Is it important to long demo or own HIGH END gear to have a fair accurate view about it?

Impossible to hear all high end gear; have to depend on other's opinions and manufacturer's fluff. OP reveals a problem with those whose $10 beats the sucker's $100. A tiresome activity. Must someone always win? Mike's adroit inclusion of passion assumes commitment and investment. Many are limited and few have a barn. But I still sing along in my car and it's horrible audio.

I am making strides with my main system, but accept its limitations as honestly as I can.

@mijostyn 

 Most differences that some audiophiles gush over are really quite minor or maybe even psychological.

Do you mean for high end gear? Or any? I hear (or imagine to hear :) ) profound differences with amplifiers.

Like all of us, I have pondered where does high end start?  Is my H390 high end or does it start with Krell, Boulder or Dan D’Agostino?

My Brother, still happily listens to his tunes from the quarter inch speakers in his IPhone and thinks I’m nuts for having spent all that money on my rig. So I guess to him, my gear is high end.  To me it’s just the best that I could afford.

Well I jumped off this tilt-a-whirl a while ago. High end audio is all what you interpret it to be.  For me it is not about high end it is about the sound I enjoy, not status. Not sure where it starts but I know where it ended in my house. 

People who haven’t heard a component shouldn’t have an opinion on how it sounds. Price has nothing to do with it. If it’s too expensive for you then don’t buy it. The fact that it exists at all means someone can afford it. 
I used to find value in forums thinking they represented a collective mind. In other words, if there were enough people saying the same thing about a product then there must be some value in the observation, versus say an opinion from a single reviewer. Nowadays, not so much. There’s too much input from too many people who haven’t the experience to comment, but they do anyway. It isn’t just the Dunning-Kruger effect, it’s people being mischievous or propagating an agenda. 
 

Merry Christmas!