Is the source the most important aspect of a sound system?
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SoCal Sam
Lunatic Member
All components are equally important. Think garbage in garbage out. If the source is no good, the best preamp will only reproduce the crappy signal and send it along. If the preamp is the weak link, the best amp in the world will faithfully reproduce the crap and send it to the speakers. In short, your system will only be as good as your weakest link.
Brett a
~◦●○o0o○●◦~
I think once your system as a whole is to the point where subtleties in the music can be subjectively analyzed (e.g soundstage imaging, detail, timbre, attack, sustain, decay, etc.) then the greatest improvements per dollar can be had by upgrading the source OR the speakers. Whichever your personal inclination. They both make a bigger difference than what's between them IMO.
And let's not forget about the listening room its self.
And let's not forget about the listening room its self.
I bet it did sound great! Nothing against LaScalas but my position is a $19k set of Sonus speakers and $2K TT would probably sound better (given everything else the same).
Way back in Ancient Times the formula steps for audio ecstasy were:
1. Pick speakers whose sound you like...
2. Pick a compatible receiver or preamp & amp combo that will make your speakers sound great...
3. Pick compatible great-sounding sound source components...and...
4. Go buy a great sounding record, or cassette tape, or CD, or R-to-R tape, or ... etc.
All the steps are important, but in the real world everybody does the best he (or she) can with whatever avails itself to be worked with.
1. Pick speakers whose sound you like...
2. Pick a compatible receiver or preamp & amp combo that will make your speakers sound great...
3. Pick compatible great-sounding sound source components...and...
4. Go buy a great sounding record, or cassette tape, or CD, or R-to-R tape, or ... etc.
All the steps are important, but in the real world everybody does the best he (or she) can with whatever avails itself to be worked with.
marc mc
Super Member
Have your heard Sonus Faber speakers?
The LaScalas are not his main speakers, he had just bought them for fun. His mains are Coral Beta 8's at about $800.
marc mc
JoeESP9
ESL's & tubes since 83
I'm firmly in the speakers first camp so I'll bite.
For CD playback I use a heavily modified Marantz CD-63 with a tube output stage.
I have an MSB DAC with all the options including an upgraded power supply and up and over sampling.
My VPI HW-19 Jr. has been brought to full HW-19 specs including the SAMA and SDS
My tonearm is a Rega RB-300 with Incognito wiring and Mitchell weight and stub. Currently there is a Sumiko blackbird mounted on it. The rest is in my sig.
Yes, some Amati's. They were superb. Granted he had a Krell SACD as the source but I digress...
dogscanskate
Super Member
Well marc, there seems to be one exception to the rule here. I run 20$ Dynaco A 25 XL's with my LP 12. Don't ask, they just sounded better in my room and to my ears than the Proac Response 2.5, the Sonus Faber Grand Pianos and Concertinos I also owned.
My speakers are the cheapest component in my kit and I love them dearly because of it. As I upgrade components, they simply sound better so I ain't saying they can't be beat but I found what I was looking for in a beat up pair of old speakers that make music come to life in my room. I am a happy camper.
ugornot
Poly Woofer?
Just to belly up to the bar ...
1. The recording regardless of medium
2. Look at the freq response of all the components
A. Speakers are the most ragged
B. followed by carts
3. Anybody having a component that makes a bad recording sound good, will also make a good recording sound bad.
4. Nothing repeat NOTHING can give a true live experience
One of my most cherished findings anymore are good recordings. Mid-fi and above systems show gross shortcomings of most modern recordings.
I am not a measurement above ( or conversely an ear above) all person. But measurements do play an important role even in high end gear. But give me relatively flat speakers and cart and I am happy. CDP preamps and amps have much less measurable ( and in my opinion audible) differences.
The only case I have heard that any component can make a bad recording sound good that has any merit IMO is tone controls. But I have had my ears brutalized more often by these same tone controls than I have heard bad recordings made good. Anything else is very suspect. Expanders can be used badly also.
Finally the most important component in the audio system that provides satisfaction is your mind. First lets rule out ears. I have 50 year old ears that I protect daily. I have my ears checked yearly with results that leave the testers shaking their heads. I have yet seen anyone score better on their tests. I have good ears. But if a transistor radio transports you and gives you what the artists want you to get GOOD FOR YOU! I have a several modest systems that get me there. Some people seek and spend endless amounts of money to reach the same satisfaction I already have. Well GOOD FOR YOU ALSO! Because their is someone who will criticize whatever you have regardless of what you have. I will end with a short quote from Mark Twain ( a very smart person in my opinion.)
"We all do no end of feeling and we mistake it for thinking. And out of it we get an aggregation which we consider a boon. Its name is public opinion. It is held in reverence. It settles everything. Some think it is the voice of God."
Trust your own opinion. If it sounds good to you; it is good. Do not confuse the feeling you get when someone criticizes your system (even if it echos the god of public opinion) as anything but pride. We all who have ears and friends can tell you of people who have spent far more on their systems and produce terrible sound in our opinion. Let them enjoy their system with your quiet response. But also be prepared for the flame that comes from offering your opinion. I hope all of you on this forum are listening as you type. If not WTF! Why are you on an audio forum when you could be on an audio forum and listening?
To the OP, what do you think?
1. The recording regardless of medium
2. Look at the freq response of all the components
A. Speakers are the most ragged
B. followed by carts
3. Anybody having a component that makes a bad recording sound good, will also make a good recording sound bad.
4. Nothing repeat NOTHING can give a true live experience
One of my most cherished findings anymore are good recordings. Mid-fi and above systems show gross shortcomings of most modern recordings.
I am not a measurement above ( or conversely an ear above) all person. But measurements do play an important role even in high end gear. But give me relatively flat speakers and cart and I am happy. CDP preamps and amps have much less measurable ( and in my opinion audible) differences.
The only case I have heard that any component can make a bad recording sound good that has any merit IMO is tone controls. But I have had my ears brutalized more often by these same tone controls than I have heard bad recordings made good. Anything else is very suspect. Expanders can be used badly also.
Finally the most important component in the audio system that provides satisfaction is your mind. First lets rule out ears. I have 50 year old ears that I protect daily. I have my ears checked yearly with results that leave the testers shaking their heads. I have yet seen anyone score better on their tests. I have good ears. But if a transistor radio transports you and gives you what the artists want you to get GOOD FOR YOU! I have a several modest systems that get me there. Some people seek and spend endless amounts of money to reach the same satisfaction I already have. Well GOOD FOR YOU ALSO! Because their is someone who will criticize whatever you have regardless of what you have. I will end with a short quote from Mark Twain ( a very smart person in my opinion.)
"We all do no end of feeling and we mistake it for thinking. And out of it we get an aggregation which we consider a boon. Its name is public opinion. It is held in reverence. It settles everything. Some think it is the voice of God."
Trust your own opinion. If it sounds good to you; it is good. Do not confuse the feeling you get when someone criticizes your system (even if it echos the god of public opinion) as anything but pride. We all who have ears and friends can tell you of people who have spent far more on their systems and produce terrible sound in our opinion. Let them enjoy their system with your quiet response. But also be prepared for the flame that comes from offering your opinion. I hope all of you on this forum are listening as you type. If not WTF! Why are you on an audio forum when you could be on an audio forum and listening?
To the OP, what do you think?
JBL GUY
Addicted Member
Not the original poster...But
Very well said...
And by the way I am listening to some vintage Johnny Cash as I type...
cableguy
In Twang We Trust
Nice post Bill....:thmbsp:
My thinking as well. The end, then the beginning. Then preamp, then amp.
goandy89
Active Member
it still all boils down to are you willing to spend the money and take the time to research it and find what you like for sound in a source then match it with with other componets and then chose yours speakers. so speakers may suprise you. i have also been seeing a lot of people talking about 5k dollar cdp's and i have to say is they are stupid. a good hi quilty cdp can only read and play what is on the cd so if it is 200.00 or 5000.00 it still is limited to what is on the cd same for the rest of the rig. if your source cant get all the info(sound) processed then it sounds poor but if it processes everything then it will sound good then it will sound good through a good pre and a good amp. it all depends on the source.
marc mc
Super Member
Well there had to be one :thmbsp: I actually had a very similar relationship to a pair of Celestion DL-8's years ago.
I notice you have an LP12, I lived up the street from an audio store for years. The couple that owned it where from Leeds England and they were Linn dealers and very good friends. I am not a Linnie but know the dogma back to front. I may have heard a hundred demo's with customers over those years. I saw the looks on the faces of those that heard a properly set up LP12/ Ittok with any speakers pound everything else into dust. The room would get quite and the music would take over. And to be totally honest it was those demo's that have prevented me from ever really embracing CD's. For me it's not the same.
marc mc
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TejasRichard
Babies taste of chicken..
You, of course, have a right to your own opinion, but there is absolutely no need to be insulting or call names. I currently use a 10 year old dvd player for cd's, and would probably never buy a player for much over a grand, but if someone hears/sees/feels a difference and has the money to pay for it, more power to them. It is not up to you or me or anyone else to be the arbiter of another person's happiness. And this cuts both ways. Marc, there are plenty of people on this forum who can't or won't afford even your "modest" $800 speakers. You honestly believe that someone with $200 speakers and a dual tt will get 1000 times the value from a $20k 'table? Of course not! This person's choice of sources WILL be limited by there speakers' ability to resolve and reproduce the signal. And that's only half of it. Chances are someone with $200 speakers will have other components in a similar budget range. I'm assuming here, but I'd guess that if you see a night and day difference between a budget-price source and a high-end source, you see the same differences between budget pres/amps, and their high-end counterparts, right? Well, how nice would a high-end component sound if every other piece in the chain cost 10 times less? Would it sound 10 times better than a similar component from the same price-range as the rest of the system? If not, there is a good chance that the owner of this hypothetical system in not going to get the same value from the high-end component that you do in your system, thus the difference in opinion. Plus, when you take into account the fact that everyone places different value on different aspects of sound reproduction (absolute fidelity vs musicality for instance), this all becomes even more murky. Someone mentionee earlier that there was a difference in "amount"' of change and "quality" of change. I think we are all talking about improvement here, not jusr change from one sound to another. From all I've read and heard, it is far cheaper to get substantial improvement from your speakers than any other component. Does this make them more "important" than the source? No, but it does mean that, of you're trying to make a large improvement on a budget, speakers would be a good place to start. If it takes a larger amount of money to create signifcant improvements in your electronics, it stands to reason, you probably can make a couple of steps up from entry-level in your speakers before they start really showing up your other components.
sorry for the long post (and any sp. or grammar errors! i'm currently posting from my phone with the tough-screen keyboard, so errors are inevitableand spellcheck is unavailible, lol!)
Richard
Edit: this was not meant in anyway to be an attack on marc, I was simply responding to something he said. Also, "modest" was my own inference about what he seemed to be saying re: his friend's speakers, again, not a jab, though I see now how it might be read that way...
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mrt2
Super Member
:thumbsdn:
Digital sources have a big job to do, both in extracting the information from the disc and converting it to an analog signal. Then there is the issue of isolation from vibrations and electromagnetic interference, and build quality.
I would not call anybody stupid, but anybody who thinks a $200 player and a $5,000 player are the same is...misinformed.
marc mc
Super Member
No, I do not believe in a dollar to percentage balance in audio. And never have. Meaning I don't think a 1K product sound 10X's better than a $100 product.
No, Again let me say that price is not involved for me. Thats an AK thing. I see money talked about as much as gear here. I hear sound and I either like it, don't like it, or can't tell the difference. The price of a componant does not determine it's sound quality and I never said it did. Now with that said the very best that I have heard in vinyl playback comes with a scary price tag.
Again, price is not the issue and has nothing to do with a persons enjoyment in any area of life. I get more enjoyment biking with my boys than I do from audio.
Again with the money? The OP never asked what was the cheapest way to make a change in sound. If he had I would have also said speakers.
My comments on this thread should be seen in this context: If a person is trying to achieve the maximum fidelity from their system. IMO the source is the place to start. And if they do that from the record quality all the way through the chain they will get the maximum potential of thier gear.
Some believe in playing Legendary speakers with any source and the world is big enough for that opinion as well.
I did not see it as an attack at all. And my responses are only to clarify my position. :thmbsp:
marc mc
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