Well I've been on the forums long enough to be the head geezer.
My plan is to buy gear that is first class for what I want it to do.
I also buy gear with an eye to reliability and longevity. If I can service and fix it so much the better. This gets harder as companies fail to publish circuits and service manuals. In addition receivers and pre pros are unbelievably complicated.
I do my utmost to not lumber myself up with junk. As I have said before junk purchases are he most costly
A good deal of equipment I have had a very long time. If there is an advantage to building it myself I will. Sometimes I will modify equipment for my own purposes, like three of my electronic crossovers.
My speakers I have always built. Most of them evolve to some degree over a period of time. I will frequently repurpose gear.
I will replace gear if it can not be reliably or economically be repaired. This is very rare for me. The most common reason is technological change and or outliving support. More about that later.
Equipment is added to provide a facility not previously available as a rule.
Bear in mind that I have been using audio equipment for 63 years now. I have been into the video part seriously for 11 years now.
My analog equipment has been with me a long time. Much of my disc playing equipment for half a century or more. My analog tape equipment for 40 to 50 years. My first digital recording equipment from 1984.
I use exclusively Quad amplification. I have added amps as required.
The LCR speakers were built and installed in 2006. Certain revisions have been done over the years, but not for some time now, just maintenance. The surrounds were built originally as location monitors. The rear backs were started in 1979 and revised extensively over a 10 year period. These were my reference speakers at my previous location. The bass line was rebuilt on transfer here in 2006 to better voice them to the space.
The speakers in the lower great room were built in 2006 for that space.
In our Twin Cities residence the speakers date from 1989 and were my second set of location recording monitors.
As far as the video end of it. I bought a 42" LED TV for the lower great room in 2006 and it is still in use.
In 2006 very large screens were very expensive so this plasma was installed then.
That was replaced four years ago, with a larger screen that was just over half the cost of the original.
The original TV is still working and in a secondary room in our other residence that the grandchildren use for gaming mainly.
I still have the Marantz universal disc player from 2006. The original preo pro was a Rotel, at the time there was no pre pro that had HDMI. When the lossless codecs were introduced and OPPO BD player was added the Rotel sold and replaced by a Marantz 8003 in early 2010. This is still the main control unit of the system, with no plans to replace it.
I built an HTPC four years ago. This is probably my most used peripheral. It was built to a high standard and there are no plans to replace it. A universal Sony BD player was added about a year ago.
The most troublesome units have been Direct TV units which is beyond my control. The Comcast units at Eagan have given plenty of trouble also over the years. I have cut the cord there and use a Channel Master DVR with over air signal. An Intel NUC was added there as an HTPC. We have Chromecast on all the systems. We stream or download much more than we watch traditional TV.
Now there is a major replacement in progress.
At the end of 2004 I built a DAW using Windows XP, Steinberg WaveLab 5 (later upgraded to 6), and an RME Fireface 800.
Digital Audio Workstations were cutting edge then, with few processors able to handle the demands.
My eldest son a software engineer, and my second son then in training as an EE named it "Death Star."
Anyhow support for XP has ended and now all browsers are ending support. The hard drive is now starting to show errors. This unit has done a tremendous amount of work over 13 years. I addition engineers coming here want more current software.
So this makes a compelling case for replacement.
So stay tuned "Death Star II" is coming.
Details will be posted when build and installation are complete and I know it will actually work.
This shows my approach to replacement and upgrades.
This is a conservative approach, based on buying the right reliable equipment for the task at hand. Replacement is never done just because there is a later unit. A replacement must provide a worthwhile and useful increase in functionality and or audibly improved sound quality.
I firmly believe that is by far the most cost effective route to fine AV performance.
