mark levinson 23.5 or Ayre V5? That's the problem

Ayre, hands down. Every ML (the company, not the man) component I've ever heard sounds like it was voiced more or less the same: clean, neutral, and totally lacking in life, like it was designed by a robot, technically correct yet sterile and sanitized. I don't know what it is, and maybe others don't have this reaction, but I simply can't get past it. I want to just scream after having to listen to it for any length of time. It's perfectly right on an intellectual level yet totally devoid on an emotional level, and real music simply isn't like that. Hope I haven't insulted too many people with this, it's only my personal opinion, ymmv.

Actually, Ivanj, I felt the same way about the older stuff too, just somewhat more or less, depending on the particular model. I haven't heard anything 4xx. To use an analogy, I feel like ML aims at the Mercedes crowd, when I'm a Porsche guy. Refinement carried to the point that the joy of the experience is filtered out; technically excellent but the raw excitement is gone. Nothing wrong with that, just not my particular cup of tea.