New Music vs. New Equipment

It depends. You have to get your equipment right where YOU KNOW that you have put together ( cost could be low if your lucky or high ) system that delivers almost every aspect of music close to perfect ( of course, it is never gonna be like live music) reproduction. Addding a little better cable or line conditioner might make subtle difference at a cost of some of the aspects you had it right in the first place. Then you shoud consider exploring new music. Sedond and Reguirre have great alternative suggestion. Sedond, No I have not heard a great FM broadcast ( my current tuner is NEC T-6 Delivers goodpeformance, but honestly, I am skeptical doing upgrade to say Etude and have CD like, so to speak, performance), what kind of tuner/antenna/cable-to pre-amp combo do you have?

hi nil,

i use an onix bwd1 tuna w/soap power-supply. i've heard the nec, & it's decent, but not in the same class, imho. i haven't heard the etude, but the 101 is nice. i still like my onix better. i also have a revox b-261 that compares favorably w/my onix, in a second system. the onix is a bit warmer-sounding than the revox, which i prefer. both show up used occasionally, for less $$$ than a used magnum 101. for antenna, i use an aps ap-13 (http://www.antennaperformance.com/). my reception area is poor - i'm on the bottom of a ~1800' ridge, on the western side, w/the stations i listen to ~60 miles to the east. this set-up is the only thing that works.

preamp is a melos music director, cable from tuna-to-pre is an all-silver kimber clone.

ya, i get cd-like performance - if wpfw is playing a cd... ;~) the warmth of the onix & the warmth of the melos more than compensate!

regards, doug

ps-i guess there's fm-haters out there, yudging by the negative feedback i received on my prior post here. oh well...

Thanks, Sedond, I will have to look in to it.

While I agree with Redkiwi and Cornfedboy I really back Raguirre's post. I got into this expensive hobby after I heard a live concert of the Chicago Symphony when I was 14 and realized that my parent's Zenith console playing Reiner didn't sound like the CSO from the 12th row of Orchestra Hall. To me that still is the only reason to spend so much on equipment. In addition to classical my wife and I listen to rock, electronica, middle eastern and indian music but if it wasn't for our roughly weekly dose of live classical music we wouldn't spend the money on high end audio.

I am not challenging the comments about the validity of attending live concerts, but a quick look over my software tells me that more of my favorite artists are dead than alive. Maybe if I am really good, I will have the opportunity to hear them in the afterlife. For now the legacy these musicians have left behind is all there is, and much of it is more valuable to me than any artist performing today. Perhaps just one audiophiles justification for the software and the hardware.