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Collectible Audio Equipment


orionflood

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Application to audio as a whole are there any old or new audio equipment that may hold their value well say as collectibles? I'm looking to start collecting audio gear. Of course I'm looking no further than some of the old Neumann microphones but I am unsure whether or not they will hold their value over the next couple of decades. From what I know microphone capsules need to be re-sensitized and they no longer support old Neumanns so they have to redo the capsules with new modern ones. Does anyone know of things that may hold value from days past or present? Thanks!

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Very old Western Electric tube amps and mixers, RCA 77DX ribbon mics, Nagras. Who knows but old Audio Developments mixers could become collectible one day, so I can unload one. I invested in gold shares, so what do I know? ;-) it's a market, timing can be everything. Hard to predict what people will care about in the future. The nice thing about the old stuff is it's repairable, pour milk into your Macbook it's value will be zero. I'm still looking for Ampex suitcase speakers with 6v6 tube amps built in, but prices seem high. I have 160 10 inch reels of tape 1/2 track stereo with a music library on them, no interest on Kiijii, along with a mostly rebuilt Revox A77, no interest in it either. You might be better to buy property in Detroit. Buy low sell high, seems to me some old gear is too high.

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Hard to say what will hold its value and grow when it comes to old gear. I never thought old Macintosh tube amps would continue to get more expensive. All pre CBS Fender guitars and amps keep getting more valuable but they are also still used by people. Not sure my vintage Nagra 3, 4.2, and STC, and Sela and Cooper 106 (1st gen) mixers will ever go up in price but one never knows. I use the Cooper in my home studio as a front end to ProTools. I love the sound and eq of it. The other stuff is just cool looking memories.  My guess is old mics will keep and increase their value more than the other items I listed.

CrewC

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orion: " So I take it no one "invests" in audio equipment to help with taxes while also using said products? "

huh??

where did this come from??

equipment is a business "investment", and as we use it we depreciate it (or expense it)... according to the advice of our tax professionals...

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I think Nagras will go up in about 10 to 15 years------because of there importance and beauty.

 

 

                                                                                                             JD

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Depends how collectable (where it's been, who used it, who it recorded) IMO, anyway.

I had opportunity to buy (at almost scrap metal price) a music console that had started in the UK - some Beatles stuff before it found its way to Australia; then loads of amazing Oz bands. I was going to buy it to turn it into a glass topped coffee table (yes) until I was told exactly how big and how heavy it was and realized I couldn't fit it in my upstairs apartment. Still wish I had bought it.....

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Unless you are an expert in the particular item you are collecting I wouldn't count on it being investment worthy. All it takes is a transformer to be non original and the perceived value plummets. With vintage guitars every wire, tuner, screw matters.

I would advise to collect as a hobby and if the things you acquire appreciate in value it's an added bonus. It is impossible to forecast what items will become true high ticket items. I worked at a rock n roll memorabilia shop and it is the things that were never meant to be collected that become the most valuable due to scarcity. Combine that scarcity with future demand and bam we've got a hot ticket.

Even with vintage guitars the bubble has burst. Some stuff comes in and out of vogue.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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i operate a music recording studio that's built/based upon vintage gear that i accumulated mostly in the 90's and it's doing well. lord knows i couldn't afford most of the same gear now.. much of it has doubled or tripled in value since then and is now quite pricey.. i'm talking about vintage tube mics especially, high end compressors and other discrete or tube-based outboard. the only things that really depreciate are cabling, patchbays, and computer.

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I collect and restore production and broadcast gear, and have restored many Nagras.  I also do alignment. I've never been properly tutored in the procedure, relying mostly on previous experience with other professional decks, the Nagra service manual, and trial/error. I particularly enjoy doing cosmetic restoration.  Here's an STC that had substantial battery corrosion damage, before and after.post-1426-0-95765000-1407534622_thumb.jppost-1426-0-80880700-1407534623_thumb.jp 

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Back when the Japanese synths came on the market, people offloaded their old analog stuff and I bought an EMS Synthi AKS in Denmark Street, London, for £150 - about $300 back then. I've still got it and used it a couple of weeks ago and was quite surprised to find that they're rather collectible these days.

When Abbey Road had a huge sale a few years later, the two Studer J37s from Studio 2 went for £500 a piece, and included a 4 track copy of the Sgt. Pepper master. I was late to the auction and missed out, not that I had the room for one, but I didn't really consider that. I bought a Teac 3440 for about the same money in the end: more practical, but it didn't hold it's value.

John

 

post-2730-0-70219200-1407591849_thumb.jp

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EMS Synthis never really went out of style--too unique and too embedded in pop and electrono music culture.  I wish I'd had one back in the day, I wish I had one now!  There's an old story that Brian Eno's Synthi A had become broken and intermittant in some ways that he loved and some ways that he hated.  He apparently had long convos with the techs about exactly what aspects they were to fix and what aspects he'd kill them if they touched.

 

pverrando--great job on the corroded Nagra case--how do you do that?   Can you fix the big top-gasket on the lid?

 

philp

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