Would you spend you money on modest brand new car or rather buy top notch vintage one?

For a car, I would buy the new one.  I have had old cars and there's always something going wrong/breaking on them.  Mechanical parts wearing out, rubber aging, etc.

For audio equipment, I would consider good used electronics, just being mindful of tube life and capacitor age.  Minimal mechnical wear and tear.

On that subject, I found this ad on USAM listed as a 10. This amp is between 28 and 32 years old depending on when it was manufactured. He says it's perfect, but I can clearly see a few small stains on the faceplate which is really not the point.

I messaged the guy and had a back and forth about the grading being improper for a used amp of this age and in the end, he dropped it to a 9. I think that the best that you can call an amp of that age is a 7. What do you guys think?

Threshold Sa 3.9e Stasis For Sale - US Audio Mart

I’ve already lived with the feature set in vintage. Cars have many more new ones every year. And besides tires there is less degradation from just aging except for seaside.

New car.

@roxy54 ..."he dropped it to a 9. I think that the best that you can call an amp of that age is a 7. What do you guys think?"

Functional condition and age matters too, not just appearance for ranking. It also depends on whether it’s been updated or not with 34-40 year old caps, and other updates. A local gent partially guts the amp, replaces caps, all wiring, bits and more at a cost $. While the SA 1,2,3 "E" Series can be interesting, some of the same owners also upgraded to Pass X150+ amps later on. Worth reading up on with other Threshold-Pass owners. The desirability may be more of a personal thing, and for me, I’d want to consider the upgrade costs as part of the total investment or perceived value of paying extra for an E series amp. All part of your own personal scoring and ranking for consideration.