Phasecorrect-
Thanks for sharing your experiences. I know you've been contributing to Audiogon and perhaps it shows. The components you've been swapping must have all been good quality and well-matched with your system. For sure, a bad or mis-matched component can really mess up the sound and no speaker can fix that. I also agree, as stated above, that swapping components of roughly equal quality will usually not buy much.
I was amazed by the differences in the sound of high-end speakers at the recent HES show. In particular, Joseph, Wilson, Dynaudio and Quad all had vastly different qualities. The first three in particular all had extensive room treatments and I'm sure were vying for "best of show". I've heard that many set-ups also benefitted from Rives' low-freq room treatment device. Each presenter seemed very proud of the sound in their particular room. How can such a collection of high-end speakers sound so different?
I heard the Wilson's in three different rooms and I suppose they were accurate but they cetainly weren't my cup of tea. The Joseph Pearl's were kind of the opposite, they immediatley put me in a comfort zone. The Dynaudio's were simply awesome. The Quads were something completely different.
So I agree with everyone that the components and the room are all critical but the biggest variation has to go to speakers.
Thanks for sharing your experiences. I know you've been contributing to Audiogon and perhaps it shows. The components you've been swapping must have all been good quality and well-matched with your system. For sure, a bad or mis-matched component can really mess up the sound and no speaker can fix that. I also agree, as stated above, that swapping components of roughly equal quality will usually not buy much.
I was amazed by the differences in the sound of high-end speakers at the recent HES show. In particular, Joseph, Wilson, Dynaudio and Quad all had vastly different qualities. The first three in particular all had extensive room treatments and I'm sure were vying for "best of show". I've heard that many set-ups also benefitted from Rives' low-freq room treatment device. Each presenter seemed very proud of the sound in their particular room. How can such a collection of high-end speakers sound so different?
I heard the Wilson's in three different rooms and I suppose they were accurate but they cetainly weren't my cup of tea. The Joseph Pearl's were kind of the opposite, they immediatley put me in a comfort zone. The Dynaudio's were simply awesome. The Quads were something completely different.
So I agree with everyone that the components and the room are all critical but the biggest variation has to go to speakers.