Absolute top tier DAC for standard res Redbook CD

Thanks Bill. I am pretty much 100% positive the M1 I am getting in is the latest greatest kool aid.

Speaker hunt is progressing.

I need to pull all the damn wall to wall carpet I put in (I'm a dumb ass) and replace it with a faux-wood vinyl floor. The room is too damn warm. I think my love seat may be an issue as well, but I'm going to replace the floor ASAP. Then I can decide about the couch.

Current speakers I'm auditioning and will be in my room concurrently to directly compare:
- Vienna Acoustics - Der Muzik
- Hansen - Prince E
- Boenicke W8SE+
- Lawrence - Double Bass
- Marten - Coltrane Tenor

Fun fun fun!!!!

Matt, since we are taking statement Loudspeapers, let's not forget: LumenWite Silverflame

Not cheap at £25K retail though

http://lumenwhite.com/silverflame_d_uk.html

" poland´s www.highfidelity.pl, one of europe`s most active high end audio webzines grants lumen white`s muenich high end 2015 show exhibit their "best sound of high end 2015" award.
=====================================================
german high end magazine "hoererlebnis" features a detailed review of the"silver flame" monitors in their december 2007 issue, concluding:

"the lumen white silver flame monitor`s sonic superiority set them instantly apart from all other loudspeakers we know and let them win the hearts of all those, who love music."

key quotes from the review:

"the sound of the lumen white has a captivating, unbelievable ease, purity and airiness.

the music appears instantaneously, as if out of nowhere, in the listening room, free from any kind of colorations and cabinet resonances".

this quality caused instant fascination when the first lumen white speakers appeared years ago and here is the same fascination again. it also may be one of the reasons for the unprecedented success, which the brand has garnered around the globe."

"in smaller listening rooms, the speakers, while significantly smaller in size, deliver low frequency extension close to that of the few significantly bigger loudspeakers in the world which are able to reproduce the lowest of the bass registers with wall shaking realism."

"their capacity to recreate the musical event in a realistic and holographic way in the listening room may indeed represent the very edge of the art at the limits of audio technology"

"their sound breathes true life, offering musical realism of a magnitude which in fact may prove impossible to surpass."

"one could literally "see" the violin player silently nodding her head in the direction of the pianist"

"the silver flames achieve perfect musical homogeneity and do so without any softening of precision or glossing over of fine detail.

details down to the most subtle spacial clue are presented, are present without sticking out, are reproduced as fully integrated parts of the whole gestalt."

"wherein lies the key to the exceptional and unsurpassed transparency, realism, and ease of the lumen white`s`sound?

is it their use of an identical membrane material over the whole frequency band? is it a result of the unique cabinet design with its "damping free" technology? and, what role does their elegantly simple, but uncompomisingly fine, crossover play in this context?

while we are not able to solve this mystery, what we know for certain is that the lumen white silver flame`s sonic superiority set them instantaneously apart from all other loudspeakers we know and let them win the hearts of all those, who love music."
====================================

http://www.hifinews.co.uk/news/article/lumen-white-silver-flame-pound;25000/7582

So why did the review give only a Sound Quality of 89% ????

Thanks Wisnon. I'll look into it.

I am, very interestingly, beginning to feel that although everyone tells me my room is "medium" sized, that I would get the best sound out of a much smaller speaker. Because it is a basement room with concrete floors, solid wood door and double sheetrock with visco-elastic glue and fully insulated walls and ceiling, the room pressurized very easily with no give - like being inside a Vault.

Part of my listening comparison is to determine which is better for my room: a larger multi driver speaker (like my Der Muzik or your suggested LumenWhite Silverflame) or a smaller fewer driver design like the Hansen Prince E, Coltrane Tenor or the downright petite Boenicke W8 or essential satellite sub system that is the Perfect8 Cube.

I seam to find that because my room is only 18.5' long I am having a hard time getting the speakers properly out into the room without me being pushed pretty close to the back wall; which is an issue because that's where the boom in the room is at its worst. It appears that rear ported speakers sound more boomy then front or bottom ported speakers, or sealed designs.

My gut is telling me that I will end up with something smaller then my Muzik's to suit the room best. I'm thinking Coltrane Tenor, Kharma Exquisite Galileo, Perfect8 Cube, Boenicke W8, etc. I think the mid size Schweikert VS-55, Vandy 7, LumenWhite Silver, Muzik, etc are going to prove themselves to be too much for my room.

Let's see.

Matt, I see what you mean. I once had a looong chat with a Swiss selling only high end manufacturer called ROWEN. They make enormously powwerful amps and innovative speakers with a 5 octave band dRiver and a hf DRIVER CALLED LMT - which is somewhat similar of the Heil tweeter. Look em up at www.rowen.ch

The 90 min long conversation informed me of how much they hated bass reflex technology and how they designed for Swiss homes that are vault-like with poured concrete being the default building material, as compared to wood and dry wall in the US. Plus Swiss homes are much smaller on average, so ideal speaker placement is more difficuult. This means they designed their speakers to work in sub-optimal locations and demonstrated this to me in the show room by putting obstacle around the speakers that normally would mess of the stero image. in their case, it made little to no difference in the "real world" speaker placements they showed. Impressive.

Lumen White have the Artisan and the Aquila as well. They are pioneers in the use of ceramic drivers, and have won best in show at CES in the past and at other places too. Their turntable is to die for as well - The Mystere $60K.
Check em out as well.