Does hearing the best in high end audio make your opinions more valid?

Elizabeth I agree. When properly matched there won’t be a 10 times improvement. To get great drivers, design, build quality and R&D it’s going to take spending a decent amount to get the really good stuff. Some people just have not heard the cream of the crop in equipment. The reference point they have is sometimes nowhere near what some have heard.  For example I heard the Raidho 5.1 with all soulution electronics and ansuz cabling. It was in a home listening cottage measured perfectly and the Raidho people came over to the states to do the set up in person. Best I ever heard in my life.  Sounded so good I don’t want to hear it again. They had to put me out I wanted to stay so long. Intoxicating, airy, great detail, no harshness, perfect soundstage big, great image placement, airy highs, open wide midrange, deep tight low bass. Granted this was an all out assault system worth about 600k retail.  But it is the best I heard and I heard it in extended sesssions on 3 occasions.  That kind of reference point is priceless in the hobby. Showed me what reproduction was possible of. The sound is in my head so when I listen it’s locked in.  Now can you get that out of a 60k system I doubt It.  I have a system 35k retail and I have heard systems all over.  Mines is put together pretty good and I have heard systems that cost 60 to 70k that mines will run with but after that if you get the right equipment and set up my system can’t run past that amount.  The proper high end stuff is just that good and some folks have no idea

Measured performance versus cost levels off alarmingly early with cables, amps, digital sources. Especially if you were under the impression that you were paying extra for gains in measurable performance. Once you’ve seen one CAD CDP or SS amplifier frequency/distortion chart, you’ve seen them all.

Even turntable analysis is heading that way as the recent Technics decks gave demonstrated. PC hardware is rapidly going that way with the adoption of SSD drives, similar with phones as the iPhone X fiasco demonstrated (unless you specifically wanted a handheld games console with a sub 6 inch screen).

It can be like a mountain climb trying to upgrade your hi-fi. By the time you near the summit the effects of altitude sickness and snow blindness seek to destroy whatever rationality you had left.

You could then easily find yourself heavily out of pocket lost and disoriented in a place of little consensus. Your erstwhile friendly sherper / dealer nowhere to be seen.

Audiophiles and Wine Tasters of the world unite. We have much in common with our Sommelier brothers. For some strange reason, not many of our sisters seem to share our passion.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wine_tasting

To be clear, take retail price of a very expensive components and put them together with out much thought vs. buying equipment that is great value, get it used and then spend time researching and experimenting  to make sure the components have synergy together and then do some upgrades like replacing capacitors.  This takes time, years.  What do you think the price difference would be.  My main point is there is a large variance across systems in terms of performance vs price.