible. Thereafter I hunted for and frequented local audio stores. I saved up and bought a Pioneer SX-424 receiver (17 watts/ch), a Garrard 82 auto table and EPI Microtower speakers. Since then I've ridden every wave and tried everything there is. The best time to be an audiophile was probably from 1975-1983. You got the most for your money then and stereo stores were everywhere because people bought stereos like they buy tv's. Even the cheap stuff was heavy and well built. I was an audiophile through every relationship and every one of my girlfriends and my ex hated my interest in it. I could go on and on.

Cw, I just have to say I just got through looking at a yamaha a1000 int. amp on craigslist for 250us. Looks nice. I need it like a hole in the head but I still just had to do a search just to uh... well you know. I wonder if there's room on my closet shelf for a third amp, ha!

Your Private Audio Museum AKA Audiophile CONFESSIONS....

A few years ago, I noticed a Marantz receiver on ebay in seemingly perfect condition. Now I have no particular thing about Marantz and in fact I think I have never owned a Marantz component.

But then, a stirring of one of my oldest audiophile memories...when I had only a plastic, staticky Soundesign "stereo" in my own bedroom, I was invited over to my neighbors house, circa 1977, where I was at first flattered and excited to be hanging around the older kids, but then I was terrified and mesmerized....

to see giant pitchers of beer being poured....a curious smoke in the air....both mixed with the smell of cedar wood dust and linseed oil from the garage where there had been making tall cylindrical devices....

All of this, accompanied by the sounds of Gentle Giant, Jan Hammer, Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock..

WOW this didnt sound like the Beatles! or the Partridge Family?!?!?!?

As I moved closer to the sound, I saw it: the MARANTZ receiver, high on a shelf, glowly softly in blue and white against the silver, perhaps the beginning of my neurosis...

So 25 years later, I just had to have that receiver.

It sat on a shelf in my office for 3 years, plugged into the wall to light up, but without speakers or a source component.

Last year, I moved it to my library, where I now use it with the DVD player and TV. Its wonderful, warm sounding, and the lights are soothing. Even my wife likes it.

The babysitter, thinking she is being polite, turns it off with the cable box and TV when she prepares to leave at night.

I get angry when she turns it off. I confess.

Cwlondon - I never really thought about it this way... but I'm glad you pointed it out that all of my hi-fi stuff that I've never gotten around to sell is part of my hi-fi museum! I still live in an apt, but when I do buy a house I will make some shelves, platforms and other displays to showcase my extra hi-fi components all throughout the house. My girlfriend is an artist and also likes hi-fi gear (so she tells me) and she can paint murals on the wall that best showcase and draw attention to the specimins. Of course, they will be able to be turned on and show the lights. The great thing is - That it will be a functional museum. If I decide I want to listen to that old tube amp just for the fun of it, I can take it off its display shelf and hook it up.

At least your babysitter didn't shut off your operational preamp and then your amp!