David, I simply recommend taking all the input to heart. And factor in bias to the extent possible. The closer the owner’s gear setup is to mine, the more I’m likely to weigh that contributor’s input favorably for the reasons set forth below.
Here is the problem as I see it. We all have different listening environments. We all have different gear setups, ranging from power conditioning (or not) to power cables to IC’s to gear and speaker cables (if needed for those not having active speakers, like I do for my ATC SCM20-2A’s which I love owing to their compactness) to speakers.
When I make posts to threads about specific gear, like I have about Jay’s Audio CDT2 MK2 transport on TeaJay’s thread, I list all the gear and accessories used in my opinion. Regrettably, the biggest factor, the acoustic space, is left out for obvious reasons.