I remember for christmas my dad got a 500$ 4 head VCR - Hitachi if memory serves; and it was HIFI
Not that it made much difference on our 15 year old Zenith 20" mono TV hahah, man that tv brings back memories, the tube would go every so often so wed have to slap the side of the tv to get the picture back into focus. For some reason I really enjoyed playing with the remote on the vcr (probably because it illuminated the buttons in red and green) and had a ton of buttons. I think i ended up getting into the whole audio/video thing was because I enjoyed playing with all the wires behind the tv and the fact that my dad couldnt figure them out while i was hooking it all up at 9 years old (finally, something my dad couldnt do)
I think a year or two later I saw Jurassic Park in the movie plex, and I was stunned, wasnt it the first movie with DTS? Again, years later, a friend of the family gave me a ride to work in his souped up Jimmy SUV, and he was a big audio nut, he had subwoofers, amplifiers, component speakers, and it all looked really cool to me - but before that day I had never knew a stereo could sound anything like that, i just wanted to take the day off work and go crusing with him all day - im pretty sure thats the exact moment i really started to want a good system.
Being a broke student and never having a decent paying job is a curse for me, because I have good taste but no money (like that horrible tv show). So what I have took a VERY long time to put together, and its still not even all that good - which is why i drool when i read that people have rotel driven systems and such (I love ROTEL). When I was 15 my mother and I were at some liquidation center place where they sell equipment that has fallen off trucks and whatnot, when I spotted a Sony system with a subwoofer - the guys wanted 75$ for it - Deal. Took it home, didnt work, spent another 75$ on some stupid cable that only Sony makes to hookup the sub to the receiver and give power to the sub. Spent another 50$ on a friend of the family to repair the volume pot. Finally, a little home theatre, mind you I only had some garage speakers to hook up to it, and it was only dolby pro logic 1
My aunt gave me some speakers when I was about 16, because she was moving up to some bose tiny speakers (go figure) to fit in her apartment without being in the way. She gave me a pair of Mordaunt-Short 3.0 Bookshelves, an Axiom Ax 1.6 Center and I still use them today. On boxing day last year I went to futureshop and grabbed up a pair of Athena AS-B2 bookshelves for my fronts and got some stands for fifty bucks at some audio shop. It sounded better, but only in stereo. About a week ago, I finally scraped enough cash together to get a HK AVR225 receiver (yes its two years old, but I could only afford used) and i am ecstatic. Finally, True Dolby Digital in all of its 5.1 glory. And DTS, its so delicious. I waited so long for something like that i almost cried when i cranked up U571. And as of this morning at 10 am, i received my home theater master mx-500 remote, like i said near the beginning of this long winded post, i must have a thing for fancy remotes.
