I suppose it all started with my parents'
Radiogram, with it's boomy sound and 78-RPM-only deck.
As neither of my parents were particularly keen on music, its eventual terminal breakdown (there were many minor ones, during which my father would spend anything from days to weeks finding the replacement valves) there was a big gap of quite a few years until I persuaded them to buy me a
Dynatron record player. As mono, one-box record players went, this was, actually, somewhat superior to that which many teenagers of the day had in their bedrooms. It also moved me into the 33.3RPM era --- although I had my head in Western classical when others were listening to the Beatles.
I do not recall the details of any of the turntables that belonged to people whose flats and houses I shared in my twenties, but, at least,
stereo had entered my life. And so, as my hair length headed for my elbows, did "progressive rock" as we called it at the time.
Another mono-box gramophone, possibly older than the Dynatron, entered my life courtesy of a housemate who didn't want to take anything he couldn't carry when he moved out. Plugged in via a time switch, Wagner was my alarm clock.
Then came
my first Stereo. As in mine, rather than a flatmate's. Here, I jumped in at what was then, if not the deep end, at least not very shallow, with a
transverse-tracking deck from Akai. Chock full of electronics and mechanics, just to keep that arm moving with the groove, it failed, and spares could not be had, after a few years.
In 1990, I was given a
Dual deck as a leaving present from a company I had worked for 16 years. It is still working
It is largely the emotional significance of the gift that has caused me never to upgrade, along with the fact that Vinyl is no longer a daily part of my listening. So, there isn't really a dream destination, although I would probably be happy with a fairly basic Rega or Pro-ject.
But wait, what am I saying...
No Dreams? Even for my ultimate will-never-happen hifi? Of course there are. Two very different ones. One is a laser deck, able to to miss scratches and imperfections a stylus cannot avoid, and the other, equally unconventional in its way, is the astonishing
uni-pivot, rotating headshell arm that I saw in Dr.Bass's system last week