What I wish I knew before starting my audiophile journey

AKG_CA

Since there's no hard and fast rules to this hobby its only your opinion which you are entitled to. I've also gone down many rabbit holes based on peoples "opinions". Going through tons of gear has its advantages and disadvantages. One being you learn a lot, the other is it's expensive unless you buy and sell used and understand the maket price and demand. Finding a trustworthy dealer is no easy task. Almost every dealer is in this to make money. Unless they're prepared to come to my house and see my room/set up i'm not taking anyone seriously. My buddy had the dealer come to his house. He also bought everything new and spent over 35 k. Not many dealers will come to your house unless you're droping some serious coin, my experience anyway. 

I actually did my breakdown of my gear cost. It's not as extreme as you might have thought. My next upgrade would be the amp. I'm probably a bit overweight on cables lol.

@dman1974

Nice post! I agree with your priorities when you start with power. I like starting from the wall outlet and work backward to the source in terms of doing a build or an upgrade. In my setup I bundled speakers and amps together by going with active speakers. When you have clean power feeding an amp coupled to the driver with an active crossover it is like turbocharging the music.

It would be great if you could post your system and some pics.

I would make one change, to setup your room, measure it and acoustically treat it before auditioning speakers and getting any spendy electronics.

Patience is #1. Doing more in-depth research is #2 if you place a value on your time, money, and energy. Then speakers, power, source components, preamp, amplification, cables, room/treatment sooner if possible. Or, simply moving speakers around in the room a little if you can, even as a temporary test.

@dman1974 That’s a lot of gear to rotate in 3 years, barely enough time to find a good synergy between 33 different components mentioned. Matching proper amplification to your speakers can help save valuable time. I like to buy 2nd hand gear at a savings from people when it gets rotated out too quickly. ;)

Developing a listening ear became my #1 over many decades. This can be achieved by listening to other people’s systems whenever you can. Savor the moments with your gear, listening to "components" gets old in time, most importantly remember to listen to the music along the way. Best of luck on the rest of your audiophile journey.

I think OP did an excellent job in articulating his journey. Like many have said, multiple paths up the mountain to nirvana. I’m still learning about this hobby, and to some extent, still consider myself a newbie.
 

At an even more basic level, I think there’s a lot of value in experience, being open-minded, and questioning absolutes when multiple variables are at play. What really helped me navigate was recognizing the type of sound I was trying to capture.  

It’s been 46 years since I bought my first stereo receiver and a pair of 2 way speakers.  Since then I have maintained a two channel system and owned just 5 different pairs of speakers, 6 amps, 5 preamps, 6 turntables, and 5 CD and or DAC/Transport combos.  I’ve been through many more cable brands than anything through the years.  It takes me months to really settle into a new component and determine how I like it.  I’m not judging.  Back in the day I would visit stereo shops on weekends and business trips to hear different systems and components.  I also had some work buddies in the hobby which allowed all of us to hear various set ups.  These days all of that is hard to do.  So perhaps buying/selling is a pragmatic way to audition a component these days.  

Another way to build a system is through planning.  Stereo gear performance can be broken down into tiers.  Those tiers roughly correlate to price.  I know, everyone has their giant killer bargain sound component or tweaks that help get the most out of a component.  I was big into that in the late 80s to the early 2000s.  It can be very rewarding and while raising a family, pretty much the only option- in my case at least.  Anyway, I found that stretching a bit for a higher tier component when possible, if you know that’s what you want paves the way to upgrades in other areas at a later time.  It requires some planning and sometimes things don’t work out.  I had one preamp, for example for less than a year.  I also had an amp once for less than 2 years.  

When I retired recently I indulged myself and revamped my entire system.  Living the dream.  The best part was since I didn’t have to go to work I could spend nearly every day listening and planning out my system.  I visited a couple of stereo stores which were several hours away.  I also went to Axpona.  Good times.  In the end I sort of did things backwards.  I bought my new speakers last.  I knew what speakers I wanted so I planned everything around them.  They were my single biggest purchase so it took me some time to work up the nerve to spend the money.  It worked out ok.  I did end up changing out my speaker cables and all of my power cords to get the sound just right.  I haven’t thought of this until now but here is a breakdown in percentage of my components to total system cost.  I will leave out room treatments and dedicated outlet costs.  Btw- I started using dedicated outlets in 1988.  It was such an improvement that I have added them to every house that I have owned since.  Don’t hesitate to do it.

Speakers 28%

Amps 11%

Preamps (both line and phono) 18%

DAC, Transport 11%

Music Server/streamer (ROON) 2%

TT/Tonearm/Phono cartridge 9%

Tweaks such as footers, linear power supplies, etc 2%

Cables 15%

Power conditioner 5%