I’ve had some fantastic chances to buy extremely good equipment at sometimes ridiculous prices but, as I didn’t need them and I don’t buy and sell things I just pass. What’s the good of something you don’t need no matter how good it is. But no, I wouldn’t pass on a bargain genuine Van Gough even though it isn’t a necessity.
The vast majority of equipment I have owned I have paid typical used prices for (I rarely buy new equipment). But I've gotten several unbelievable deals over the years. Fisher X101 amp for free. A Revox A77 R2R for free. A Sony TC755 R2R for free. A Nak CR7A for $20. An Akai Gx747DBX R2R for $35. Mind you, all of these deals occurred near the very bottom of the market back when nobody wanted any of this equipment.
Thank you though that happened 5 years ago I still have the Dac though it's currently in the shop hopefully returning to me soon.
When my girlfriend and I broke up in 2005 and I moved out, she called me up later and said her stepdad gave her all his LPs and his lovingly cared for Dual 721. She owned a Stanton and didn’t want the Dual and asked if I wanted to come pick it up. I drove straight over. I love that thing. It was very generous of her to do that right after we split. She is pretty cool.
Threshold S200. They are seriously rare in Sweden and at ca $800 it was a no brainer. It was my first taste of true high-end gear and it doesn't disappoint.
Recently bought a Marantz SA-KI Ruby at the current sale price of $2999.00. Maybe not the "bargain of a lifetime" in my close to 50 year audio journey but what an incredible sounding CD/SACD player for the money ! Marantz SA-KI RUBY Super Audio CD Player with DACDefault Title
I'd like to know where these thrifts are . I do pretty good with CD's at thrifts but have yet to see anything other than good mid-level receivers as far as equipment goes. Only thing I can recall seeing that was out of the ordinary was a pair of those Pioneer tower speakers that Andrew Jones designed.
I always buy devices at a discount... audio, pc, smartphone, kitchen appliances... except for my turntable, because it’s always at MSRP in all stores here in the Netherlands. But I never had some extraordinary bargain, except once. Bought an Audio Technica VMN40ML stylus for €0. I only had to pay €4,95 shipping. Probably a pricing error, so I expected the order to get canceled. To my surprise it actually arrived a few days later.
Mint JBL 4312 speakers for $200 pair back around 1984. Didn't need them. Had to look under rocks for rent money after buying them. 100% worth it.
There was a Sony SCD 1 at 700 EUR in a private ad a few weeks ago. I hesitated too long. To be honest, I don't know where to place this 27 kg piece...
Got a Resolution Audio Opus 21 full stack for less than $200 which was the cost of shipping. The Opus 21 stack consisted of the CDP with dac input, power module, XS (extra source) module, and S30 power amp. This retailed for $6k when new. The ad for the unit was placed in the classifieds here in 2014 and stated there was a problem withe the disc reader. The owner had contacted Resolution Audio and received a quote of $500 for repair. I figured I could repair the cdp myself so contacted the seller stating I was interested in the cdp portion only and made an offer. He didn't want to separate the pieces but wasn't getting any offers. We emailed each other a few times and spoke on the phone a time or two. After a month or so he contacted me and said I could have the whole thing for the cost of shipping. I was hesitant, but he had already replaced the system and just wanted to be rid of the boxes. It took me 30 minutes or so to repair the cd mechanism issue. About a year later I sold the power amp and sent the proceeds to the guy; he returned the funds with a note stating he didn't need the money. I used the Opus 21 joyfully for seven years. That was a true bargain.
I guess that would be my SP200's. I never expected to own a pair of speakers that were over $25K list, but when my dealer decided to unload his demo versions and I got them for less than half that, I couldn't pass them up.
My Tannoy XT8Fs were only £750 because of damaged packaging. Normal price when in production was about £1800/$2200.
Those woofers look like knock offs of the legendary RCA LC1 coaxial drivers with the bumps on them. Tannoy? BillWojo
I recently bought a pair of Sony SS-U701AV speakers for $50. I couldn't pass them up for that price. The speaker foam was crumbling in them which is why they were being sold so cheap. I ordered two foam replacement kits and carefully fixed them. They sound great now and really mean something to me because I brought them back to life. I recently saw another pair of similar Sony's for sale for nearly $300!
SO Why? Did they just want to make sure they covered ALL the frequencies? I had a JVC Class-a amp from the very early 80s with JVC 3-way speakers in high school. Becker Speakers too. So what were they thinking?
