High End System Building. How important is the matching, cabling and room? Thoughts ?


The last 20 years as an audiophile and now a dealer has taught me a very important lesson. Everything matters. The equipment can be great but no matter how much you spend the matching is very important. The cabling is also important. Some think cabling is all about making it sound better. I prefer my cabling to not get in the way. It’s like it can’t be a clogged faucet for your sound.  Materials and shielding are very important. In addition to that the room is very important. You may not have a perfect room but you build your system to work in the room you have. I don’t have all the answers but you can’t just spend money and have a great system. Combination of equipment, cabling and room has gotten me there. I’ve tried a lot of gear and cables and this is how I feel. What are your thoughts everyone? 

calvinj

@jacobsdad2000 now you are talking.  Some people think I’m dissing lesser equipment and that I’m dissing the importance of the room.  I have slowly climbed up the chain through the years.  I have seen cheaper systems with proper cabling and tweaks  that are matched correctly mollywop more expensive systems. Synergy is really where it all starts. But I have found that when you do have properly matched high end systems with proper cabling in the right room  that also have synergy it is truly sublime. Nothing against anyone’s set up but that’s my personal experience.  I have had access to a lot of great gear and I have learned how to get  really good performance out of said gear. 

There is a  false marketing tactic on the rise from the dealers these days. Dealer sez, "Hey, unsatisfied/disgruntled audiophile, I'll take the guesswork out of everything for ya. I will create the synergy of components for ya. You go plop it down in your room and magic just starts to flow like the Niagra. Just remember, that's the greatest perk of going to the knowledgeable dealer!!"

Really?? Let us explore that lie for a minute...How the flip did he create that "synergy" for ya again?? He put together a mix of components for a specific "synergy" that worked in his room! You take that synergistic wonder and plop it down in your room and it sounds nothing like what he heard in his room. His tastes are very different from yours. So ...even if he genuinely tried to build a synergistic rig for you, it will be way off in your room for your ears. 

Most often, his "synergistic build" is a list of sht that he either finds very hard to move (rarely sells) or some other sweet saucy deal he's got going with specific vendors. It is just business most of the time. Even if he forgot about maximizing his wallet for a minute and made a genuine effort to build a rig for you, he will be way off (in execution).

 

@mahgister as far as cabling is concerned. Pure silver works in your system. I have a ring radiator tweeter in my speaker. Pure silver using that tweeter in my experience doesn’t work well. Every little thing matters. In a folding tweeter silver works better. In a soft dome tweeter. Silver is even better. My tweeter reacts better with the best copper you can get your hands on. I have really studied my equipment and speaker choice to truly understand what my personal tastes for my signature sound for my music and system.one thing I have learned is that there are a lot of guys that think they are the smartest in the bunch.  They equate expensive cables as snake oil etc.  I literally allow people to try before they buy in most cases because I want them to be happy. We have had folks with cables way more expensive than ours demo them. Keep them and sell the other ones. I allow demos because as an audiophile I hate when I bought cable that didn’t work or a component that didn’t work and I was stuck with it. I do that based on my consumer experiences.  Anyone that wants to try them can hit me up. No pressure. But for someone who doesn’t know me talking.a bunch of babble calling the rest of us idiots because we believe in cabling and certain gear can say whatever they want but in my opinion can kick rocks. 

I don’t think anyone here has stated that anything matters more than the room.  What do you do when you can’t do anything about the room or very little or there are things you can do nothing about?  Getting another room is likely not a solution for most and a great system in a garbage room does not make it a garbage system.  Suggesting headphones is not helpful either, although it might be well intended. What do folks do when they can’t address the room correctly?  That was the question I thought was being asked here.