List your System Ingredients: Listed most to least expensive, by list price or price paid
How did you proportion your system spending? You can choose to list by component name or type, and by the the price you actually paid new or used, OR by the original full retail price. Just be consistent.
For example, by price paid mine would be-
Millercarbon: Tone arm, speakers, phono stage, motor, cartridge, turntable, Cones (rack, Shelf, etc), speaker cable, power cords, room treatment and tweaks, amp, interconnect.
But by full retail price when new mine would be:
Millercarbon: Speakers, speaker cables, tone arm,
Cones (rack, Shelf, etc),
phono stage, power cords, cartridge, motor, interconnect, amp, room treatment and tweaks (fuses, ECT, HFT, etc).
Uh oh, can't hardly believe this but just realized I forgot to include my five subwoofers! The four DBA subs I built together with the one I had would vault speakers to #1. Although, just to be consistent, if adding subs and speakers together then should probably add motor, arm and cartridge to the turntable, in which case then going by retail when new it would be:
Speakers 38%. Used Amp 19% New Pre-amp 9% New DAC 8% New TT 7% Demo cones/rack/etc 7% New Streamer 6% Demo power cords/interconnects/etc 5% New/Demo Power conditioner 1% New
Amp, speakers, preamp, cables, turntable, power dist., CDP/DAC, room treatment, tweaks, UDP, streamer, cartridge, equipment stand, phono preamp, record cleaner, cassette deck and headphones. CD’s and vinyl would be ahead of amp.
Hi, by retail, Power amp, TT motor unit, Speakers, Tonearm, Cartridge, Line preamp, SACD player, Audio rack (not as total), R2R, Phono stage, Cables (not as total) Tuner, MD deck, others.
Speakers dominate by a factor of three or more. As it should be, IMO.
We didn't include amount spent on music, I wouldn't know how to add it up, but at least 500 albums, over 1000 CDs, and several streaming services for the last few years. And a dedicated server. The music sum may be larger than the system.
Maybe I did when I first started about 40 years ago and had to put a complete system together initially within a meager working college student budget but that was too long ago to matter now. It’s a new world, including when it comes to hifi, these days.
Since then I’ve spent what I’ve needed to spend at any particular time (within reason) over the years to get things to where I wanted them to be and did it one step at a time.
No major changes to my core system for several years now, though I have expanded and added other gear to provide more listening options both within my house and even from remote locations like work or when travelling.
As I write, I am at lunch break at work, listening to my music server located at home, via Plex app running on my Iphone, and playing via a wireless bluetooth adapter connected to the aux input on a very nice sounding Sangean desktop radio.
Sweet!
FWIW, I’ll estimate as a result I have about 30% invested in speakers, another 30-40 % in amplification, and the rest in source gear per system typically at any particular time.
Maybe I did when I first started about 40 years ago and had to operate within a meager working college student budget.
I’ve spent what I’ve needed to spend at any particular time (within reason) over the years to get things to where I wanted them to be and did it one step at a time.
Right. Same here. Because the trick with an existing system is to find the upgrade that will get you the most for your money. Only when buying everything all at once do you need to budget that way. So this is a snapshot. Doing it this way without prices or even percentages eliminates a lot of detail. Still I think it is illuminating. A pattern may be emerging. Or maybe not. We will just have to see.
Von Schweikert loudspeakers, Lumin Streamer Dac, PrimaLuna integrated. I like a simple system with limited number of boxes. I used to have a rack full of gear for many years.
tuberist, Is that it? Surely you have more. I mean the rule with ingredients is everything has to be listed. Is your system so simple it is just speakers, DAC and amp without a transport or even wires to connect them all together? Come on, don't be holding back on us. You list all the ingredients or the FDA gonna have a hissy fit!
Having paid $2000 around 1980 for the vintage Klipschorns I still use, albeit with 10 year old crossovers, what I paid for everything else over the years is all out of balance considering that to replace them would cost me north of $20,000 today.
I paid just half that 1980 price for my Earle Weston integrated valve amp in 2011, about the same for my Antipodes streamer/server in 2017 and a bit more for my Denafrips Pontus DAC last year.
Today, I would never pay 20 Grand for anything other than a motorbike or car.
pokey77 wonders about the point of this, ”Not sure you will find any meaningful trends here.” If Tina Turner were an audiophile perhaps should be singing, ”What’s meaning got to do with it, got to do with it What’s meaning to an audiophile’s emotion What’s meaning got to do with it, got to do with it Who needs another amp when an amp can be broken”
Seems to me like a very reasonable idea for a thread, that would be of interest to some even if (as might be expected) clear trends don’t emerge. For one thing, lack of a trend could in itself be reasonably considered to be a trend. For another thing, it seems expectable that many audiophiles would find it interesting to gain some idea of how other audiophiles have apportioned their audio-related investments, especially other audiophiles they may have become familiar with here, over the years.
In any event, at least so far it seems like a considerably more pleasant thread than some others I can think of.
List your System Ingredients: Listed most to least expensive, by list price or price paid
Not by percentage. Not alphabetically.
While all those might be interesting, the deal here is by price.
Throw in a few relevant details, key word being "relevant", so much the better.
almarg writes:
Seems to me like a very reasonable idea for a thread, that would be of interest to some even if (as might be expected) clear trends don’t emerge. For one thing, lack of a trend could in itself be reasonably considered to be a trend. For another thing, it seems expectable that many audiophiles would find it interesting to gain some idea of how other audiophiles have apportioned their audio-related investments, especially other audiophiles they may have become familiar with here, over the years.
In any event, at least so far it seems like a considerably more pleasant thread than some others I can think of.
My spider senses are tingling mmporsche, and my finely honed Holmesian deductive powers lead me to the inescapable conclusion a man with a VPI Prime Signature Turntable most likely is using a phono cartridge, a mysteriously missing ingredient. Surely a man with a $5k DAC and $5k record cleaning machine must have at least as much in his cartridge??
Yes, the foundation of a great system is the turntable. Well, if you haven’t figured out how CDs work, it is? Once you figure it out, there’s not much of a contest. 🤗
I figured out how my CD/SACD player works, but I can’t get it to play my LP’s. Guess I’ll just throw them out. The music contained in the groove of a fair number of them is unavailable on CD, but since CD’s make LP’s obsolete I’ll just have to go without that music.
List your System Ingredients: Listed most to least expensive, by list price or price paid
How did you proportion your system spending? You can choose to list by component name or type, and by the the price you actually paid new or used, OR by the original full retail price. Just be consistent.
Naw, when the likes of elizabeth and geoffkait show up the best one can hope for is a dead cat bounce. There comes a point where the inanity is so bad no one wants to be associated with it in any way, and so the asylum is left to the inmates.
But: people asked what use could this serve, what could we learn?
Van Halen performance contracts specified no blue M&Ms. Turns out the M&Ms were just a clever way of checking to see if the contract had actually been read.
When people can't follow a complex line of reasoning its one thing. But when you prove the same people can't even read and comprehend well enough to follow something this simple well now that tells you something too, doesn't it?
Or maybe this whole thread was a McGuffin. Alfred Hitchcock's term for whatever it is that serves to get the protagonists protagonizing. And yeah I know this is over your head, but maybe not everyone else's.
But consider. A perfectly nice little thread, more pleasant than most according to some, not only ruined but ruined with bullying. Trust me, elizabeth, I know I don't own this space. But do you?
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