The difference between musicians and audiophiles is directly related to your posit.By this I mean a musician is primarily focused on the realism of a given instruments variables and an audiophile seeks some other earthly recreation that in the end does not resemble a living organism.It is primarily a pursuit of technical miracles and subject to so many market variables incomprehensible to many and driven by too few.We have long since past the detail and transparency of the live event and entered into a disturbed place of hyper real... masquerading as more real.A pity really since seeking great music is energy more wisely put to use.
How Revealing Should a System Be?
I've heard tales of audiophiles reach a point of dimininshing returns as they upgrade their systems. Meaning, the more revealing the system gets, the more discriminating their system will be of the recordings that are played back on it. Some of you have said that recordings that you once really liked were now unlistenable because your system revealed all of the flaws in the recording. Doesn't that limit some audiophiles to what recordings they can actually listen to? If so, we have gotten away from the thing that brought us to this hobby in the first place.........THE MUSIC! It seems the equipment should never be more important than the music.