Beautiful! That thing looks squeaky clean.

Musical is a good way to describe a lot of that old, silver gear. It just makes everything sound good and feel right to me. Makes me want to keep listening and I guess that's the whole point. 

Congrats!

njnancy said:

There are certainly some nice looking stereo systems in this thread. I always had a turntable and speakers and stereo system growing up, but somewhere along the line I stopped. I don't even know what happened to my various pieces. I had my son and had pc's and cd players and when vinyl disappeared so did my stereo system. Now that vinyl is back, I still have my large collection of records along with new records I've purchased but I have nothing to play them on. I have looked at turntables and they are really expensive, at least for me and I'm not really sure how to go about getting a decent stereo system, budget system. Any advice would be appreciated.

So I guess the first question is... what's your budget?  It sounds like you are starting from scratch minus the records themselves.  There's a huge range of options and the quality will generally go right along with it.  I would definitely consider going to Craigs list and buying used equipment, particularly speakers.  A well maintained pair of speakers will last your whole lifetime easily.  You just have to look for obvious signs of abuse or deterioration from poor storage.  A huge % of all of my gear was bought second hand, and I never have issues.  

mrussel1 said:

njnancy said:

There are certainly some nice looking stereo systems in this thread. I always had a turntable and speakers and stereo system growing up, but somewhere along the line I stopped. I don't even know what happened to my various pieces. I had my son and had pc's and cd players and when vinyl disappeared so did my stereo system. Now that vinyl is back, I still have my large collection of records along with new records I've purchased but I have nothing to play them on. I have looked at turntables and they are really expensive, at least for me and I'm not really sure how to go about getting a decent stereo system, budget system. Any advice would be appreciated.

So I guess the first question is... what's your budget?  It sounds like you are starting from scratch minus the records themselves.  There's a huge range of options and the quality will generally go right along with it.  I would definitely consider going to Craigs list and buying used equipment, particularly speakers.  A well maintained pair of speakers will last your whole lifetime easily.  You just have to look for obvious signs of abuse or deterioration from poor storage.  A huge % of all of my gear was bought second hand, and I never have issues.  

Or if you're reluctant to go the Craigslist route, and I'm sure you can hit the jackpot on Craigslist, there should be some vintage audio stores around your area which generally offer higher prices but usually a tech has gone through the gear, serviced it and there likely is a 90 day -1 year warranty and then you can go back and have your needle recalibrated for free twice the first year of ownership. It seems there's tons of evidence that among other brands the older (mid to late 1970's) Technics turntables are built like tanks. I took a friend over to a really cool vintage audio shop in the greater Vancouver area early in 2017. Hey picked up a Technics turntable and a Pioneer Integrated Amp, modest stuff for around $475.00 Canadian so $350.00 ish USD. He had speakers already. I don't think you could spin more vinyl than this person has without being a pro DJ. We were at his place last month for a 45RPM single records only night. I told him I wouldn't be crushed if he took an occasional rest and put on an occasional LP lol. Anyway the components are performing beautifully. I can dig up the actual Model numbers if you're interested or post the name of the shop in our area.

DJ253147 said:

mrussel1 said:

njnancy said:

There are certainly some nice looking stereo systems in this thread. I always had a turntable and speakers and stereo system growing up, but somewhere along the line I stopped. I don't even know what happened to my various pieces. I had my son and had pc's and cd players and when vinyl disappeared so did my stereo system. Now that vinyl is back, I still have my large collection of records along with new records I've purchased but I have nothing to play them on. I have looked at turntables and they are really expensive, at least for me and I'm not really sure how to go about getting a decent stereo system, budget system. Any advice would be appreciated.

So I guess the first question is... what's your budget?  It sounds like you are starting from scratch minus the records themselves.  There's a huge range of options and the quality will generally go right along with it.  I would definitely consider going to Craigs list and buying used equipment, particularly speakers.  A well maintained pair of speakers will last your whole lifetime easily.  You just have to look for obvious signs of abuse or deterioration from poor storage.  A huge % of all of my gear was bought second hand, and I never have issues.  

Or if you're reluctant to go the Craigslist route, and I'm sure you can hit the jackpot on Craigslist, there should be some vintage audio stores around your area which generally offer higher prices but usually a tech has gone through the gear, serviced it and there likely is a 90 day -1 year warranty and then you can go back and have your needle recalibrated for free twice the first year of ownership. It seems there's tons of evidence that among other brands the older (mid to late 1970's) Technics turntables are built like tanks. I took a friend over to a really cool vintage audio shop in the greater Vancouver area early in 2017. Hey picked up a Technics turntable and a Pioneer Integrated Amp, modest stuff for around $475.00 Canadian so $350.00 ish USD. He had speakers already. I don't think you could spin more vinyl than this person has without being a pro DJ. We were at his place last month for a 45RPM single records only night. I told him I wouldn't be crushed if he took an occasional rest and put on an occasional LP lol. Anyway the components are performing beautifully. I can dig up the actual Model numbers if you're interested or post the name of the shop in our area.

Yes, I'm starting from scratch. I may have speakers stored - big ole things that I used to love, but I'm not sure. I have never bought anything from craigslist - not sure why. e-bay and Amazon are my two go to places. I've only looked at actual turntables on Amazon and they were all in about the 300.00 range, which is over budget and sitting in my cart as i watch for price changes. I just found out that my mom has a Cd player, stereo, turntable, speaker combo circa 90's. She's used the tape deck and cd player but never the turntable and hasn't used it in at least 10 years. I can check out what the model is and post here later - it's not what I would want but if the turntable is decent and won't scratch my records, I could use that while I save and research better equipment. Since my son moved back home, I don't have much disposable income so let me post about the multi system and then I can read up as I save up. 

Thank you for answering me so quickly, everyone. I need to gain more knowledge to really answer questions. There are a lot of places in my area (NJ - NY metro area) where I could go, but again, I have to know what I'm talking about better than I do now. Seems so weird since I grew up with 'record players' and huge speakers. 

I'd love to get a SX-1980.  I haven't read a bad review on that monster.

BIGDaddyWil said:

mrussel1 said:

...she's a beaut Clark.  Very nice!  I love my Pioneer SX-950 and SX-636.

Word is the x50 series is a little nicer than the x80. I'm very worried about my upgrade bug. 

mrussel1 said:

tempo_n_groove said:

I'd love to get a SX-1980.  I haven't read a bad review on that monster.

My god what could you do with 200 wpc. This 780 is 45 and I can barely get it to 20% driving my towers. 

Okay, I am officially out of my league. I have lots of researching to do, I hate when I am completely clueless. 

mrussel1 said:

njnancy said:

mrussel1 said:

tempo_n_groove said:

I'd love to get a SX-1980.  I haven't read a bad review on that monster.

My god what could you do with 200 wpc. This 780 is 45 and I can barely get it to 20% driving my towers. 

Okay, I am officially out of my league. I have lots of researching to do, I hate when I am completely clueless. 

There's a bunch of geeks here.  Don't feel bad asking basic questions.  Lots of people love to help. 

Thanks, I put a lot of my time into understanding PC's and Androids - all aspects of them and I completely missed the re-emergence of the stereo system. 

I get the idea that the stereo system is so powerful that you can't use more than a small amount of the speaker capacity - but that's about it. 

And what keeps me coming back to the forum are threads that show the genuine kindness of this group of people.  ( I like to debate on AMT, but the kindness is what draws me back). I will follow and ask when I need to. Thanks everyone. 

njnancy said:

mrussel1 said:

njnancy said:

mrussel1 said:

tempo_n_groove said:

I'd love to get a SX-1980.  I haven't read a bad review on that monster.

My god what could you do with 200 wpc. This 780 is 45 and I can barely get it to 20% driving my towers. 

Okay, I am officially out of my league. I have lots of researching to do, I hate when I am completely clueless. 

There's a bunch of geeks here.  Don't feel bad asking basic questions.  Lots of people love to help. 

Thanks, I put a lot of my time into understanding PC's and Androids - all aspects of them and I completely missed the re-emergence of the stereo system. 

I get the idea that the stereo system is so powerful that you can't use more than a small amount of the speaker capacity - but that's about it. 

And what keeps me coming back to the forum are threads that show the genuine kindness of this group of people.  ( I like to debate on AMT, but the kindness is what draws me back). I will follow and ask when I need to. Thanks everyone. 

@njnancy I did a whole bunch of research before I finally decided on what I wanted.  I even changed the speakers I originally wanted(and bought) to something else and am happier with them.  Someone on here referred to them as "BAS" type speakers, Big Ass Speakers, lol!!!

Looking to upgrade my cartridge on my Audiotechnica LP120 from stock. Thinking about the Ortofon 2M Red. Anyone else done this?