A new thread - with no Smileys, Similes, bets/wagers, animosity, or T M-P

well, I lied about the Smileys!

Corkie

Hurrah!

The 3020 was a good little amp. Must brush the dust off mine and get my Son into Hi-fi...

Or is that a bad idea, Hmmmm.

Phil

Phil

My first ever amp was a 3020.

A real cracker I had some American Scott speakers and a Dual 502 record deck? A nice little starter system all in all. Years of pleasure from that set up.

Spock

Aha, another 3020 owner! I'm glad I still have mine - last seen woefully outclassed as the amp for my spare Linn Karik CD (bought for £300) in my bedroom in the UK...

Phil

Dual 504, Amstrad ????, KEF Coda II speakers.
Odd thing was the Amstrad amp I had, must have got a wed afternoon model or something, saw off a 3020 and beat all I compared it with until it was trashed by a Myst TMA3.

Crikey!

Hard to imagine an Amstrad beating anything! My first stereo was an Amstrad when I was 10 or 11... It was pants!

Phil

Mid 50's in a small market town we had a radio shop nearby and my father bought an Armstrong tuner-amplifier. This was fed to a kit for an enormous bass reflex cabinet in chipboard obtained by mail order through the post. A pair of clear-coned tweeters resided on a sloping baffle on top. That reflex box lasted for years until stereo finally arrived. Wireless World was the mag of the day then eventually Hifi News.

My own first hifi was a hand-me-down Mullard 510 mono valve/valve pre with an all-steel Lenco turntable and 10" Whitely driver with cambric cone. This driver found its way into home-made Tricolumns and other Voight folded horn designs of the day. Thus began the search for real bass with ever-larger enclosures. Sand filled baffles, closed-off cupboards, horns etc. Hopeless of course with the drivers of the day but it was great fun over the years. From the first I was a constant modifier. Always searching for a cheap way of obtaining perfection. Library books and magazine articles were constantly scanned for some way of cheating physics and a tight budget. WH Smiths was my reference library. Apart from the real library where I spent literally man-years from the age of 13-14 when kids were most unwelcome! I used to creep in then turn the pages very, very slowly to avoid the attention of the bespectacled hawk at her high desk! Shush! Damned good library though!

Since music had been a passion – almost a religion since as far back as my memory goes it was logical and inevitable that a system would be top priority as soon as I had the means to achieve it. So I built amps and tuners at school and trawled all the local electrical shops that don’t seem to exist any more for anything that could be made to receive, retrieve and play back music. First ‘proper’ system (it’s all relative) came on the back of my first full time paid job in 1980. Rega Planar 3, A+R A60E and BMW DM14 speakers. I thought that would sort it for good and let me concentrate on buying all the music I wanted – how very naive.

Cheers

Harry

Another very happy former Nad owner here!

My first amp was a NAD 3020e.

I was inspired to get it because my best friend at the time (1987) - had a NAD 3120. I probably would have bought the same thing but the 3120 was no longer being made. I remember turning up at one of those hifi shops in Tottenham Court Road with £100 cash - I bought the amp there and then!

My first CDP was a cheap Philips player with no functions on it whatsoever except play, pause and stop! Can't remember the model but it only lasted about a year anyway before I could hear it shaking about inside, so I thought the transport must be knackered. Then I went to audition a new one, and ended up with..a Philips CD630 - very similar to Phil's CD610II, but with more functions!! Like Phil I bought it in 1990 and in all that time it has never gone wrong! In fact, I still have it to this day!

First speakers were a pair of Heybrook Point 5s, a then revolutionary design which cost £119. I was inspired to get these on the back of an enthusiastic review by Alvin Gold in Hifi Answers (I think). Bought them from a shop in Rotherham during my first year at college - I was studying in Sheffield at the time. Of course it was a financially reckless thing to do. I was skint for six weeks afterwards!

But the system didn't half sound good!

Cheers,

Jon

Interest was stirred after Mum and Dad bought their first "stereo". Garrard deck in a box with removeable lid and base with the speakers in.
My first sytem was Mullard 10-10 valve amp Garrard SP25 and Sinclair Q14? speakers. This elvolved via jap amps/tuner amps to the last pre NAIM system A 75 watt? jap amp BD1 TT SME arm V15 cart and AR2Ax speakers.. That sytemwas traded up to LP12 Basic and K9, 12 and 160 with AR 8 speakers.
" And so it begins"

Howard

Rega Planar 3, NAD 3020, KEF Coda 2. Approximately 1979! I then added an LP12 in about 1984 which I still have. I rewired the Coda's internally and that made then work better, they trashed my friends much more expensive but beautifully finished Monitor Audio speakers.

I think NAD has a lot to answer for!!

Harry, is the A60 the very slim one with the wooden top and sides?

Phil

My first system was a Garrard Zero 100S with Ortofon VMS20E into a Sinclair Project 80 and Wharefdale Lintons.





My first upograde was to replace the Sinclair with a Cambridge Audio P60. Then I replaced the TT with a Rega Planar 2 and the Speakers with Heybrook HB2s.

Later the Rega gave way to a Linn and the P60 to a Tresham Domestic 1 amplifier. Subsequently,the Heybrooks were upgraded to TDL Studio 1s

Then the Linn was exchanged for a SpaceDeck (God knows why) and I bought a Croft Super Micro pre-amp and Series IV power amps - well it seemed like a good idea at the time.

Then I replaced the lot with my current set-up.

Rotf

quote:

Originally posted by Phil Cork:
I think NAD has a lot to answer for!!

Harry, is the A60 the very slim one with the wooden top and sides?

Phil

Yes it was Phil. With a black ask sleeve. I didn’t see many black ones. I hammered it for about four years and loved every second.

I chopped it in for an Exposure X and got so little in PX that I really should have kept it. I’ve been kicking myself ever since.

Cheers

Harry

Harry,

Thought I recognised them. When I studied in Plymouth, the local s/h dealer/pawnshop had about 3 or 4 of them!

Ok this was over 10 years ago, but they never seemed to sell - stacked up in a corner!

http://www.wantshop.co.uk/

Phil

quote:

Originally posted by BigH47:
... and Sinclair Q14? speakers. ....

£6.19.6d well spent - a classic of its day.

They had their moment and then were almost forgotten – or seemingly so. The X was better in many respects but you sometimes don’t realise what you have until it’s too late. There was something about the A60 which I missed . Can’t really say what, but I wish I’d kept it for a second system. It’s not like it would have taken up much space!

The amp that followed the X was retired last year. That’s staying for another system – if I ever get round to it.

History has been kinder to the 3020. I can still remember how much it stirred everything up when it hit the streets. Quite an amp. I had the matching tuner (which is in the loft - see? I'm learning).

Cheers

Harry

Couple the Q14s with this



£9.19s.6d for S60 pre-amp, 2 Z30 power amps at £4.19s.6d each and power supply PZ5 at £3.19s.6d and you had some system

Where could you get an amp and speakers for £35 these days that matched the quality of Sir Clive's kit?

My first serious hifi was purchased in '81. Luxman PD11 record deck (if memory serves), Quad 44 and 405, FM4 tuner and Rogers Studio 1 speakers.

Took me until late 2004 to start down the Naim track with a CD5x. Now have CDX2, 282, Hicap2, 200, Nat05, Fraim and Audiovector M1 Signatures on Audiovector stands.

The first thing I bought with money from an after-school job about 40 years ago was an Akai M6 reel to reel tape recorder.

7" reels, 7 1/2 and 3 3/4 ips. Weighed a ton, lots of glowing valves inside and you could plug little speakers straight into it!

A wondrous thing which provided years of fun. It even smelled good when it got hot, which was most of the time.

My first real system was a Denon CDP (sorry, can't remember the model) with a Rotel RA925BX amp (comparable and to my ears superior to the NAD3020i) with Mission 780 speakers. Not a bad system at the time - think I was about 15 - but the bloody speakers kept blowing up. I won't be buying Mission again!!

EW

A Technics CD4 ( Quadraphonic ) system.
It was aweful.
ATeac tape deck and Technics direct drive turntable.
oh.. and a set of Pioneer closed cans.

Kuma
I always enjoy your posts. I've learnt a lot. You have come a long way from where you started!