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What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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Posted by Just_A_Guy (My Page) on Thu, May 5, 05 at 16:58
| My parents never would buy me the AM/FM reciever with the built-in turntable and bookshelf speakers in the early 70's (boo hoo!) so in the mid-70's when I started working I saved up and bought a Marantz reciever, Panasonic turntable and Yamaha 12" 3-way studio monitors.
It was kinda sorta low end gear but to a 16 year old it was good enough. And I used to love rocking-out to The Who, The Doobie Brothers, Jethro Tull and Chicago when no one else was home.
So, at home as a teenager or on your own for the first time... what was your first stereo like? Grammaphone? Stereo cabinet? Record changer? The all-inclusive am/fm/turntable&speakers? Separate components? |
Follow-Up Postings:
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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| I had the most mishmash of audio gear on my first system. I was 15 years old. I had a Voice of Music reel to reel. In it was an amplifier with speaker output jacks. Hooked up to that reel to reel were some Radio Shack speakers in home made cabinets. For other listening options I connected up a Pioneer turntable and a GE portable am/fm radio. Sounded good to me at the time. It was all second hand gear and I had about $100 into the whole system. Bill |
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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| I remember my first High Fidelity (hifi) turntable. We called it a victrola in those days, then had to learn to call it a stereo.. It was just a turntable in a mahogany cabinet on legs and you could play 78s. the new 45s, 33 1/2s and 16s. We were very excited about it. That was about the same time we got our first tv set - the largest size - 16 inches. There were 3 channels broadcasting. I think they were CBS, ABC, and channel 13 (can't remember its call signal). Yeah , I feel about a hundred years old.... |
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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| A no-frills Panasonic receiver/turntable that mom paid for. It sounded fine to me, though. I remember 8-tracks were beginning to fade out at the time. The stuff I have now isn't much better, but I can play albums and listen to the radio, so I'm a happy camper. Is anybody watching the Derby today? I have no use for it, but my parents have a party every year and I'll be going over there later to watch it with them. While I was looking for some information I ran across this site that has Hunter Thompson's story about the 1970 race. If you've never read it and you want a good laugh, check it out. |
Here is a link that might be useful: The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent And Depraved
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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| My first "Hi-Fi" system was a piece of crap Yorx all-in-one monstrosity. However with my first summer job (mid-seventies) and spent all my money upgrading. I ended up with a manual pioneer turntable, Kenwood amp and Marantz cassette deck. I bought a pair of home-made speakers second hand. The whole thing sounded pretty darn good. The memory makes me misty-eyed. |
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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If my memory serves me (which ain't often), we began with the victrola too; Ah yes, that mahogany cabinet that smelled of Pledge! Then we moved 'up' to the horizontal RCA cabinet jobbie early 60s with REAL 'imitation' mahogany front panels and removable side speakers covered in brown polyester fabric (that smelled like smoke, even though no one smoked in our house unless we had company over for a par-teh a-singin' and a-dancin' which was often). I remember Harry James Orchestra played alot. The imitation mahogany stereo matched the equally ugly RCA tv in the other corner of the den. I recant: I say ugly but it was way cool back then!
When I got my first apartment in 74ish, my parents gave me a Pioneer turntable. I bought two mastodontal KEF speakers at a garage sale and which I am proud to say I still have and yes... they're made of imitation mahogany, matching plastic top and polyester woofer filters! Go figure! My first amp was a TEAC, if I remember correctly and my tape deck was a new kid on the block, TECHNICS, but I took a chance and was not disappointed. When I moved into my hippiehouse in college, someone added 2 other Kefs and a reel-to-reel. T'was bliss! |
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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| Cool stories, guys and gals. Good times, eh? |
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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| What a HUGE investment that was, when money was pretty tight. My first stereo system, I did some homework and wound up buying an Aiwa tape deck, baby Advent speakers and the receiver was......Pioneer.....Teac? I think it was Pioneer. |
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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I grew up with this plastic mono record player with a lid and a twelve-pound tone arm. My whole family would gather 'round it and listen to 78's and 45's. And one Bill Cosby album (our first 12", I think). Then we got a huge console for family use, and my brother and I got to fighting over the mono player. After a while I started to buy my own albums and found the old player scratched up and wore out the vinyl, so we both stopped using it.
During my forteenth birthday party I could hear the sound of Cat Stevens' Foreigner drifting out of another room as I was blowing out my candles and making a wish. There, in the family room, was a brand-new Sears stereo on a brand new cart with detached speakers and a (drrrrumroll) built-in eight track player!!!!
O happy day. I got my wish. |
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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Here is a link that might be useful: You can thank Thomas A. Edison
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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| First stereo - G.E. portable with the fold-down front and removable speakers. Added a headphone jack to get halfway decent sound out of my handfull of records. Listened to Iron Butterfly, Mountain, James Gang, Duane Eddie, Beach Boys, and Beatles all on that machine. Spanned about 10 years or so before I got a "better" one, with an 8-track player. JIMBO |
RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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First home stereo? Hmmm. Does it count if it was mono?
Ric 
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RE: What Was Your First Home Stereo?
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| My first stereo was also my first "charged" item. (Well, OK, unders Mom's name) Had to buy it at a furniture store. 1968 I believe. A Magnavox with detached STEREO speakers and HEADPHONES!!! Oh WOW! Oh how good did LED ZEP sound? and later, EL&P's "Lucky Man", MOODY BLUES, JETHRO TULL etc. Seems that these days things are so advanced and "realistic" that you just don't get that seperation of sound. Or maybe it's just nostalgia.... :) |
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