It's good to recall all the different playback formats over the years.
When I started to work, I didn't have much money and was using a monophonic portable system in a box with a 78 rpm turntable. Later on, I built my first tube amplifier from a schematic in a Radio-Electronics magazine. It was a 10 watt tube amplifier.
Shortly afterwards, as I wanted to play LPs, I built a tube preamp which I added to the amp chassis. I bought a Elac turntable and followed with several vinyl purchases until the time I got a Mercury LP featuring David Carroll's RePercussion recording. Because of the massive low frequency peaks on the disc, the cartridge I was using then couldn't properly track it, so I had to get a more decent cartridge.
I had a lot of enjoyment with that equipment until I switched to stereo with a Fisher 202 tube stereo amp and built speaker enclosures using Goodman drivers. The new turntable was a Thorens TD-124 equipped with a Pickering cartridge installed in a SME 3012 tone arm. In the early 1980's, I switched to SS electronics with Crown IC150 preamp and Harman Kardon Citation 12 & Sony TA-3200 Power amps and Altec Lansing A7 Voice of the Theater speakers in own design 8 cf ducted cabinets.
In the early 2000's, I moved on to surround playback possibility which evolved to my current HT system.