Hey everyone,
This will be my first "official" post and it may have already been done to death but I think it's at least somewhat interesting so here goes!
I have lurked here for months and gleaned some very helpful information but I haven't seen much on getting a listenable sound for as little as possible. My daughter and I started playing this game a while ago because she loves music and wanted her own system that wasn't Dad's hand-me-downs. We started cruising auctions and thrift-stores, garage and estate sales and have found some incredible (albeit sometimes pricey) vintage equipment. This got us both thinking about just how little we could spend and still get a decent sound. Her first find in this vein was a Yamaha Natural Sound TT 400 turntable at the dump of all places. I showed her how to install the belt and we learned together how to set up the new cartridge (thanks
ma!). The new belt was $14 dollars locally and we put an AT90 cartridge from Amazon on there. Her next find was a thrift store bought RCA stav-3990 receiver (which appears to be a re-badged Pioneer) that was $5. We then went to a church-type sale where she bought a lower-end JVC 5 disc cd player for $3. God bless her, she then drug in some 80's Fisher tower speakers that she had gotten at SA for $5 a piece.
Well, we spent the next two or three days cleaning, testing and figuring out a place in her room for speaker placement and lo and behold, it actually sounded really good to the both of us! Now the sounds coming from her room are still too loud but at least much more bearable than when they were being filtered through a box-store bookshelf stereo.
I suppose the point of this ramble is this, when I first got into this hobby years ago it was very intimidating but when my daughter showed interest I wanted her to feel the rush of a piece of music without worrying about the brand name of the equipment. So if there's any new to music folks reading, you can get pleasing sounds from a very low cost set up without having to resort to super crappy plastic speakers with a little effort. After all, isn't the search some of the fun? It's also a fantastic way to spend time with your kids and get them addicted to the music. By the way, I have created a small monster in my daughter, who now drags stereo equipment in like stray animals.
Thanks to Wigwam Jones' post on recapping speakers! My Novas sound incredible now!
This will be my first "official" post and it may have already been done to death but I think it's at least somewhat interesting so here goes!
I have lurked here for months and gleaned some very helpful information but I haven't seen much on getting a listenable sound for as little as possible. My daughter and I started playing this game a while ago because she loves music and wanted her own system that wasn't Dad's hand-me-downs. We started cruising auctions and thrift-stores, garage and estate sales and have found some incredible (albeit sometimes pricey) vintage equipment. This got us both thinking about just how little we could spend and still get a decent sound. Her first find in this vein was a Yamaha Natural Sound TT 400 turntable at the dump of all places. I showed her how to install the belt and we learned together how to set up the new cartridge (thanks
ma!). The new belt was $14 dollars locally and we put an AT90 cartridge from Amazon on there. Her next find was a thrift store bought RCA stav-3990 receiver (which appears to be a re-badged Pioneer) that was $5. We then went to a church-type sale where she bought a lower-end JVC 5 disc cd player for $3. God bless her, she then drug in some 80's Fisher tower speakers that she had gotten at SA for $5 a piece.
Well, we spent the next two or three days cleaning, testing and figuring out a place in her room for speaker placement and lo and behold, it actually sounded really good to the both of us! Now the sounds coming from her room are still too loud but at least much more bearable than when they were being filtered through a box-store bookshelf stereo.
I suppose the point of this ramble is this, when I first got into this hobby years ago it was very intimidating but when my daughter showed interest I wanted her to feel the rush of a piece of music without worrying about the brand name of the equipment. So if there's any new to music folks reading, you can get pleasing sounds from a very low cost set up without having to resort to super crappy plastic speakers with a little effort. After all, isn't the search some of the fun? It's also a fantastic way to spend time with your kids and get them addicted to the music. By the way, I have created a small monster in my daughter, who now drags stereo equipment in like stray animals.
Thanks to Wigwam Jones' post on recapping speakers! My Novas sound incredible now!
