What should I upgrade next?

Sorry but I still disagree with you " speaker first " people. Since I am a experienced technician employed by the largest broadband company in the world. I can accurately tell you that " garbage in is definitely going to give you garbage out " It is quite obvious if you use the cable television signal as an analogy to the signal your speakers will get. If we receive a poor signal from our satellite, when then feed that poor signal into our head end equipment, them our head end needs to do more work to process and amplify a already poor signal. Then it is sent out to our fiber nodes, which sends it to our amplifiers. The poorer the signal the more work our amplifiers need to do, to give the appropriate amount of signal, which then travels to the customers tap. Which then goes through a splitter, and eventually ends up at the customers TV. I should also add that as signal travels it degrades, and loses strength. Hence the need of our amplifiers, and yours in your system for that matter.

Now, think of the cd or LP as the satellite sending the signal. Think of the head end as your source cdp or turntable. The preamp as your fiber node, the amp as our cable amplifiers and so on. If your following me then you know the end result of my analogy, your TV ( in my analogy ) is the same as your speakers in your stereo systems. If my cable signal at my TV sucks, it is not going to do me any good to go out and by a high end digital TV and expect my picture to improve drastically. In fact my new TV will only show me how bad my signal really is. So tell me, how is it possible to upgrade your speakers and expect a noticeable improvement in you system? If the rest of the system is garbage, you will only hear your garbage better.

I rest my case.............

Let's try a little example here. Given $3-$4k to spend on this system let's say you can put it into the source or the speakers. I don't care what source you put into this system, my contention is that I'd much rather hear this current system through a pair of Silverline Sonatinas or Vandy 3A sigs than the ADS speakers with an Ikemi or even a used Audio Aero(same would hold if the amp or pre were replaced instead). Get the speakers right and the rest will follow. Improving electronics will surely improve what you hear out of your speakers, but they cannot change the physical design and overall character of a speaker(hence the example above), which is why you should get that right first. Best of luck.

Tim

KT88 is repeating a well known, and logical, premise. In real life though, your system transformation will unfold much more rapidly if you buy first rate sensitive speakers first. Only by doing that will you understand the monstrously poor system you now own. I have $6,400 invested in a reference system. That is not much more than two year's allowance for you, Lance. Except for the cd player, I bought everything used, and everything but the cd player has made the Stereophile Class A short list (KT88 must be wincing).

After the amp pre/amp and speakers are near perfect, all the smallest nuances exhibited by various front ends come out loud and clear. Now, I know the cd player is my worst link (but not bad at all). To help in my search for a repacement, I just hosted a bring your own front end party, and this is what one contester had to write afterwards:

"Your system is by far the most neutral I've heard in a home. Any change to front end is so immediately noticed that I feel comfortable that the rest of the system is simply getting out of the way."

The moral is, listen to sensible advice offered by war weary audiophiles, and not sales people. Buy only afer careful thought, and audition in your home, if you can. That way you can avoid common audiophile pitfalls like, for instance, trying to fix an offending amp with expensive cable rolling.

Jolida 100 cd player ($900)
Pass Aleph P pre amp ($1,600)
Pass X150 amp ($2300)
Apogee Duetta Signature full range ribbon speakers ($1,600)
Total ($6,400)

I want to make one additional point as to why, IMHO, I think an audiophile looking to upgrade everything should start at the speakers and work back from there (see my lengthy post above). Kt88 isn't incorrect in his GIGO argument (as I acknowledge above), it's just that a source-first approach, while maybe in some instances sheilding one's ears from stuff about your present system you'd rather not know, does not lend itself as well as the approach I'm advocating to the total process of system improvement. Above, I go into detail on two primary reasons why this is so, summarizable as: 1) The speakers chosen are going to have the most influence on, and the most interaction with, those elements of one's listening environment and listening preferences that are least amenable to errors in the selection, or least likely to undergo change during the system-building process, such as family considerations, the properties of the listening room, and types of music listened to; 2) Ideally, system-building will be best accomplished if one can perform meaningful auditions of gear under consideration in the context of one's own home listening environment and system, and this requires a "clear window" provided by revealing and resolving end-of-chain gear to aid in evaluating preceding components in the chain. I also stressed the importance of making a proper match between the speakers and the amplifier chosen to drive them as the most important subsystem within the chain when it comes to gear selection, with the speakers coming first, and then an appropriate amplifier chosen to complement them.

In response to the other suggestions about starting with sources, though, I'd like to point out one other advantage of my approach. An average system has, usually, just one end-of-chain subsystem (speakers, amplifier, speaker cable) and one middle-of-chain subsystem (amplifier, preamplifier, interconnects), but may have more than one source subsystem present (DAC, transport, interconnect) (phono preamp, cartridge, turntable, interconnect) (tuners) (A/V processors) (analog recorders) (digital recorders). Since an audiophile will basically always be listening through the same end-of-chain/middle-of-chain subsystems, it makes more sense to choose one's source components through auditioning that will account for the sonic traits of the rest of the system, rather than the other way around. If one began with the source subsystems individually, by the time the chain was completely upgraded to the end, the listener might well find that system synergy between the source subsystems chosen and the middle- and end-of-chain choices that followed was somewhat hit-or-miss. In other words, this ordering could promote good matching between, say, the CD subsystem and the rest of the system, but fail to accomplish the same with the analog vinyl subsystem - both source subsystems haven been already chosen prior to getting around to, say, the speakers. By starting at the end and working back, one is much more in control when it comes to selecting only gear that will ultimately create an equally synergistic balance between all subsystems present throughout the chain when completed.

I thank all of you for your input. Listening to all your suggestions is why I am have the next step problem trying to better my system. After all this I think I am heading toward doubling my budget $2000-3,000 used and buying speakers. Electrostatic most likely among the leading candidates Maggie 3.5-3.6. Then going to Pre-amp tube in the winter. Next summer the amp.

Keep the comments and suggestions coming, I am not firm on anything yet!