When is your system good enough-and why?


Frank van Alstine once suggested that this should be measured by how much time you actually spent listening to your system (not Frank's exact words, but my summary). When the sense of pleasure of the "rightness of the sound" is added, I agree it is an excellent yardstick. I have traded many systems that gave me great pleasure for more capable ones that did not. My listening time invariably plummeted.
Many have replaced tube based systems that were wonderful at low volume but failed at so called "realistic" volumes or with demanding material, with solid state replacements did the demanding material, but never delivered the pleasure of it's predecessor. I wandered about for years before discovering some of the particular characteristics that made all the difference to me (tubes, surprisingly were not among them). Rather than recite my list (and perhaps have to defend it), I would like to take the coward's way out and ask others what they have discovered matters to them sufficiently to make their system "good enough".
128x128samujohn
IMHO, your system is "good enough" when you stop listening to the components and find yourself listening to the music.

I have achieved this with my current system. While it may not be everyone's cup o' tea, I feel that I can finally sit back for a few years and simply enjoy the sounds it puts forth...

-RW-
When you cannot remember the last time you visited the "For Sale" page of audiogon...
when you are not on this site, ordering and reading audio rags and thinking of the next step, and if you ever thought about a new amp, pre, speaker and so on only to dismiss it because it will cut into your new music budget......your gear is good enough.
I guess mine is good enough since I haven't done any upgrade for more than two years.