Ia a good amp more important than a good DAC?

Thanks, Unsound!

Though I'm in the "amp first" camp in this thread, I still feel the source is definitely important. In fact, critically important.

One trend this type of argument (more commonly: speakers or source) often follows is to dismiss the importance of the other side of the argument altogether. Most of the audiophiles whose opinions I respect would never go down that road.

A personal anecdote, five or so years ago, one of my local dealers hosted a gentleman from Linn at his store on a beautiful autumn Sunday afternoon. Obviously, you know where Linn's opinion lies.

The system this fellow demonstrated for us featured their $20K CD player on one end and a lower end (something in the $1100 - $1500 range, though I've respected their micromonitors that have long slotted below whatever this model was, pricewise) Linn speaker on the other. The Linn amplification used fell somewhere in between those two extremes. He made the usual statement about the source being everything, and to prove it, you could basically use "any old speaker" as a speaker can only reproduce what is passed to it.

The overall goal was to show how divine the result would be in having one follow the Linn philosophy, and spend a disproportionate share of the system budget on the source

Needless to say, the sonic experience of the system was far less ideal than we were being told. Apart from hopefully providing valuable insight into how wrongheaded the Linn approach actually is, I found the entire exercise ridiculous. For the sake of argument, I'll put a $30K price tag on the system, and believe that if I were allowed to divvy that up into 4 $7500 portions, then go around the store and grab a CD player, preamp, power amp, and pair of speakers that individually came in at or less than that $7500, the end result would have walked away from the system that was demonstrated.

My overall point, to quote Kondo-san of Audio Note, "Nothing is unimportant."

The sushi analogy is lame; it's either good or bad.

Not the case with digital sources. Most are good enough for this fellow's application. As I said earlier, there is a plethora of inexpensive digital sources and converters.

I hope that helps.

The sushi analogy isn't lame if you're not too illiterate to understand it. The point is it doesn't matter how good the fish starts out if the trip to your mouth destroys it, just like the signal's trip through your stereo system to your ears. Odd thing is, I think Mr. Feil and I agree more than disagree on the question posed.

Isn't Audiofeil point that most of the fish is good, it's the journey to your plate that can be the problem? Well, anyway, I think we have argued the point to death; yes, the source is important, but unlikely to be a problem with most current digital sources, and that where you are most likely to go wrong is to mess up the amp/speaker combo, so focus there and you are likely to be on the right path.

Well guys, I have experimented a bit since posting the question that has created a good little debate and this is my take so far. Today I swapped out the Cambridge 840 c (CD player) that costs around $1,400 for one twice the price, a Bryston BCD1. Both of these players have glowing reviews. The Bryston came out better BUT I had to listen hard and keep swapping the interconnects to make that decision. What this tells me is the Cambridge seems to be a really great player for the price. They really were very close. As far as the amps go I have been swapping the Pass Labs 250.5 back and forth with the NaimNait5i which costs a fraction of the price. The Pass came out tops but I think it may be because of the high current and extra power that Maggies need but the Naim (50w) was/is very impressive too. Regarding the speakers, I really think these are the most important thing, amp next then source, but what was making a bigger difference than all of these was room treatment - massive variation in sound depending on what I damped and where. With all the different configurations of the gear I was happy with the sound after I got the room treatment under control but until I fixed the room it all sounded miserable, really miserable. So, in a nutshell, I don't think you have to spend an arm and a leg to get great sound. There is gear out there that can take you almost there for a fraction of the price, but regarding the difference between the amps and the players I would have to say that the amp made the biggest difference.....with my set-up, that is.