Optimize or buy new gear..?

i'll add to your comment with fix/treat your room. your room is half what you hear or more. 

I discovered the basic principle of minimal acoustic satisfaction level :

 

Upgrade the component to a good synergy level in relation to your budget...

We must buy a minimally well designed system to begin with ...

 

Then forget all others upgrade proposition especially the costlier one...

A---Begin to experiment with basic acoustics ( not only absorption-reflexion-diffusion but with Helmholtz resonators use) and psycho-acoustics concept ( crosstalk-crossfed mechanism etc ) ...

B---- Experiment with vibrations control...

C---- Experiment with electrical grid optimization and EMI control etc

D---- read about unusual "tweaks " for example Schumann generator but only after you had taken the stage A-B-C very seriously ...

 

Why this road is the only one ?

 

Because any evaluation of gear acoustic potential effects  had no value nor meaning in a speakers/ room which is not under your control, you cannot know the acoustic quality level of your experience in a non controlled system... Period...

Any other road is consumers programming by upgrade according to taste (subjectivists) or according to specs measures (objectivist)... But these upgrades by taste or measured specs made no sense or are illusory in a non controlled system , mechanically, electrically and acoustically ...

Because in a non controlled room with a non controlled system , there is no way for you to know the real potential S.Q level of your actual gear or the upgrade one, even if the upgrade is really a good choice ...This last fact induce people to be satisfied with no acoustic control of their room because their system satisfy them but they will ignore the the true quality level in an optimized speakers/room...

 

When this is done you are so happy you read no more publicity about audio, you listen music in ectasy and you pity most people with very costly system instead of envy or jealousy...

Why ?

Because even if my low cost system can be upgraded with a better one for sure (and i know with what and how) i am so proud of my actual S.Q. with a 1000 bucks system done right that i will not buy anything else just to prove that hi-fi satisfying experience cost nothing if we understand what to do ...

I learn it alone almost because most threads promote costlier upgrades nothing else...

I promote acoustics experiments ...

 

To me this is very much an it depends question. What gear do you have and what improvements in sound are you looking for. If you want a sea change cables and ancillaries may not get you there. But if your mostly happy they can get you that final step closer.

Cables is the last thing you must be interested in...

If not throw money in a useless well...

I say that not because i am not able to perceive differences in cables... I can...

But the difference compared to all other factors implied (mechanical,electrical,acoustical) is small ...

Then cables is a part of the consumers programming...

Take note as i said i am not an objectivist mocking audiophile buying cables, i know cables matter...But i am neither a subjectivist mind focusing on cables because he never study and experiment with accoustics or anything else ...

 

I had a similar experience with speaker cables.  I had gone through several sets of cables, none grossly expensive but all in the “several hundred dollars” range.  All sounded good, one or two modestly better than the others.  Then, several months ago, based on reviews, user comments, recommendations, and in light of the trial period, I ordered a set of Silversmith Fidelium speaker cables.  They were an instant “WOW!”  Better tonal qualities, better instrument location, much improved soundstage, and improvement in the bass reproduction, which was my major point of dissatisfaction with my speakers.  Even my wife, who enjoys good music but is not “in to” how it is achieved, remarked almost immediately on the improvements.  I was a bit of a skeptic on the impact of cabling … but not any more, for I have seen (heard!) how cables CAN make a difference.