Originally Posted by Don Ro (Post 10104909)

My first "system" was two Dyna Stereo 70 tube amps (kits...$90 each) in mono, the pre from an AR Receiver, two AR 2ax's, and an AR turntable...Shure cartridge.
I worked swing shift for the gov't and a few of us would gather at my house at midnight, turn out all the lights and listen to music as loud as we wanted.
Those AR speakers would suck those St. 70's down so much that we'd watch the output tubes pulse and gasp.
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Can this be real? $725 now for the St. 70 kit? :eek:
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https://www.dynakitparts.com/shop/st-70-kit-120-vac/

Originally Posted by Don Ro (Post 10105063)

"Sorry for the hijack..."
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Tis OK. You're among friends here. :)

Originally Posted by aschen (Post 10104743)

I've been an audio enthusiast / hifi guy for over 2/3rds of my life. The term audiophile has taken a bit of a sour connotation in the last several years, so its not my favorite term.

Anyways, depending on your definition of high end: used/Heavily depreciated is the only sensible way to buy. Class AB amps, turntables, preamps, and to a large degree speakers havent improved much in the last few decades. Speakers probably have at the very high end due to improvement in computer modeling and test equipment. Also DSP controlled active speakers are really the state of the art but arnt heavily adopted for home use.

I have 15 year old dynaudio confidence speakers, 22 year old audio research tube preamp, a new bryston amp but it replaced a 12 year old one only to get more power, etc. I bought all this stuff at less than half of MSRP which puts you closer to 1/4 of new MSRP for comparable items since prices inflation. This stuff is still pretty close to state of the art.

One caveat with 20+ year old components is that you are at the point where Caps and sometimes potentiometers can fail and/or get noisy. In most cases these items with go 30+ years, but its not uncommon to have to recap power amps in this range. This can be expensive for big daddy hi current biased amps. I also advocate for new or at least more modern digital equipment.

Really the best bang for buck would be to leave your components alone (if functioning correctly and of sufficient power) and buy the best/baddest/your most preferred speakers from the discussed era.

Speakers, speaker placement, room acoustics and optimization are by far and away the most important elements.

Originally Posted by Shaun @ Tru6 (Post 10105110)

Thanks for the confirmation and direction. What are some vintage speakers you would recommend? My preference is for clean and bright. Paid just $400 for the virtually new CM4s and really like them over some older Advents which were very warm.

I would like another P230 but the one I have is fine for the most part now.

Originally Posted by Don Ro (Post 10105101)

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http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1531423417.jpg
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http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1531423462.jpg