High End System Building. How important is the matching, cabling and room? Thoughts ?

The fact that electronics matter a lot when we pick our system pieces is well known and called : synergy....

I just changed a bad low cost  cable for a better low cost cables i already had  and added a low cost tube  preamplifier well designed to my active speakers and for my secondary headphone  for the best... Then synergy matter and can be helped as anyone know by adding the rightful pieces .😊

The fact that the greatest improvement will always be acoustics as in room or as in acoustics gear modifications using acoustics concepts , ( modification of porthole design and modification of the wave guide) these facts are way less well known...It is why they must be known ... This improvement facts going on with  acoustics basic are true even compared to most upgrades of a single piece of gear ... The only exception will be going from low-fi to top hi-fi  speakers which will represent too a high improvement ...

The two "schools of thoughts" you are refering to are not schools of thought but 2 groups ignoring that measures or tastes are not enough ...

One group vouch for set of electrical measures which are not enough at all and the other group in the name of "tastes", which is not enough either, ignore acoustics factors and psychoacoustics factors and measures and go for an upgrading race to improve his S.Q. blind to acoustics by necessity ( not all people own a dedicated room or know its importance )

There is only one enlightened group for me : People who takes into account all factors in the right order ...

I want to be clear....😊

Repeating common place fact as changing electronics piece can improve S.Q. will not change acoustic and psychoacoustics truth ...It only will add to the feud "between these two school of thought" ...

It is why i stubbornly repeat basic which goes over this feud...In acoustic we used "ears" and we use "measures" ...

@immatthewj i was blessed to be able to try my amp and Dac combination prior to buying it to replace my old Dac and amp combination. I was able to retain a slight by of warmth that my tubes had with the Infigo amp but gain in dynamic range , soundstage, speed, dynamics and decay. The Infigo stuff just took the top off and made it sound truly live.  I put a lot of work into my system and through the years. So I know what to put in my listening room. 

An interesting experiment would be to take two DPDT switches like these

And hook up two competing cables. With a simple throw of the switch one could easily A/B test cables. I wonder why this isn’t done by the cable sellers at audio shows. It would prove the value of their cables.

@mahgister im not minimizing your points. I think at certain situations a proper room can raise your system levels above where it is at. I agree with you somewhat but there are speakers and pieces that are just built better and sound better 

ossicle2brain

105 posts

01-04-2024 at 03:28am 

An interesting experiment would be to take two DPDT switches like these

And hook up two competing cables. With a simple throw of the switch one could easily A/B test cables. I wonder why this isn’t done by the cable sellers at audio shows. It would prove the value of their cables.

If you consider the alternative possible outcome, you’ve answered your own question. 😉

Incidentally, sighted switching (A/B’ing) between 2+ items does not relieve the lack of experimental design that can prevent bias in the outcome(s). IOW, it’s still not a real experiment, unfortunately.