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Are You Satisfied?

Consider this a poll. How many of you are actually happy with their existing system and have no plans on upgrading? This thread seems to go "against the grain" of most of the threads regarding upgrading, future upgrades, plans to upgrade, another upgrade, etc.

Are there any of you out there who have actually stopped the upgrading and now just spend their time listening? Not that I feel that upgrading isn't a fun part of the hobby. But, I think it's more a question of, have you finally reached a point where you see no reason to upgrade.

I recently upgraded my complete 2 channel system. This is the first time I have upgraded since about 1985. It took about six months of reading, evaluating and ultimately listening, to approximately a dozen seperate pieces of equipment before making my final purchase.

I could not be any happier. Based on my past performance, I will probably own this equipment for another 15 or so years.

Are there others of you out there that are satisfied enough with you system that you see no reason to upgrade or am I to be considered the "black sheep" or not the "norm"?
128x128buscis2
ghostrider45
449 posts
 
I think you hit on the real limiting factor in this hobby - time. I have a nice set up, and it sounds pretty good, but it's getting harder and harder to spend time with it.

First problem is competing activities such as work, kids, and church. The second problem is that what time I have left is fragmented.

To have a good listening session I need a minimum of 3 contiguous hours. That gives the amps time to come up to operating temperature (can't afford to run them 24x7), and allows for at least a couple of albums before quitting. It's not worth firing up the system for less than this.

On a weekend I might get 6 or more free hours, but they are rarely contiguous or even close to contiguous.

Logistically the best time to listen is late at night after the kids go to bed, but by then I'm exhausted. There's nothing worse than to have the system sounding great, but to find yourself picking up a CD case and looking to see when it's going to be over so you can go to bed.

So who's got the magic tweak for our schedules?
4yanx
1,576 posts
 
I don't think that upgrading and the enjoyment of music are necessarily mutually exclusive. While happy to listen to my system as is, I can always think of ways it might be improved. Then again, I don't lose sleep or satisfaction from listening to music while pining for upgrades. When one cannot enjoy what they have presently based on the notion of what could be, that is a sad situation.
twl
3,251 posts
 
I'm sticking with what I have for the time being. I always keep my gear for a pretty long time. I make some small upgrades and tweaks here and there, but I usually stay with my gear for several years.
jdombrow
371 posts
 
Yep, very satisfied. There are always a number of changes I'd like to try, but nothing that I need to do. I'm usually experimenting with various tweaks, and am getting reading to build some wall panels and bass traps, but the basic system sounds great.
budrew
467 posts
 
Yes, I'm satisfied and plan on keeping my components for a while. I'm tired of spending money and selling gear and frankly it sounds pretty darn good. My only wishes are an Electrocompaniet SACD player and a CD player for my headphone system that's great on both SACD and redbook (but my Marantz SA-14 is pretty good). My only concern is that my main system is tubed and we have kids on the way in the near future. I'm going to keep the tubed components, but if there are any problems I'll have to do something else. But to summarize, yes, I'm content, and I'm really enjoying some good music these days -- jazz, classical, and bluegrass/flatpicking. : )
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