washmymoose

My first boombox was a GE 3-5286A from December of 1982. The sound quality was surprisingly good - mids didn’t honk, and the treble was clear without being edgy. It was a little bass-shy for typical medium-size portable sound, but in fairness, probably the best way to describe the sound would be “balanced” - it clearly hadn’t been designed to impress with thumping bass. But it impressed in other ways. FM sounded particularly good, with impressive stereo separation for speakers that were less than 18 inches apart. Build quality for the most part was pretty solid. I was in middle school, and by that point I was heavily into music lessons of different kinds, and already had plans for a career in music. My parents gave it to me so that I could listen to different kinds of music on something that had decent sound quality, and also to be able to record myself (it had Dolby B, chrome and metal tape capabilities, fairly uncommon in a portable at that time, and inputs for external mics). It was usually on my homework desk, where it would play music - probably 80% classical, 10% jazz, and 10% typical 80s teenager music, for hours on end. The classical radio station in Colorado Springs, KCME at 88.7 (still broadcasting and now also streaming), was one of my primary music educators prior college.
Today, as a professional classical musician, that GE sitting there playing music day after day (and night after night) was part of the foundation for my music career. It left with me for college in Boston, though it wasn’t my primary stereo by that point. After college, I moved to Chicago for grad school. Even though I had been bitten by the “perpetual upgrade bug” with my main home component stereo, the GE boombox got more use in Chicago for some reason than it had in Boston. It was in Chicago (specifically, downtown in the Lyric Opera building) in 1993 that it met with an unfortunate accident. If I would have had the internet of today back then, I’m sure I could have found parts for a repair, or found someone to take it on as a project. But unfortunately, I just disposed of it. I still remember that it felt like saying goodby to an old friend. I can’t count the times since then that I’ve thought about it, and regretted getting rid of it. There were other boomboxes after that, but I kept them around for utility, not because I necessarily liked them: a JVC PC-W35 and a Sharp QT-CD114. Neither one of them was in the same league as the GE 3-5286A.
Now, I have my eye out for a 3-5286A clone (AKA), the Zenith R99. I like the Zenith’s appearance a little better than the 3-5286A, and since I’ve seen 2channelhero ’s mods, I want to do something similar. I think his work looks spectacular. I would also probably add Bluetooth, so I would be more likely to use it regularly. Hopefully, a restoration candidate will show up soon, and I’ll be posting some pictures. It would probably do some traveling with me (when I'm not traveling professionally), which these days means between Bailey, Colorado and Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

Primary audio system: Carver C1000 with Bluetooth mod, Arcam MDC, Sony RDR-HX715, LG BP350, Bang & Olufsen M100II speakers (modified with Aurasound “linkdrivers” - all other drivers original; rewired with LAT silver wire; WBT platinum binding posts; new caps throughout), Yamamura M5000 speaker cables; Straightwire, Esoteric Audio, and DH Labs Silver Sonic interconnects.

Office audio system: Nakamichi RE-1, Nakamichi CD-4, Bang & Olufsen S45-2 speakers (WBT platinum binding posts, otherwise unmodified), Furutech FS-303 Alpha speaker cables, Esoteric Audio interconnects.