Which component is most responsible?

LOL! This thread is beginning to remind me of that old Why the rectum is the most important organ joke. ;)

Jmcgrogan2, haven't heard that one in a very long time, guess it's been around for years.

This thread is reminding me about reading this some time ago,

Put 10 audiophiles in a room to discuss a topic, and they will emerge with at least 11 different theories.

"12-18-13: Quad-man
I would rate in this order: The recording..source..pre-amplifier...amplifier....speakers.

The speakers are often the most innocent...unless they're not!

Another way to look at this: all in all the pre-amp in the most responsible."

Its good to see that so many people are giving preamps the credit they deserve. This wasn't always the case. Preamps are often overlooked when building a system. They're just as important as any other piece.

Your system is only as good as the weakest link. You are the weakest link! Goodbye!!!

Sometimes the owner is the weakest link. :o)

I just had this very experience in this past month. I was auditioning speakers, and had tried the Martin Logan Motion 40s, the Sonus Venere 2.5s, the GoldenEar Triton 7s, some 2001-isth McIntoshes, and Aperion T3s. But when my wife and I played Mendelssohn's "Elijah" cantata with full orchestra and 8-part vocal harmonies, the Magneplanaer 1.7s ran away from the pack. They were the only ones that easily tracked the 8-part vocal harmonies in the midst of a fullscale orchestra operating at … er … full scale.

I pay attention to sources, to phono and line level preamps, interconnects, and speaker cables. But they can't fix a lack of phase coherence, cabinet resonances, driver overshoot and ringing, driver-to-driver discontinuities, and in-room power response deficiencies from crossover-based suckout. Those belong to the speakers alone and can't be fixed by upstream components and cables.

The Magnepans are devoid of clarity-robbing enclosure resonances. Also, with their large radiating area and minimal excursion, they are also less vulnerable to inertia-based distortions. Maggies aren't the only speakers that address these problems; other panel speakers such as electrostatics offer the same strengths. Open baffle dynamic speakers, especially those with multiple tweeters and mids also have an advantage here, both in reduction of cabinet resonances and also minimal inertia-related distortions.

The point is, if you want lots of delineation in polyphony, speakers that rely on radiating surface vs. excursion have an inertia-based advantage over designs based primarily on diaphragm excursion.