What's your profession? Age?

If I see nowadays prices, my system would be around 50K$
which I consider ridiculous. If I paid half of that amount, it would be a lot.
I am still a violinist, my love is in violins and bows (!!),
Age by now (still bang in the middle of statistics) 43..

Damn....I just realized that I'm now 10 years older than when I first responded to this thread. Getting old sucks.

Dang, John. I didn't think we'd be hearing from you anymore. Are you back? If so, I hope you are well and yes, it's good to see you back. (o:

Interesting thread! I always thought people with $20k+ systems were wealthy MD/Biglaw/Exec type people, but there's a lot variety in professions here, although the middle-to-advanced-aged male stereotype seems to hold true. Now I don't feel so guilty with my relatively "modest" system. I should show my wife this thread, haha.

Me: 29 years old, "systems engineer" (computer) by title, sysadmin without the overblown label. Main rig is ~$11k retail, paid about $6.5k used. Bedroom system is $2700 retail, paid about half.

Then again, I upgraded to all this in the current year from a $1500 integrated/monitor setup while also getting married and having a baby, and my wife does not work, so maybe I should feel a touch of guilt. I think I'm done for a while though... except for maybe swapping gear that's lateral in price :D

I'm 45 and a finance director at an industrial firm. Two beautiful kids. I have a main system that retails for about $7k. Still upgrading but it sounds very good.

18 months ago I decided that I had better listen to all that music I had been putting off for years so I'm on a full-scale program, working my way through Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, moving gradually into his late period and will veer out of Austria and into France in the 19th-century for next year. Been listening to all kinds of music for 30+ years but wanted to be more systematic, which I'm finding to be a really interesting adventure. Just started getting into audiophile equipment a year ago after owning a decent mid-fi system and I have to wonder why I didn't do so earlier.