Kedoades,
I have, over the last two years, spent considerable resources on power supplies, interconnects, powerchords, power plugs and vibration control devices. In my system I have had surprisingly good results in doing so. In that time I have not changed out any components. I have found that power conditioners and powerchords have give the most impact in reducing digital glare. Next the vibration Control devices brought out a more organic guality in the music. The interconnect upgrades have also aided in further reducing the digital noise further, thus extracting even more musical detail.
The Total Contact upgrade provided a stunning across the board upgrade to all the previous upgrades to my main and office systems. This upgrade was one of the least costly of all the above mentioned upgrades save for the power plug change outs.
The cost of two Mats is just as an effective upgrade as The Total Contact and just as easily heard. I put the one that Tim sent me on my +/-15 year old CD player’s transport and it made it sound like a very decent analog rig. The second Mat, that I will pay for, was placed on the inside of the door to my breaker panel. Both systems improved subtlety during the first week and a half. At the two week point it really did improve both systems dramatically. Both systems are now sounding substantially less digital.
I hope this gives you anothers perspective on the value of the TC and Mat upgrades/tweaks.
Thanks,
rc