Perfect Path Total Contact no longer?

mapman ...

• Of course one could listen to a system and drop dead in awe but to attribute that solely to the tweaks would still require a huge leap of faith

If you heard my system, you’d think that you had walked into an old-time Billy Graham revival tent. You’d be a convert in no time at all.

 Repent, anti-tweakers ... Repent! *lol*

Frank

Once you met Franklin Graham you would depent. 

For the record of course as OP well knows, I am not an “anti tweaker”. I’ve done quite a few of my own. Some work really well some not so much and everything in-between. I treat each case individually based on the specific merits and of course anything that helps tie a specific result to a specific part of the system.

Life is basically just a bunch of tweaks. 

But in any case the fact stands that it’s the whole system that produces the end result. There can be things in there that do nothing different or special which just means the system sounds as good or bad as it would have otherwise.


It can’t help anyone’s case to claim otherwise and attribute the end result solely to whichever part happens to strike one’s fancy for whatever reason at any particular time.

"If you heard my system, you’d think that you had walked into an old-time Billy Graham revival tent."

In that case, can we just listen to the boombox in the park?

mapman ...

Agreed. It is necessary to start with a good baseline. In my case, an ARC Reference amp, an ARC Reference preamp, and an ARC PH-8 phono stage.

Once nirvana has been attained through tweaking, only then can one really appreciate the genius that went into the design of the equipment, no matter the brand being used.

Without all of the tweaks added to the system, including, but not limited to, the PPT products, I thought it was a good system ... and it should have been based on the dollars spent.

After all of the various tweaks were installed and applied ... well, as you know, everything is an accumulation in an audio system. When it all comes together correctly, the realism is astounding. 

Frank