I got started on this mess about 40+ years ago when my Uncle gave me his unused old Marantz tuner and Fisher amp. I bought two speakers at a local stereo shop, they were pretty bad, but wow, I was under 9, and had a STEREO. My folks and I went to Chicago that year and they got me a turntable, a Garrard of some type, with a cheap cartrige of some kind, might have been ceramic, can't remember. When I was 14, I started working for my dad, and right accross the parking lot from his store was an appliance store that sold Dual, AR, Pioneer, Kenwood, Sansui, and all the other popular names from back then. I started putting stuff on layaway, and soon was taking home a HK 330A. My dad thought it was "stupid", and yelled at me the entire drive home. I told him I thought the money he spent on shoes and clothes was "stupid". He never really stopped complaining about it, even after I made money on it.
About the same time, I found out that I could get stuff wholesale through that appliance store's wholesale division, and almost instantly, I took most of my money out of myu savings account, and bought several lower end receivers to resell to other kids in high school. They were gone instantly, and then I began selling them on "credit", half down, they took it home, and as long as they paid on time, no interest, but if they missed on, it was a 20 buck late fee added to the balance. And if they tried to screw me? My huge friend would pay them a visit. I was big enough, but he was 6'5" 260 pounds at 14, and added an inch and 10 pounds a year! Very few actually missed any payments, and only one guy ever actually didn't pay me off, he just left town one day, and never came back.
All through high school, I sold stereo equipment, and afterwards, everything was going good, until QUAD. I eventually got out of the business, and about the time I thought of going back into it, the wholesaler went under, like a bunch of others did around that time.
As far as goofy stories go, I have a friend, a really nice guy, but he's CHEAP. I mean so cheap, he actually complains about himself being cheap! He never buys anything for quality, just price. He can't seem to hear the difference between the junk factory radio in his truck, and the fairly high end set up I have in mine. He has bought several ham radios over the years, against my advice, and other's advice too, and then complains about the same things that we used as the basis for recommending he pass on it.
He decided to get into Home Theater a couple of years ago, and bought a really weak Pioneer 5.1 receiver, used, at a local pawn shop, and 2 old pioneer speakers at the local police auction. He used a huge, annoying pair of Cerwin Vegas for the fronts, and some little center channel speaker he got someplace on line. The center actually sounded ok. He hooks everything up and starts complaining about how bad it sounds, that the old console stereo he was using sounded better than the Pioneer, etc. I go over there and the woofer surrounds on all 4 speakers were basically dust. I break the news to him, and he says he will buy woofers someplace, or fix the surrounds. He doesn't say anything about it, so one day I was close by and call him and he's home, so I drop by. He's showing me his set up in the basement, and it sounds BAD, to put it mildly. His rear surrounds are way too loud, and sound very odd, to put it mildly. I look and see chrome through the grills, and say, "What's with the chome?" He takes the grill off one, and he had taken a 6x9" car speaker, and replaced the woofer with it! They were some junk brand, a $20 pair, and besides the angle iron mounting deal he did, he also left the original midrange and tweeters hooked up, and was running the 6X9 directly off the terminal block! Well, I started laughing, and he got angry, but agreed that it did sound a lot better when I clipped the mids and tweeters out of the Pioneers. He had replaced the woofer in the CV's, but he couldn't find one that fit, "That didn't cost a fortune" for the Pioneers. I asked him how much a "fortune" was, and he says, "Well, they wanted over 20 dollars apiece for just the woofers alone!" I snorted Iced tea out my nose on that one!
I told him this is/was the wrong hobby for him! His cheapness amazes and amuses me without end!
