When's enough, enough?

Atmasphere basically said what I was going to say, that the biggest culprit is that you get used to the sound no matter how spectacular and it becomes less amazing due to how familiar you are with it.

The other major culprit to merry-go-rounding is the hifi press and sites like audiogon. The hifi press is constantly telling us that the latest offerings are dramatic improvements over older gear. For the most part this is untrue. There are only so many "break throughs" that can really occur. It's mostly hype. You can easily assemble a 10 year old system that competes with today's brand new offerings.

If you want to get off the merry go round, the first step would be unsubscribe to the hifi press and hifi web sites. It's like breaking a shopping addiction, step 1, stop going to the mall.

Funny thing happened with my last audio changes -

I have always had a lot of curiosity about what is possible and, for the most part, I always knew something was missing. Well a couple of months ago, I found I could afford to seriously think about something to do to really improve my sound.

I've been listening very carefully to a lot of different recordings and music types (as well as sources, amps etc)for the past couple of months and I can't really pin down any aspect of my sound that I can change in my present environment that would give me more pleasure (apart from getting a different room and that ain't going to happen).

Don't get me wrong, I'm sure with a new pre-amp alone (I fantasize about the Audio Space Reference pre-amp, boy does that look neat!) would give me enought to play with for a year or two but I think all I would end up with is a slightly different sound and a lot more curiosity.

It's like lusting over finding a blond, finally getting one, and then wondering if a 'natural' blond might be seriously better and its worth a divorce to find out. Well I suppose you could go out and rent one, but it wouldn't be the same would it. Lucky folks find a 'natural' blond in the first place and realize the differences are all an illusion, I mean who would prefer a bottle blond.

It has really come to the point that I can no longer tell you what I would/could/should change about my systems sound to actually improve it. So I'm spending my money on a coffeee bean roaster - I'm sure I can find perfection there. Un huh! :-)

I agree with Jaxwire about audiophile journalism being deadly for those with compulsions or angst. I gave mine up many years ago, but I'm still here so it is not necessarily the whole solution, :-)

Atmasphere and Jaxwired,
This is a very interesting question. I think some people are more restless than others to improve the sound in their system, and if they have the funds they will tend to indulge themselves. A lot of this depends on personality and how important reaching higher is for each person.

I agree with you, Jaxwired, that most of the hifi press is hype. They are too tied to commercial interests to be believed. The conflict of interest is too obvious. When you stated, "you get used to the sound no matter how spectacular and it becomes less amazing due to how familiar you are with it", this is also true of many facets in life. We get used to new circumstances. But with audio, once you have improved the sound in your system it is hard to go back to the old sound. If you improve the sound with a new wire, for example, and you then take it out of the system, you are likely to put it back very quickly. In life, on the other hand, we usually get used to, or at least grow to accept, a new status quo that may not be as elevated as it was before. Which is not to say that we would not prefer to be back where we were earlier.

Onhwy61,
You stated, "It is not natural to be disatified with your system. That disatifaction is a learned behavior encouraged by magazines and other forms of marketing." Actually, I think it is very natural for some people to be dissatisfied, depending how deficient they feel their system is -- and their personality. I agree with you that various forms of audio marketing will tend to influence many people into making purchases they would not otherwise make. But, in some cases, they may be very happy with the results once they make those purchases.

It all depends on what you are trying to achieve. For those with a little bit of sticktoitiveness there are really no limits. The only limitations are the ones you bring with you. It's an Old Wives Tale that your system, no matter how evolved, is only 5% from the Absolute Sound. Far from it.

It took many years of audiophilia to realize that I was a System Builder, a form of audiophile who exults in the gear as much as the media. As such I am almost never completely satisfied with any given rig. I have built hundeds of systems but can almost always find areas which could be improved.

Yet, there is what I would call the "Perfect System" experience, when one has put together or hears what is deemed a perfect sounding rig. I would liken it to a pitcher throwing a perfect game, and just as rare. A system builder may never have the Perfect System, even over the course of a lifetime, just as most pitchers never have a perfect game. The conditions must be absolutely ideal, the room, gear, etc. all optimized.

Some simply do not care and it is not their goal to hear the perfect experience; good enough is good enough. It has never been good enough for me, as I have always wanted to hear in my ears a sound matching the ideal representation of the music in my mind.

I have become a far better system builder over the years, and just now, this week I built a rig which I consider the equivalent of the Perfect System, meeting all my sonic objectives. I never would have thought this rig would be the one to achieve it, just as one might not think any particular baseball game would be the one where the pitcher throws the perfect game.

Yet, I have been doing this long enough that with the passage of time I will find even more progress, better sound. The ante certainly does get upped, however. I had to put a lot more money into rigs than I ever dreamed for this to happen.

This is also "A" Perfect System, as an expression of one technology speaker-wise. Others exist, but are just as elusive. The fun thing is that this is my Perfect System; I'm not trying to tell you it has to be yours.

I know full well with time familiarity can bring contempt and the great satisfaction now can wane. There is no such thing as an absolutely perfect system, but experientially to have built a rig that is as perfect as conceptualized is one of the greatest moments in the hobby for me.

The evidence was the way my fingers tapped, my head swayed, my eyes closed... my body felt the beauty. I set extreme standards for sound quality and almost always there is a slight to significant shortcoming as I analyze the sound to the Nth degree. This time not.. it is "perfect."

I also enjoy listing my systems from first power cord to speakers' and listening chair positioning. I can return to that rig if desired. But systems keep improving and I know that this will someday seem like a shadow of perfection. :)