Your experience in "in their day" brands/components that you remember foundly?

@clearthinker, We had KMA 100s and KMA 200s driving Apogees at Excalibur in Olde Towne Alexandria VA. Dan and Rondi (Krell) would drive down frequently from CT to audition prototypes on our Infinity IRS Vs, some of the best sounding prototypes never made it to production. Bill and Lew (c-j) were 5 miles away and also used the IRSs as a microscope to test new products, the IRSs were at their best with a pair of Premier 5s and a Premier 3 preamp. There was something special about the KSA 50, especially in that timeframe when most SS amps were sub-par, the KSA 50 was sweet and musical.

@klh007   I agree with you entirely about the KSA50.   There was something magical about it.  It is often the case that a new company's break-through product is a killer.  But the magic is  probably mainly that it is full-range Class A.

It was John Atkinson's  reference for years after he bought the test piece when testing it as editor of Hi-Fi News & Record Review (UK) before being poached by Stereophile.  in a recent piece he says he still rates it and uses it a lot.

The KRS200s have been my main amps for more than 30 years now.  I have had them overhauled and re-capped once and shall never change them.

I went Audio Research in the pre-amp department rather than CJ although both offer very similar characteristics and benefits in my view as well as unquestionable integrity as traders.  I've moved away from AR on phono amp, initiated by their not offering fully balanced in their Reference flagship.  I went van den Hul The Grail and very definitely not regretted.

waytoomuchstuff,

I bought my Mother one of the great KLH compact systems that she used the balance of her life.  

sfar,  I also had the Dynaco model you mention...with an early BSR turntable with a early Shure M44e and some decent two way Dynaco speakers...of course with heavy gage lamp cord wire.  

So my starter system in 1977 in college was a Phase Linear 4000 pre, a Phase Linear 400 power amp, a Yamaha Tuner, a Phillips 212 turntable (with highly cool green LED touch sensors for speed on on/off, which in 1977, was awesome( and Electovoice speakers which I replaced with Epicure Trilogy 3.0 speakers.

But what sucked me into hifi was a setup at this store called Natural Sound in Framingham, Mass, where I grew up.  Mark Levinson separates, a turntable that I dont remember but looked very hi end, and stacked Quad ESL57’s.  To me, it was like the band was playing in the room . . . It was just an awesome experience.  Of course, the weed might had something to do with it, but I remember that sound so well.  I recently spoke with one of my college buddies who went there with me and he agreed that that was just about as great as we could imagine!  Ive been chasing that sound since then!