Second opinions — how have others (including non-audiophiles) helped you?

@audioguy85  Good for you. Not me. I need help expanding what I notice, from time to time. Even the best writers need a second pair of eyes, but if you're self-sufficient and happy, that's all that matters.

My wife has little interest in my audio hobby, so I usually don’t get into the details when I am upgrading or installing a tweak. Last week the Isoacoustics isolation feet I ordered arrived while she was at work. I installed them immediately and gave them a listen.I did all this while she was at work, not to hide the fact that I was doing it, that is just how it worked out. A few days later we were playing cards with friends in the kitchen with the stereo playing in the background. One of her favorite songs started playing and she started listening to the music. She looked over at me and said, "Did you change something with the stereo?" I asked why she would ask that and she replied, "Something is different, it sounds much better tonight." She was hearing the same thing I heard when I was critical listening after installing the Gaias. They made a profound difference in the sound of my system!

I'm 70 and still learning to "hear" a good system. When I upgraded to an air bearing turntable I heard an immediate difference, a "loss" of high frequency. It was a day later that I realized that the "high frequency loss" was really a loss of distortion.

Of course, my wife is the best critic of the system. Also, it's second biggest fan, which is more than fortunate.

I doubt that the University of Salford's School of Acoustics is much into audiophilia, but they nevertheless made a major contribution. They provided the dimensions and specs for my listening room.

"Gut feeling and conceptualization are polarities in the human being...Not dualities... Polarities"

"it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God".

Concepts are the baggage that doesn't allow those who cling to them to pass through the eye of the needle. I don't quibble with the polarity/duality distinction, but concepts require extension in time. To enter the kingdom of God you go naked and alone... no concepts allowed.

I value the input of others for several reasons, principal among them being that I can't audition in our system the number of equipment that it would take to efficiently effect improvement in our system.  I must rely on the kindness of strangers :)

The underlying predicate here is that strategic equipment matching can result in higher levels of convincingness with respect to the recreation of the recorded event in our living room...no less than the raison d'etre for us being here.

For me, the strategy of achieving the highest level of recorded event convincingness started with selecting a speaker with the highest potential to transmit the recorded event that I could afford and then build the system around the speakers in such a way as to prioritize transparency.  The underlying predicate here being that convincingness is a function of transparency...I acknowledge that it is a function of other factors as well, but transparency is certainly a primary factor.   I chose B&W Matrix 801 Series 2 with North Creek crossovers.  These speakers were described by Louis Lipnick in his Stereophile review as "ruthlessly revealing".  They're even more so with the North Creek crossovers.  So this is exemplary of me acting upon the input of someone else.

In the interest of transparency, I chose Bob's Devices Solid Silver interconnects.  Also in the interest of transparency, I chose Dodd Battery Powered Preamp.  Being battery powered, it is dead quiet and having only one half of a dual triode tube and one capacitor, well two actually, one that is bypassed, in the signal path, it is extremely transparent.  Stephaen Harrell in his 6 Moons review described the Dodd Battery Powered Preamp as having a "sunny disposition", by which he meant that audio details are highly illuminated, but at the cost of texture.  So this was another example of me acting upon the input of someone else.  I knew I could bring texture to the system with choices of tubes, capacitors and cables.  I got the Dodd to both detailed and textured by using Voskhod 6N23P tubes.  Thanks to Audiogoner petg60 for the recommendation of those.  Yet another example of me acting upon the input of others.     

Now to amplification: I worked with a brilliant builder who used a version of a design developed by Gary Dodd that utilizes 2 6BL7GT tubes as input and driver and 4 KT-77 output tubes per 90 watt, 75 lb. monoblock.  They use all Dueland Cu-CAST capacitors and 1 watt PRP resistors.  They are extraordinarily transparent amplifiers.  By using the GT version of the 6BL7 instead of the GTA version, I was able to bring the system to yet an even higher level of convincingness.  This was done upon the recommendation of the builder and resulted in increased vividness, flesh and organicness compared to the GTA.  Input from others again.

Clean power is important for transparency, therefore I bought a Dodd Balanced Power Supply to run the system off of...also recommended from the builder.  Amazing improvement in transparency.

Lastly, speaker cables.  I chose Silversmith Fidelium because they have, justifiably so, been lauded by many here...again, acting on the input of others.  They've been referred to in one way or another as the least colored speaker cables yet created...i.e. transparent.  They really tied the system together :) 

When you get right down to it, basically everything in our system was selected to some degree on the basis of input from others.  And it's a stunningly convincing system.  It routinely produces drug-like levels of endorphins and occasionally tears of joy.  And I have the input of others largely to thank for this.  Thank you others, couldn't have done it without you!!!