Interestingly the only thing I regard as a mistake in my 5+ years of hifi, from original budget DIY to current system was purchase of an XP5XS. Otherwise every change has been positive - and at all times my system has been satisfying to use, music being enjoyable and engaging, whilst improving in quality at each upgrade. However, unlike the described listening behaviour of some, past if not now, I never sit and analyse music for soundstage or depth or anything else, nor seek tapping of feet etc, nor fuss with tweaks and constant changes of cable or whatever - rather I just listen to the music and let it absorb me and feel its emotion…
My first system wasn’t really all that great (unsurprising given the limited budget), though very enjoyable at the time and far better than anything my friends had. I improved speakers with further DIY, and uprated amp, then about 3 years in my source received a major uplift leapfrogging ahead of the rest of the system. I suppose that could be viewed as source first at that time, albeit without such thought. Then about 4 years later speakers leapt ahead of everything else and with another speaker change after a further 14 years they remained above other items in terms of quality until 2016 (though still the item with greatest monetary value).
Just to be clear, when I refer to speaker/room first, I’m not referring to room treatment. In most cases I don’t believe this is necessary and can often lead to overdamped rooms which sound horrible.
In the ideal setup, you have a satellite/sub/room configuration with the satellite speakers set up for optimal spatial reproduction and sub/subs positioned for best bass response. When done correctly (which is extremely rare) with maximum placement flexibility, the results are stunning as you can achieve holographic soundstage and exceptional bass response (the effect of ideal sub placement also enhances spatial realism at all frequencies).
Of the systems I’ve heard that achieve this, the main subjective impression is that of complete decoupling of the sound from any of the transducers. The sound just floats in space with an openness and effortlessness that is truly intoxicating.
The speakers must be correctly timed aligned if multi-way and this is not easy to achieve. It also helps if speaker/subs are sealed boxes. If I recall correctly, Naim offered a system like this at one point.
Again, most audiophiles simply don’t have the luxury of placing all of their transducers anywhere in a room, but this is by far the most critical aspect of achieving the most “realistic” playback and will always inform you as to the quality of other components in the chain.
You’ve come a long way… I’m excited for you with the new speaker hunt later…!
We will start the insidious poisoning sessions later when you open a new thread
on suggestions for your new speakers… ha ha
Me too… on the nail… it’s a fine line when we wish to explore what might improve things as time wears on. Part of the hobby I guess, which is why it’s so important to know just when to stop and just settle down to listening for what the music accords us. Be happy. It doesn’t matter what we own really. Just be happy when we know it sounds great to our ears at home [not anyone else’s] and chill.
Goosebump territory. So well conveyed, Naimism! Thank you.
Even on ACDC and the liveness of their drums and guitar play.
Gold, for me, when it comes to bass.
Think ported speakers can sound great - just more
finicky on room placement to get it to sound nice
and tight, and deep. No puns…
It’s a challenge for many of us, but a good dedicated room for our music is always a good promise for the future we can look forward to. We can make our choices and head for what we want because life’s just too short not to live out our choices. I got into all sorts of trouble following this premise, so we need to manage our emotions before spending.
Once I have found speakers that work well in the room they don’t get changed frequently. Since my first serious separates system in 1979, I’m on my fifth and probably final speakers. I’ve had 11 digital sources, more like 20. if you count PS and off board DAC upgrades.
It’s always been source first for me. It has never been difficult to prove to myself that this model works. Or at least, works for me.
To me prioritising source elements is just logical and can be shown to be so by listening.
However, balance eventually also becomes important so that the best source signal possible gets a chance of reaching one’s ears as intended. I do not mean amounts of money though. It is false in my view to just assume balance will be achieved by spending certain amounts of money on components.
That can be true of the source too. I have seen recommendations (from manufacturers) for example distributing one’s budget for turntable, arm, Phono stage and cartridge as 30%-30%-30%-10% respectively. This could mean missing out on components that just gel together when you listen but does not follow the formula.
We should not be slaves to any received wisdom but have faith in our own ears to decide what works best.
For me it has been all about having a long term strategy. My long term priorities are LP12 at about Akurate level, best Naim olive amps with sensible box count, lower priority on speakers.
With most purchases being second hand, I needed to be flexible in the ordering of putting the final system together, as I wanted to source mint items as keepers. This took several years. The order of purchases ended up being: Supercap, 250, 52, servicing, Allaes, Karousel/Kore. Other than my LP12, the replaced items have formed a fairly decent second system as per my profile.
I think the strategy and end result are biased towards source for my main system, but the journey was quite different, though never wildly out of balance.
Some of the most consistently satisfying results I had was using Guru speakers, the reason being in my opinion is that their placement advice is so different to most other speakers.
There is an acceptance of the less than ideal rooms that most of us listen within and they tend to be far more forgiving of compromise, but they lead to a more consistent and ultimately satisfying end result.
They are not perfect however, what is? So I’ve now replaced them in my main Naim system with Kef LS50 Meta and Kc-62 sub combination.
Deploying a sub was a big move for me, previously being of the view that subs were for home cinema and would just be all boom and ruin the whole thing.
It took a lot of time, quite a bit of reading and lots of micro adjustments but I finally got the combination of crossover, output integration and room placement to a point that it all gels seamlessly. Should also add main speakers also needed moving around to get it all to snap in to focus.
The setup now displays the consistency that the Gurus seem able to bring and which in my experience leads to a less stressful hifi pursuit and more music listening.
The sub approach definitely takes more work than what the Gurus can achieve even when just plonked somewhere but whilst the methods are different think the concepts are similar, that being the room response.
I’ve seen many in the forum talk of the near magical results from classic Naim speakers, many of which would appear to need much closer wall placement than is recommended by most designs these days.
I’ve no experience of these speakers myself but sounds very similar to Guru placement and owners of those Naim designs seem to be some of the most satisfied musically based on their responses here.
Should add the Gurus are happily doing their stuff in my second system for all the reasons above and saw off lots of more expensive designs over the years when considering upgrades.
Logic is not feeling though and the saying, garbage in, garbage out sums the logic up. Speakers should be representing the signal supplied warts and all if they are not they are just adding colour to them.
But as I went on to say balance is the next goal and that includes speakers.
“Garbage in garbage out” in this context, is a logical fallacy. I’m just not sure which one. You are stating that anything other than a “source first” system is “garbage in”.
I would get the best turntable, or CD player or a DAC/streamer as far as my budget can allow, and then build everything based around it. If you lose info at the source, you just cannot re-create it down the chain - it is as simple as that.
The second would be a pre-amp or an integrated amp.
Personally I class the 552 as a source, the 552 extracts everything from the Dave so for me the 552 and Dave are my two sources, not sure which one would be first or second though
The advice I got when I purchased my first Naim set-up 27 years ago was 2/3 of your budget on electronics and a 1/3 for your speakers. That advice has worked for me as it’s allowed me to continually upgrade my boxes without changing my speakers. With each upgrade my speakers have just gotten better.
