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How do you determine how much to spend on speakers

Hello all,

I am just starting out in this HI-FI stuff and have a pretty modest budget (prospectively about 5K) for all. Any suggestions as to how funds should be distributed. At this stage, I have no interest in any analog components. Most notably, whether or not it is favorable to splurge on speakers and settle for less expensive components and upgrade later, or set a target price range and stick to it.

Thanks
krazeeyk

Showing 3 responses by drrdiamond

drrdiamond
671 posts
 
It depends.
I used to use the rule of thumb of 50% of the total budget on speakers. That worked well (40%+) until I found a great speaker that could be made arguably the "best speaker on the planet" by actively bi-amping them. Now the actually speaker price is a mere 25% of the total price.
I think that with the high quality of some of the speakers today, the percentage of the total system cost has dropped.
drrdiamond
671 posts
 
I don't think this took any guts. He was obviously able to choose the other products and make the comparison BEFORE the show.

Richard
drrdiamond
671 posts
 
Sean,
I was just responding to the statement prior to mine, saying that it took "guts" for Dave Wilson to put on the demo.
I completely agree with you about "know how vs. the dollars spent."

I personnally altered my speakers according to instructions by someone far smarter than I. They now, in my opinion will beat out speakers costing five times as much. I also purchased an SACD player that, when tweeked, far beat out CD players costing more that two or three times as much.

Richard
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