Before I began putting together a high-end system I ran pro sound for a rock band & got a good education in the basics. A lot of them carry over to home audio & the biggest culprit is AC. It's amazing how much noise one dimmer switch can put into a system. Then there's phasing, everything being correctly grounded, shielded cables only going where they belong & so on.
As for my system, what I've tried to do is recreate that "live" sound as best I can & have gone through a few different set-ups to get what I'm after. You'll never know how a piece will work in your system until you hear it there. You can get a pretty good idea from hearing it in another application but it's not the acid test.
Then there's synergy. You might fall in love with a certain component but it just won't work in your system. You can either build your system around that one component or try something else. Or build a second or third system around that one component.
If you're happy with the sound of your system then when you want to upgrade or change something you can evaluate that one change & make a decision regarding that one change. If you're not happy with the sound then you have to evaluate what you don't like about it & go after that particular thing until you get satisfactory results.
For me its been a combination of hearing a piece I liked (i.e. speakers) & going after that sound and sometimes its just been experimenting in a certain area (i.e. SS amps) because I wasn't quite happy with what I had. The rest of the time it was trying many different items (i.e. cables) until I settled on one I was happy with.
I suppose it's a combination of some sort of system philosophy & favored component(s) although I would throw in trail & error as one of the main ingredients.
As for my system, what I've tried to do is recreate that "live" sound as best I can & have gone through a few different set-ups to get what I'm after. You'll never know how a piece will work in your system until you hear it there. You can get a pretty good idea from hearing it in another application but it's not the acid test.
Then there's synergy. You might fall in love with a certain component but it just won't work in your system. You can either build your system around that one component or try something else. Or build a second or third system around that one component.
If you're happy with the sound of your system then when you want to upgrade or change something you can evaluate that one change & make a decision regarding that one change. If you're not happy with the sound then you have to evaluate what you don't like about it & go after that particular thing until you get satisfactory results.
For me its been a combination of hearing a piece I liked (i.e. speakers) & going after that sound and sometimes its just been experimenting in a certain area (i.e. SS amps) because I wasn't quite happy with what I had. The rest of the time it was trying many different items (i.e. cables) until I settled on one I was happy with.
I suppose it's a combination of some sort of system philosophy & favored component(s) although I would throw in trail & error as one of the main ingredients.