first decent hifi system..??

Got a quick query here….

What was the first decent stereo system that was commercially available to ordinary consumers..?

Just that I was thinking of the first time that someone would of sat at home and literally got blown away whilst listening to music…

Dates, images, prices etc would be useful!

 

I'm not sure that there was any one system. Hifi in its early days was much more a DIY affair than it is now. I guess things really took off after WWII, with many people having had training in electronics either for building military equipment for the war effort or servicing it. That, combined with large numbers of parts being sold off surplus (valves in particular) meant that people were buying the bits and building their own. Then they'd make one for their friend who wanted one too and would pay for the parts. Then the friend of a friend wanted one as well, and so on.

Flanders and Swann wrote a song on the emerging phenomina of audiophilia in the mid 50s (A Song of Reproduction). It remains astonishingly valid even now, 50 years later.

 

I guess the firsr really affordable mass produced HIFI systems where the Japeneese music centres of the 1970's, not really HIFI but sounded quite a bit better than the cheapo mono 1960's British things from the likes of Ferguson and Bush.

I guess true budget HIFI really took of in the 1980's thanks to places like Richer Sounds. Before this I guess the Japs did with it the first decent mass produced amplifers from the likes of Sony. Pionneer, Maranz etc although these were still quite expensive for the average consumer.

 

NAD 3020 amp. I was still using one until 2 or 3 years ago. A true classic.

http://www.tnt-audio.com/ampli/nad3020e.html

-- Ian

 

I was at a party a couple of years ago, and decided that the speakers were making an uncommonly agreeable sound. I tracked down the amplifier which was under a large table....was very pleased to see a 3020 sitting there. Fantastically-good amplifier, I still regret selling mine.