Most Important?

"Weakest link" a "good" rack and some isolation for your components including some isolation tweeks sorbogel, points etc., innerconnects & speaker cables & the room, your choice of the order ! S/C very important but not "paramount".

The real source is the recorded music not the player. Is the player more important than the speakers? I don't think so. Is the recording more important? Without a doubt.

Jazzkid to answer your question, I think that the weakest link of your system is the blue coloured painting of your room. Blue is transmitting a kind of psychological perception, which one may associate with cold, distance and being without emotive connections. Try repaint your room to a warmer sunnier color. Than you may change the location of your speakers. There are lots of info on this issue.

Shadome--sorry I missed that in your second paragraph. I should read more carefully. I will say that I do subscribe to the "weakest link" theory to a large degree. The system should work in balance and great speakers with a lousy source or lousy speakers with a great source--well you'ld probably do a lot better to have moderate speakers with a moderate source. By in large however I find that the room is the gating factor to how good a system can sound. A medium system in a great room will outperform a great system in a bad room hands down.

I think the source is important (the recording most of all)but that diffences between CD players is relatively minor compared with difference between speakers - That is diminishing returns start rather low with digital equipment IMHO, so I think a good $1,000 to $2,000 Cd player is going to be pretty darn good, wheras speakers differ a lot and you need to spend quite a bit more to really start hitting dimishing returns - maybe $10,000 or so. IMHO, the speaker choice must be made first and will determine the general sound of your system, the digital source while critical is unlikely to be a major weak link since to my ears at a certain point they sound more and more alike. After finding a speaker I like, I would spend a lot of time (not necessarily money) finding an amp that really works well with my speaker (great speakers, and great amps can sound bad if this interface is not well matched), and I would learn somethin about speaker placement and treating room acoustics.