Larstusor -
While I agree with most that you need to audition I am was in the same boat (or is it boonies) as you. The one component that varies the greatest in sound are the speakers - 95% of the time if I had to guess. But I didn't have a dealer near me, so I did my research and read the reviews and made sure whomever I bought from had a return policy. That happen to be Crutchfield and they happen to be selling the Thiel CS2.4's - the speakers I was interested in. So I took the plunge.
All the the rest of my system other than the BAT preamp and Parasound JC3+ Phono pre was bought direct from authorized internet dealers with return policies. And I did use them. Though it was a pain, in the end I made it all work.
So it can be done. The upside (and downside) is since you probably don't have any reference systems to listen to, you have only "you" to judge when good sounds "good" - and that's all that really matters!
While I agree with most that you need to audition I am was in the same boat (or is it boonies) as you. The one component that varies the greatest in sound are the speakers - 95% of the time if I had to guess. But I didn't have a dealer near me, so I did my research and read the reviews and made sure whomever I bought from had a return policy. That happen to be Crutchfield and they happen to be selling the Thiel CS2.4's - the speakers I was interested in. So I took the plunge.
All the the rest of my system other than the BAT preamp and Parasound JC3+ Phono pre was bought direct from authorized internet dealers with return policies. And I did use them. Though it was a pain, in the end I made it all work.
So it can be done. The upside (and downside) is since you probably don't have any reference systems to listen to, you have only "you" to judge when good sounds "good" - and that's all that really matters!