Inspired by a visit to a friend’s place in Singapore—where I had the chance to experience vinyl on his hi-fi system—I decided to dive back into the world of perfect audio reproduction.
To be honest, I am a relapsed audiophile.
As a kid, I was always tinkering with audio systems, though I never had the resources to get anything truly high-end. My house started with an 8-track system, later replaced by an unbranded all-in-one cassette-tuner-amplifier and a pair of home-built speakers. On that modest setup, I grew up listening to The Beatles, ABBA, Bee Gees, Anne Murray, Art Garfunkel, Fleetwood Mac, Earth, Wind & Fire, Leo Sayer, Boney M, Beethoven, Mozart and Sam Hui. Given those musical influences, it’s no small wonder I turned out emotionally balanced and relatively normal. (Or did I?)
The Audiophile Awakening
The audiophile bug bit me when I stumbled upon an old Hi-Fi Annual from the now-defunct Asia Magazine at a Berita Bookstore warehouse sale. The magazine was filled with insightful articles on high-fidelity sound and reviews of top-tier audio systems of that year. One particular article claimed that every true audiophile’s dream is to recreate, as faithfully as possible, the experience of live music.
That got me thinking– I had never actually heard a live orchestral performance (aside from school recitals, which I don’t think really count). Determined to understand what “live” truly sounded like, I attended a classical music performance by a traveling youth orchestra. Even in the sonically challenged Dewan Tun Hussein Onn at PWTC, I was completely blown away.
It reminded me of that scene in Amadeus where Salieri first hears Mozart’s clarinet concerto—a moment of pure sonic seduction. The music transcended mere notes, becoming intangible ethers of absolute beauty, stirring emotions and soothing the soul. But at the same time, I felt a deep frustration—no matter how much I tinkered, my setup at home could never replicate that live sound.
The Struggle for High-Fidelity Sound
Lacking the financial means to upgrade my system, I survived on compact cassettes—though I had to stick a toothpick on the pinch roller of my tape deck to slow it down (because it played everything slightly too fast). FM radio became another go-to source for music.
Later, thanks to Bob, a fellow audiophile, I managed to get a mini-compo (a term that still gives me shivers), which—crucially—had a CD player. My very first CD? Enigma’s debut album. I played it over and over and over again, mesmerized by the hiss-free, crystal-clear sound.
Adding a CD player to my basic hi-fi system was a small step—perhaps just one out of a thousand—toward achieving live music realism. But it was a step that opened up an entirely new world of sound.
The Audiophile Cycle
But I digress. To cut a long story short, my passion for high-fidelity sound became cyclical.
At its peak, I had a Marantz CD-5000 CD player, a NAD C320 integrated amplifier, and Tannoy Mercury MX1 speakers. At its lowest point, I convinced myself that iPods sounded fantastically natural, and I swapped my Tannoy speakers for a pair of Audio Pro Focus SA-5 floor-standing AV speakers—mostly because they had booming low bass, much like (dread of all dreads) an Ah Beng’s car audio setup.
Next Stop: SACDs, DVD-Audio, and Vinyl