My point is high end is relative. Low end is obvious, but high end is most likely somewhere in between. I think I hear everything, but the differences between my 25 year old stereoe and my 2011 car stereo are stupid. The 2011 car stereo is horrible compared to the stereo of 25 years ago.
Boss you hit it. I will upgrade, but I will not go overboard. Scat gets it too. I am actually hyped to get back to music.
Here is a great website to learn or even purchase any type of component you may be looking for. Consists of intelligent people who really know their stuff. http://app.audiogon.com/ As far as spending a lot of money you get to the point of diminishing returns where twice as much money only gets you a 10% improvement in sound. When I got a separate preamp and amp it made a big difference in my system however. It was money well spent.
Those electrostatic speakers are probably closer to $50k for the pair, if you can find them. I started a thread on the same subject many years ago. You can probably find it by searching for it. Some good advice...
I'm sure a lot of young people's only concept of music is MP3 or equivalent... some of that isn't bad, but some is really crappy. Even a great system can't make it sound good. If anyone cares to take a flyer on my recommendation... the Denver Symphony Orchestra guy who bought my Kef 104s asked for the ID of a disk I played for him. If you appreciate classical music and especially Haydn concerti... check out Denon # 38C37-7094... "J.Haydyn, 3 Quartets for 2 Violins...", performed by the Berlin Philharmonic.. it's fabulous!
I found that high end audio is like nice whiskey. Each speaker sounds differently. When I was buying my bowers and Wilkins it was a big purchase for me. I listened to tons of speakers. In my house they all probably would sound "good" but when compared side by side they had noticeable differences. Some would have a poppy base. Some would have a warmer treble. Etc. There's a lot of personal preference involved. My wife even noticed that swapping CD players (nothing fancy to a little more fancy) changed the sound a lot. I liked the not so fancy.
free shipping. http://www.ebay.com/itm/WESTLAKE-AU...91?pt=Speakers_Subwoofers&hash=item45f94f2abb http://www.ebay.com/itm/220890708039?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1438.l2649
$645 FOR TODAY, soory for the caps lock. Getting to updating the stereo. My kids have Ipods, and I think, and I say I think , they are missing sound, but they have no clue what I am saying. This week maybe a goal for me and to express to the kids.
I've had my KEF 103.2 reference series speakers since the late 1980s and still love them. I've heard some speakers that sound as good as my old Kefs but they were ~$80k for the pair and they were very large. I've had the same old QED P300 amplifier since the late '80s as well. I've heard an amp or two that sound as good or better than my QED but they were also ridiculously expensive and were vacuum tube amplifiers. My QED is solid state (BJT). Someday I would like a nice tube amp. My pre-amp is a modern piece (Adcom GFP-750) and uses a couple of FETs. I love FETs because of the very high input impedance and they work well with BJT amplifiers. I don't have a turntable anymore (sold my old Linn) and have been using a Rega Planet CD for about 15 years. Its got pretty nice sound for a digital piece. My audiophile friends turn their nose up at the Planet because it is integrated (transport unit and DAC in the same box) but it uses the same Burr-Brown DACs as some of the very expensive federated units. A few years ago I had a Fanfare receiver custom made with silver Kimber cable interally. I use a Magnum Dynalab Signal Sleuth and a custom folded dipole antenna I made on the front end. The last couple of years I've concentrated on making extremely high quality interconnect cables. Some of my interconnects are Mogami that I've silver soldered with palladium RCA connectors. The rest of my interconnects are Cardas ordered to length with the connectors soldered on at the factory. My power setup is Audio Research power cables fed by a Monster AVS 2000 (a large auto-rheostat regulator/stabilizer) connected to a Monster HTPS 7000 conditioner/filter. I don't generally use Monster equipment but their power gear really is first rate.