Why pay so much for super high end?

Well put, guys...all y'all....

To be fair (and believe me, I do try...in my way), if you can afford The Quest, your predilections and tastes, carry on.  'State of the Art' is up to those who can appreciate it and afford it.  Bluntly, I can't the latter.  The bulk of my time, energy, and what it generates goes into the business that my spouse and I own.  I tinker in what spare time I can steal with what interests and amuses me on what perhaps might be viewed as Quixotic, making what one acquaintance called 'steampunk speakers'....which I thought was rather apt.  Considering that they sprung from 'cast-offs', this 'n that, a small investment of capital, and a larger investment of time, study, and thought....

Like a parent with a child with 'difficulties', I'm still rather proud of them.  Even with their known and obvious flaws and shortcomings, They Work.  With some selections and a tad of eq, I'd bet I could make some of you pause, if only for the moment.  Working on improving them beats hanging out in a bar,  watching sports that don't appeal, or attending 'functions' with people I have nothing in common with.  I 'hang out' Here because we Do have something in common in a general way, the love of music of various sorts, and the reproduction of it in a fashion that agrees with our tastes.

mb1audio, if you don't like surround, OK.  If class A is your thing and D stands for Dull, Dumb, or a Disaster, cool.  If that cart in your TT costs more than my entire system, well...that's your call and your cash and go forth.  IMHO 'extremism' in audio beats the 'ell out of a lot of other 'tastes' that seem to be prevalent of late.  Y'all can fill in that blank with what may bother you personally...

Do what you want to do.  I do.  I realize that one's posts arise from their opinions and observations, their tastes and preferences, and their situations.  Some may consider me some odd version of a troll, and that's fine.  I don't come around to pester or make fur fly for the frivolity of it.  I lurk mostly, getting some 'education', and noting that price still doesn't guarantee  'perfection', pretty baubles can still be ultimately be polished rocks, and hopes still get dashed...although that realization can sometimes take awhile to dawn.

Please do carry on. *S*  I'll just step back into the shadows again....and watch the show.... ;)

" Begin with a good two channel system, like ESL's. Double the Left and Right speakers, mounting them at an angle dictated by your room. Right angles are a good place to start. Right away one hears something like an MBL with clean, fast bass.

Now add two more ESL's in the back, for surround. Best is to blend the Right and Left signals, but that's not absolutely necessary. What is necessary is a volume control. Set the volume control to the highest level which cannot be discerned in the listening position. That provides the concert hall ambiance without the source confusion."

As it stands, I'm pretty happy with my current system. I've had several pairs of ESL's so I'm familiar with how they sound. The issue I have with surround, is that I don't think its necessary.

This is how I see it. If you play a recording of an instrument on a 2 channel system (piano, sax, whatever), your system puts the image between the speakers. Now, lets say you have someone play the same instrument live in your listening room. They would be placed in the same spot where your stereo put the image. We all know the room will have an impact on SQ. Whatever effect the room has on the live instrument, it should have on the reproduced instrument. If you now through surround into the mix, you're forcing a different type of interaction than what you had with the live instrument. Unless I'm missing something, it would appear that surround takes you further away from the recording, than closer to it.  

As somebody who plays instruments and runs live sound for small venue shows, I beg to differ on some points bandied about here (are they being bandied? I'm not sure but whatEVER). Speakers project sound through drivers pointed someplace (remedies for this notwithstanding for this particular rant) while instruments project sound all over the place and vary infinitely in output, let alone direction. Stand in the middle of my listening room and play guitar, then play my speakers playing that guitar (I can and have recorded live "house concerts" in my listening room using expensive and arguably accurate mics). Utterly different, both good, and both musical. Since I can't get Vijay Iyer to play in my house, or fit an entire orchestra in here, my system does the job well enough for me to really enjoy this stuff anyway.

" Speakers project sound through drivers pointed someplace (remedies for this notwithstanding for this particular rant) while instruments project sound all over the place and vary infinitely in output, let alone direction. "

I don't see that much of a difference. If you stand behind a pair of speakers you can still hear them just like you can stand behind someone playing an instrument. In either case, if you want the best sound, you need be in front. 

Also, I assume you're talking about traditional box speakers. Bipolar speakers, like my old Mirage M1's will most likely project more sound from behind than is realistic.

" Stand in the middle of my listening room and play guitar, then play my speakers playing that guitar (I can and have recorded live "house concerts" in my listening room using expensive and arguably accurate mics). Utterly different, both good, and both musical."

I understand what you're saying, but I think you missed the point I was trying to make. If you were to switch back and forth between someone playing a live instrument and a recording, would stereo be a better choice, or surround? We all know that no one is going to mistake a live instrument for reproduced. I just don't see where surround would be a better choice. 

@mb1audio I kind of had this discussion in a thread with Kal Rubenstein of Stereophile.

To my ears the biggest benefit to multi-channel sound is the addition of the center channel. It fixes a problem of your head blocking certain frequencies. Have you ever noticed that a violin will sound bright on the sides, but duller near the center? This is exactly that problem. I don't really care about surround content though. :)  Try listening with headphones and you'll hear this problem goes away.

If you have an Oppo or similar try Neo6 music mode.

As I recall, a lot of the early classical "stereo" recordings were actually 3 channel, so there's some interesting reading to do on the attitudes and recording practices as well.