bill10907: I was on the merry-go-round myself for about 40 years. I tried at least 10 power amps, both tubed and solid-state, 5 preamps, who knows how many speakers, some up to $42K with ion tweeters and spherical horn midrange, 3 turntables, 2 arms, 3 cartridges, 2 subwoofers, and a plethora of cables, some up to $20K for a pair of speaker cables. A few years back I discovered do-it-yourself products and now have single-driver speakers in homemade cabinets and High Fidelity Cables. Nothing I had before even touched what I have now and I am off the merry-go-round. Just something to think about. Good luck with your endeavour.
I'm happy but I want more, more, more
My system is a Clearaudio Performance SE table,
Clearaudio
Stradivari cartridge, ARC PH5, Conrad Johnson et3 se pre, and a Classe CA-2200 amp running a pair of Thiel 3.6. Speaker cables are Cardas Golden Cross and interconnects are Cardas Clear Refection. Now, to upgrade the pre to a Conrad Johnson ACT 2 series 2 or an ARC Ref 3 will cost me about $3500-4000 CAD, as will an upgrade to a ARC PH-8 phonostage. Any opinions regarding which upgrade, pre or phonostage, will yield the greatest jump in performance are appreciated. BTW, no talk about upgrading speakers and leaving Thiel as that costs real money and countless therapy sessions.