Transducers. While Al is correct, he presents a nuanced, comprehensive approach.
At the most fundamental level, nothing happens unless a medium of some kind is converted into something the rest of the system can work with and then back into something you can hear. The result is either pleasing to a given listener or not. All the stuff in between merely introduces or eliminates color since it can only work with a uniform signal format.
For that reason, different sources (cartridges, DACs, disc players etc.) and speakers produce the most noticeable effects in sound reproduction. Note that technology such as fiber optics introduces even more transducers since an electrical signal is converted to an optical one, transmitted and then reversed back into electricity.
The fun part IMO is finding the transducers that make the magic happen for you and then getting all the other stuff to support them properly.
At the most fundamental level, nothing happens unless a medium of some kind is converted into something the rest of the system can work with and then back into something you can hear. The result is either pleasing to a given listener or not. All the stuff in between merely introduces or eliminates color since it can only work with a uniform signal format.
For that reason, different sources (cartridges, DACs, disc players etc.) and speakers produce the most noticeable effects in sound reproduction. Note that technology such as fiber optics introduces even more transducers since an electrical signal is converted to an optical one, transmitted and then reversed back into electricity.
The fun part IMO is finding the transducers that make the magic happen for you and then getting all the other stuff to support them properly.