Pawn shop treasure
Fongolio
Posts: 3,516
The other day I was trolling the local pawn shops for good deals (I found my RTi70's and CSi40 at a pawn shop for a steal price). First treasure, and this may cause controversy, was the fabled Sony Playstation 1 with the model number ending in 1001. This is the one that is rumoured to sound as good as cd players costing in the thousands of dollars. Took it home and did A/B comparison testing with my Pioneer Elite DV-79Avi player. The Sony definitely sounds better. The Pio has deeper low end but the Sony is tighter and more defined. The mids are very smooth and the highs are more airy and real sounding. This $10.00 unit will have a permanent place in my two channel audio rack.
Next was even better. A different pawn shop. I saw a box on a table in the old audio section. I asked the owner if I could look. He told me to go ahead. Inside was a slighly dusty but near perfect Marantz 6200 turntable. Dust cover had a couple light scratches but nothing deep. heavy duty rca cables. The original headshell with a cheapy Realistic cartridge and stylus. We plugged it in and all functions appeared to work except the belt was missing. I asked how much. He asked $20.00 and I offered him $15.00. He took it. Today I spent a good chunk of the day cleaning it up and setting it up with an older but still good Shure M95ED cartridge I had kicking around. I had a good belt robbed off a garage sale junk table that fit perfect. Long story short....it's works perfectly and looks great. I tested in my bedroom rig and it sounds fantastic. It doesn't have quite the detail of my Pro-ject rig but the cartridge amp and pre and not same caliber as my main rig's either. $15.00 and a fun day (for me anyway) tweaking and cleaning and the bedroom now has a first rate classic table. The old one was a very capable Dual 606 with Ortofon cartridge.
Next was even better. A different pawn shop. I saw a box on a table in the old audio section. I asked the owner if I could look. He told me to go ahead. Inside was a slighly dusty but near perfect Marantz 6200 turntable. Dust cover had a couple light scratches but nothing deep. heavy duty rca cables. The original headshell with a cheapy Realistic cartridge and stylus. We plugged it in and all functions appeared to work except the belt was missing. I asked how much. He asked $20.00 and I offered him $15.00. He took it. Today I spent a good chunk of the day cleaning it up and setting it up with an older but still good Shure M95ED cartridge I had kicking around. I had a good belt robbed off a garage sale junk table that fit perfect. Long story short....it's works perfectly and looks great. I tested in my bedroom rig and it sounds fantastic. It doesn't have quite the detail of my Pro-ject rig but the cartridge amp and pre and not same caliber as my main rig's either. $15.00 and a fun day (for me anyway) tweaking and cleaning and the bedroom now has a first rate classic table. The old one was a very capable Dual 606 with Ortofon cartridge.
SDA-1C (full mods)
Carver TFM-55
NAD 1130 Pre-amp
Rega Planar 3 TT/Shelter 501 MkII
The Clamp
Revox A77 Mk IV Dolby reel to reel
Thorens TD160/Mission 774 arm/Stanton 881S Shibata
Nakamichi CR7 Cassette Deck
Rotel RCD-855 with modified tube output stage
Cambridge Audio DACmagic Plus
ADC Soundshaper 3 EQ
Ben's IC's
Nitty Gritty 1.5FI RCM
Carver TFM-55
NAD 1130 Pre-amp
Rega Planar 3 TT/Shelter 501 MkII
The Clamp
Revox A77 Mk IV Dolby reel to reel
Thorens TD160/Mission 774 arm/Stanton 881S Shibata
Nakamichi CR7 Cassette Deck
Rotel RCD-855 with modified tube output stage
Cambridge Audio DACmagic Plus
ADC Soundshaper 3 EQ
Ben's IC's
Nitty Gritty 1.5FI RCM
Post edited by Fongolio on
Comments
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Damn.... LOL sounds like a hell of a fun day to me!! Congrats on your finds!!"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Benjamin Franklin, February 17th, 1775.
"The day that I have to give up my constitutional rights AND let some dude rub my junk...well, let's just say that it's gonna be a real bad day for the dude trying to rub my junk!!"
messiah, November 23rd, 2010 -
congrats! that same turntable at any pawn shop here would have been listed at $90. Pawn shops here are WAYYYYYYYYYY over priced. you are a lucky dude. The only ones here priced reasonable are the silver plastic crap.. similar to the Black Plastic Crap stereo gear from the 80's. :eek:
Might be time for a yearly trip to British Columbia for pawn shopping.
PolkFest 2012, who's going>?
Vancouver, Canada Sept 30th, 2012 - Madonna concert :cheesygrin: -
Everytime I go to the pawn shop/thrift store they don't have crap that interests me.
Nice find. -
Everytime I go to the pawn shop/thrift store they don't have crap that interests me.
Nice find.
The key to finding stuff at pawn shops is going there frequently. All of the stuff that is interesting tends to get snagged up pretty quick. Timing is everything with pawn shops. Being there earlier in the day shortly after the open helps too...because you get to see what new stuff they have before anyone else does.
Nice find on the turntable.The nirvana inducer-
APC H10 Power Conditioner
Marantz UD5005 universal player
Parasound Halo P5 preamp
Parasound HCA-1200II power amp
PolkAudio LSi9's/PolkAudio SDA 2A's/PolkAudio Monitor 7A's
Audioquest Speaker Cables and IC's -
comfortablycurt wrote: »The key to finding stuff at pawn shops is going there frequently. All of the stuff that is interesting tends to get snagged up pretty quick. Timing is everything with pawn shops. Being there earlier in the day shortly after the open helps too...because you get to see what new stuff they have before anyone else does.
Nice find on the turntable.
How about I just buy a house next to the pawn shop. -
How about I just buy a house next to the pawn shop.
How about you just buy a pawn shop? That would completely eliminate the middle man altogether. You'd get to see everything first, and keep what you want.
You get lucky sometimes though. I have an original '69 Fender Stratocaster, that's valued at thousands of dollars...and I found it at a pawn shop for 900 dollars. The guy just didn't know what he had...amazingly. It was really early in the day when I went...and if I had waited until that afternoon to go, it probably wouldn't have been there anymore.The nirvana inducer-
APC H10 Power Conditioner
Marantz UD5005 universal player
Parasound Halo P5 preamp
Parasound HCA-1200II power amp
PolkAudio LSi9's/PolkAudio SDA 2A's/PolkAudio Monitor 7A's
Audioquest Speaker Cables and IC's -
you also get burned.... I took a blown up carver receiver ro a pawn shop knowing that it was useless and sold it for two hundred bucks... this was back in 1986.The Gear... Carver "Statement" Mono-blocks, Mcintosh C2300 Arcam AVR20, Oppo UDP-203 4K Blu-ray player, Sony XBR70x850B 4k, Polk Audio Legend L800 with height modules, L400 Center Channel Polk audio AB800 "in-wall" surrounds. Marantz MM7025 stereo amp. Simaudio Moon 680d DSD
“When once a Republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles; every other correction is either useless or a new evil.”— Thomas Jefferson -
I am finding that most pawnshops these days already sell on Ebay or they check Ebay pricing. The days of finds such as your cheap Marantz turntable are indeed numbered. Those pawnshop owners do not like leaving any extra money on the table.
