How competitive are you with your system?

@goodlistening64  Thanks for the nudge.  I’m not sure I’ve got the same passion for golfing anymore, but maybe I’ll give it another shot.  I’d have to dust off the clubs and see if my swing still works!

I've had the Lintons set up that way in my living room for a while. In my case, the missing piece was the right DAC—something I hadn’t been able to find until I finally settled on the Topping D90 III Discrete and the Harmony micro DAC.  It’s great to know you’ve also endorsed a similar setup. 

After quitting golf as a hobby during Covid, two-channel music listening took its place and has become my main—almost only—hobby, aside from jogging. However, I carried over a similar sporting spirit: I only compete with myself. In fact, golf is probably the only sport that truly allows one to compete against oneself. My goal in golf, which gave me a sense of accomplishment, was breaking 80.

My goal for my stereo system is to create a tonally accurate, balanced, palpable, and immersive 3D listening space. It’s not an ambitious goal on paper, but it has taken me a long time to achieve. The good news is that it doesn’t require fancy or expensive gear, and my setup includes:

Wiim Ultra (DH Labs Mirage / Cardas Clear USB, 0.5m) → Gustard U18 (DH Labs HDMI 2.1, 0.5m) → Harmony μDAC (Mogami quad XLR) → Parasound A23 (Belden 5T00UP) → Wharfedale Linton.

And after nearly four years of continuous effort, I’ve finally arrived. The Linton remains unforgiving of poorly recorded music, but at least I’ve tamed it. As a reward, it delivers tonal accuracy, balance, and a wide, tall, and deep soundstage that extends well beyond the speakers, which are placed 11 feet apart, 4 feet from the front wall, and toed in by 10 degrees.

No competition with others along the way—just my own continuous journey of learning and improvement, if that answers your question, Mr. OP.

My system challenges me to a fight every time i turn it on.

Are you gladiator? Who are you going to fight with? Why do you wish to pick up the fight?

It’s interesting that the majority of the many people answering the question claim they are not competitive.  Why do they bother responding to this thread if it didn’t occur to them at some point how others’ systems sounded.

Just don’t force the issue. Most of the AGs here aren’t interested in competing with each other’s systems. Rather, they respond to posts like this to express their views on what they believe is the right or healthy attitude. In my opinion, your goal should be to assess how closely your system can reproduce the sound of a live performance on stage. The evaluation criteria can include timbre accuracy, tonal balance, soundstage, imaging, detail retrieval, and so on.

That said, my observation suggests that something may be lacking in your system. For example, in a previous thread, you highly praised a particular CD—a compilation of excerpts from various classical masterworks. As I noted at the time, in some tracks the cello timbre seemed off, and the mixing lacked proper center-stage image / focus. The music appeared to come only from the extreme left and right channels. Furthermore, since the CD is just a collection of excerpts, it feels disjointed—something many classical listeners wouldn’t even find appealing.

I didn’t mention all this earlier out of politeness. But if your system is truly as outstanding as you’ve claimed, why didn’t it reveal those flaws to you? Is your setup capable of exposing such deficiencies? If not, I wonder—how competitive is it, really?

@rvpiano Now you're diverting from the issues I was referring to and talking about something else. I can discuss 'distortions' all night long, but that's not the point. I'm talking about the cello's timbre and the center hollowness in the MLP recording you prefer. Just take my advice and move your speakers farther apart and listen again. Your current setup, in terms of speaker spacing, is masking the issue and limiting the soundstage. It’s not ideal. It’s not competitive.

@rvpiano  My system beautifully decodes the truly magnificent recording of Mahler’s Second Symphony by G. Kaplan I have previously referred, reproducing a live performance with an immersive sound field in my listening space. At the same time, it reveals the flaws in your MLP.

I strongly suggest placing your speakers farther apart to possibly expose the hollowness in the center stage and to expand the soundstage.

Who told you masking the issue is a priority?