Emotional rollercoaster


I think I've been slowly improving my system over years. Starting with garage sale finds and tip finds to eBay and ultimately spending serious dollars on some decent amplification and speakers. I was even going to post recently about how the journey has been worth it.
Then this afternoon I tested an old Akai AA-5200 that I'd retrieved from under my ex's house (left it there 8 or so years ago) and I connected it to some old magnat 10p speakers I picked up for about $40 ages ago.... and behold.... I was listening to about $60 of hi-fi equipment that sounded extraordinarily nice and made me wonder why I'd spent a hundred and fifty times that much "improving" my main system over the years. 
It's left me disillusioned and fragile. Is spending big bucks a sham. Where have I gone wrong. It's an emotional rollercoaster. Help.



mid-fi-crisis

Showing 1 response by jameswei

It is good you enjoy the Akai and Magnats.

I remember enjoying my college system. Since then, the improvements have been in small steps that depended on me learning what to listen for, as well as more capable equipment.

Back in college, I didn’t pay any attention to imaging, musical details (like the sound of individual instruments vs, e.g., wall-of-sound), or second order harmonic distortion, etc. I just enjoyed the music.

The magazine reviews helped point me to what to listen for. I learned to hear the differences, small as they sometimes were. Sometimes I had to spend a lot more money to achieve a small improvement, an improvement I would not have even noticed early on. Was it worth the money? Only if you care about such differences.

I remember visiting a store during college and thinking about upgrading to a pair of KLH 5s. The sales guy said they were very good speakers. I asked him if they could convince me that the musicians were in the room. He just looked at me and rolled his eyes. Of course not.

Now, after years of upgrading, I can sometimes get that feeling of live presence. I can’t even name all the types of improvement that have come together to achieve this. But I am happy. And yes it was worth it.
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