"The Ultra High-End Speaker."

I have heard a number of rooms built from the ground up as audio rooms with full blown complete room treatment.  Even with such rooms, subjective impression of the rooms vary greatly.  Most of such rooms were, to me, disappointing—too dry and analytical sounding with bleached out harmonics.  
 

The best was a $250,000 room designed by an acoustic architect.  That room did not look like it was treated because most treatment was hidden behind the wall coverings, including the truly giant bass traps in all four corners.  The front wall had a very large convex wood diffusor that looked like room decoration, not treatment.  But, even this room, which I liked, got mixed reviews.  Two of my friends did not like the sound and both are audio professionals.  So much of good sound IS subjective.

A good treated room can cost many thousands of dollars. But the thing is, even if you spend tens of thousands building your room with all the acoustic treatments with the right dimensions, a cheap stereo will still sound cheap.

False.... A purpose built room+a sizeable investment in treatments that actually work can drastically reduce the perceived performance gap (and all associated metrics of audiophilia) between high end gear and relatively affordable gear.

For example, I could demonstrate to guys like you how a 60k speaker and a 1k speaker sound in the same room (one of my rooms)...a good one with about 40k to 50k worth of treatments that work, i.e. how close it starts to get.

Of course, if such truths get demonstrated too much, the "high end" sales guy (which is maybe half the forum) may start to freak out that his sales numbers could suffer. But then again, he need not worry...because most audiophiliac dudes love to buy a few hundred thousand dollars worth of gear, plop it down in a sht house and hope for miracles anyways. Such dudes may usually buy 2 doofus panels, put it up in a couple of spots for decorative purposes and claim that their room is treated! Hence, the high end sales guys has nothing to worry about...high end sales will be great as usual. All is good in the world...Amen.

The Salon’s are great speakers but they’re not the peak of the speaker designer’s art.

I don’t think that you can get the measure of a speaker at a show or dealer’s shop. I think you have to live with them for a while. Especially the ultra-high-end type. Your ears or brain have to adjust to them.

If someone like @mikelavigne is willing to put the money AND the time and effort into an ultra-high-end system, I think he can probably build one that sounds noticeably better than yours, no disrespect intended. Diminishing returns will surely also be noticeable, but if someone has the money and wants a system and room that’s the best he can buy, I don’t have a problem with that.

There seem to be a lot of posts on this forum that imply or state that high-end audio or some aspect of it is a scam or that everybody should listen to a system like the poster’s or at least one based on what the poster has found works for him. I think we all hear differently, have different tastes, have different listening rooms, have different budgets, different wives 😁, etc. and that is why we all have different systems.

I say live and let live, and that’s just my opinion.

OP  I honestly believe that my system (speakers) produce that ultra high-end, reference quality sound.

Do you have any uploaded live recording of your system? I love to hear it. Alex/Wavetouch

My system live recording => Pink Floyd – Time - David Gilmour, Wavetouch audio, Live recording

Edith Piaf - Non, je ne regrette rien, Wavetouch audio - Live recording

Ultra High end? Borressen 05 SSE, the best speakers I have ever heard,
Stenheim 05 SE, Estellon X Diamond Mk 11, Gauder Berlina RC9. Any one of those are my endgame speakers.