Is this about music or equipment? Am I crazy or am I such a wise man lol.?


Dear Friends,

Few years ago I decided that I'm happy with my system.

Actually I love it.

In a few words:

I'm the owner of the first version of Martin Logan CLS speakers (panels have been changed twice) that I'm powering by VAC Renaissance amp. The source is a Dell touchscreen computer running Windows 10. The signal goes to the old Denon CD player that was modified by APL 20 years ago and that I will upgrade soon (maybe not). The power to the  the most of the system is (horror of horrors lol.) cleaned by an old Tice Powerblock.
In addition I'm using  additional Aperion Ribbon Super Tweeters for the high frequencies (ML CLS are quite soft in the high frequency department) and an old Velodyne 18" subwoofer that I'm running through Rolls SX95 filter to limit its' frequency to 32 HZ. Over 32 HZ two Martin Logan Depth subwoofers limited to +/- 45 HZ take over. The signal from DAC to the amp goes through Yamamura 6000 interconnects. I tested the system several times on different frequencies and the curve is almost flat with regards to few spikes and valleys (please pardon this non-technical description) - the only "room treatment" as you could see from my profile photo are bookshelves filled up with books I love, placed on bookshelves  behind ML panels. The custom stands for ML speakers I designed and built wit a help of cabinet maker. I'm living in an apartment.

This leads me to the point of my post. A dear friend of mine is at this moment in the phase of improving the sound of his system. His step now is to get new power cords to make his system sound better. And my question is - Is this about music or equipment?

Please see the copy of my email to him and please let me know your thoughts.

"I just did the calculation. My entire system costs me about $50,000 including the changes of tubes. This is is a price if I paid a full price. Taking into the account the discounts and the lower price for used equipment such a VAC amplifier and Yamamura interconnects it would be somewhere around $40,000 spent 20-15 years ago, so considering the inflation, nowadays it still stays around $50 k.
Because I went through 5 changes of vacuum tubes that are costly (8 main driver 300B tubes and 4 6SN7 steering tubes) that were around $2,500 per change.
Now - I have in my collection around 2500 CDs. Some of them are single CDs for the cost of $15 a CD. Operas and other collections such as complete rerecordings' of Bach organ music are between $80 - $150.(I'm not mentioning Rammstein, Dr. Dre ant French hip-hop I love depending on my mood ;-)
So let's round the average cost of CD to $25 (very low estimate).
Please multiply that by 2500 CDs and we are around $60k for CDs.
To me this makes sense - the proportion is +/- 1:1
Now please talk to your "audiophile" friends.
Are they music lovers and are they are listening to the music they are passionate about, or are they the equipment lovers and they are listening to their system?
You'll be surprised by your findings.
I'm not going to comment."

I'm certain that this discussion will be entertaining.

I'm looking forward to hear your opinions - let's have some fun guys.

Love

lucian-sf

Thanks to @thecarpathian.

The whole thing was worth it because you put "members" and "impotent" in tye same sentence. Wish I'd thought of that...

It's all about the music.  But something/s or someone/s has to produce it.  Thus, the rabbit hole and dollars, euros, pecos, yen....

My system is presently off.  There is no music. I don't consider roosters crowing, music. 

Without music a system would have no purpose (movies?  but not the same bug). 

My love of music drives me to build the best home possible for it. I also agree with the posters above who discuss that different systems reproduce different genres better and should lead the listener to new forms of music.

My system has done that for me: I have XLR patch bays between gear so I can easily switch amps, preamps, or speakers and so there is an endless variety of combinations and see what synergies can be produced, and what sounds best with a type of music. I can also easily switch from 2 to 5.1 channel and have a large collection of surround music. It is all about experiencing music in as many variations and ways possible. 

It's loads of fun and I have learned a lot.   

I think the OP could have just asked what has been the lifetime ratio of media to hardware purchases by each poster without sounding like he was trying to create a fight.  Mine is probably 1:1 when comes to overall spend, but in terms of equipment actually in play at any time, overall media spend to gear would be easily 3:1.

@jji666 

I think the OP could have just asked what has been the lifetime ratio of media to hardware purchases by each poster without sounding like he was trying to create a fight.  Mine is probably 1:1 when comes to overall spend, but in terms of equipment actually in play at any time, overall media spend to gear would be easily 3:1.

How about in terms of media actually in play at any time? 

That would be just as pointless as any other ratio mentioned.

 

I think its a little bit of everything. Thats what makes,this Audiogon a great site...Audio equipment lovers,Vinyl lovers and collectors, Cds the same.,music lovers.