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Which area of components to spend the most $ on? Boy I was wrong all my life!

I have been an audio junkie for about 25 years. All those years, I have read plenty of discussion posts and recommendations where to spend the most money on. The majority, even the experts recommend to spend the most money on speakers. Up to as high as 60% of the total budget.Example: CEO of PS Audio-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYwL7vPkPhg
I believed this all my life. Today, my eyes are opened. My total budget is about $15K.Before today, my system was:Speakers-Revel F36 Concerta 2 (For the money, this is the best speakers I’ve heard. I like it more than my previous Dynaudio Contour 30)Integrated Amp-Marantz PM-10 (Class D, balanced, 400wpc at 4ohms)CD Player-Oppo UDP 205 & Marantz CD 6005 (Some of the best in class)Line conditioner-Furman Elite PFi 15Cables-Kimber 8TC Speaker Cables (Sorry, not a cable nut. I’d rather spend money elsewhere)
I upgraded my front end CD player to... Marantz SA-11S3. I was BLOWN away! This is the greatest upgrade I have ever heard in my life. For 25 years, I was taught to spend the most in speakers. Sorry! It’s the FRONT END! The best source you can afford. The purity transcends down the river. I am blown away by the sheer improvement in detail, clarity, depth, the air around the instruments.
My philosophy has changed.
skimrn
oddiofyl's avatar
oddiofyl
3,797 posts
 
This was a great thread, I had replied earlier but it never posted.....  I believe the source and preamp are for most people the most important items in the chain.  Speakers are obviously important ,  but I have had many speakers that sounded markedly better as the quality of the components upstream improved.   Speakers in general are so good now that you can take a really good $2k speaker and it sounds pretty good with modest electronics.  Pair it with a really good amp / pre , or integrated that's $5k or $6k plus a $2k or $4k source and in many cases it brings that speaker to a different level...  same speaker but great electronics.  

So the question I have is how many speakers have been swapped in the quest for better sound , only to be a lateral move?
dave_b's avatar
dave_b
3,159 posts
 
The Police offer us some insight regarding our Audio Obsession:

With one breath, with one flow
You will know
Synchronicity

A sleep trance, a dream dance,
A shared romance,
Synchronicity

A connecting principle,
Linked to the invisible
Almost imperceptible
Something inexpressible.
Science insusceptible
Logic so inflexible
Causally connectible
Yet nothing is invincible.

If we share this nightmare
Then we can dream
Spiritus mundi.

If you act, as you think,
The missing link,
Synchronicity.

We know you, they know me
Extrasensory
Synchronicity.

A star fall, a phone call,
It joins all,
Synchronicity.

It's so deep, it's so wide
Your inside
Synchronicity.

Effect without a cause
Sub-atomic laws, scientific pause
Synchronicity


shadorne's avatar
Ag insider logo xs@2x
shadorne
7,477 posts
 
@dave_b


Thx. Great post. Reminding me that Sting is such an intellectual. In these lyrics he really expresses the connectedness we all feel at times. I am as far from being a hippie as it gets but I still sense the connectedness in absolutely everything.

“The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself.”
― Carl Sagan

or, interestingly you can replace Cosmos with DNA (curiously DNA is similar and largely shared between disparate life forms)

“DNA is within us. We are made of DNA. We are a way for DNA to know itself.”

That everything is connected is a universal law. Music is a language that well expresses this form of spirituality that is so hard to express in words. Written and spoken languages are mostly about our materialistic world (for practical reasons - “pass the peas please”). Music is consequently such an important and higher art. 

dave_b's avatar
dave_b
3,159 posts
 
We are the universe become aware!  BTW, Sagan was one of my idols growing up.  Own all his books...he was truly inspired.
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 
He may have been inspired but his idea for Jodie Foster’s character to travel to Vega in the book and movie Contact via a black hole was totally screwed up. Fortunately Kip Thorne convinced him that wouldn’t work out too well.
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