Percentage to spend on Amp and Speakers

Sorry to be so blunt, but if you have a relatively large room you can get the Maggies 1.6 ($1.5K), the Marsh A400S ($1.8K), a street DVD/CD with 24/96 output ($350), the MSB Full Nelson Link DAC ($800), and a volume control such as the MSB($400, or preferably an analog one) and have a truly audiophile system for around $5000, with true 24/96 capability ! Wire everything with Monster Cable ($200) until you can afford to upgrade the cables (north of $1K). Future upgrade: Adcom, Marsh or other good (i.e. inert) solid state linestage/pre-amp to replace the volume pot($1-1.5K),and the Sunfire self-powered subwoofer ($1.9K) for near-sonic heaven.

I disagree. I think the first choice should be speakers, then amp, then upstream, then cable.If you want to "voice" a system speakers have unquestionably the biggest impact. Then amps, then digital front end, then cables. When you select your speakers and your room you are voicing 75% of the system, if not more. The rest is fine tuning. The cabling is micro-tuning. Most of the tweaks are folly.

Rayhall, I fully agree with your philosophy of looking for neutrality. However, in my experience there are no "speakers which [are] generally quite neutral", even if you spend tens of thousands of dollars. I believe speakers are the most subjective decision, because they all make big mistakes, and you have the pick which mistakes are less important to you (and which virtues are most important). With regards to Jim's crude comment hinting I am using drugs ( I don't think he was referring to the Nearfield Pipedream speakers), I maintain that if you are chosing between reasonably designed solid state amps in a certain price bracket the differences between them constitute "fine tuning" a system. Actually, what I did omit was that the more revealing your speakers are, the more important that "fine tuning" will be. I would agree that with the best speakers around, the upstream decision (amp + front end) is close to 50% of the end result. But this applies only to very revealing speakers (e.g. Avalon Eidolons, SoundLabs, etc.). But in most cases speakers are easily 75% of the sound (again, if the rest of the components are reasonably good, OK ?). In fact, I believe many dealers advise you to pick speakers last because that ensures you are sucked into a never ending upgarde spiral. So there.

By the way Rayhall, I hate preamps, even good ones (I have a good one, BAT VK3i). My next move will be to get rid of it.

I think your poor impression of the Opus has to do with the more flabby bass control, compared to the super-tight Avalon. The Avalon in my opinion is a speaker to die for. To your other points, I just find it hard to define "neutral" when it comes to speakers since to me all speakers sound very very differently. For instance, I have a strong preference for first order crossovers or single component units, in order to maintain the time and phase coherence which you get with live sound. However, I have heard well reasoned arguments (and some not well reasoned) that time coherence is irrelevant or just not worth its compromises. I have also heard some speakers I liked which were not time coherent (by the way a sloped baffle is not sufficient). I really like the sound of good electrostats, but recognize they have serious drawbacks which can detract from the musical pleasure. The list goes on and on, speakers are very faulty in general ! Particularly when compared to the good solid state amps of nowadays, in the sub $5,000 range, which include such marvels as the Bryston 4BST and 7BST, The Marsh 200 and 400, and the Gamut. Pick any of them and you'll have fine amplification. Pick any of the good CD players from Arcam, Naim, or if you have more dough Muse, Metronome or Levinson, and you'll do great. That is, unless you want to shoot for the stars in which case you'll ned to spend a boatload (i.e. 20-50K) on each component to get them to deliver what you are paying for, not to mention have the perfect listening room. To conclude, there may be some faulty speakers that you would discard right away, but again, I'm focusing on the decisions you make once your listening has narrowed down the choices. At that point I would recommend you pick a pair of speakers and start from there, because they'll determine (together with your room) 75% of how your system will sound. Naturally you will start by trying them with the electronics that made you like them, but from then on you can experiment with different electronics and that is easier than the other way around. Just my 2 cents, anyway !

I agree with many of your speaker choices, including the Vandersteens 5 which are wonderful, although somewhat complicated to set-up (too many options). The Eidolon is ina ompletely different league than the Opus, the latter being in my view somewhat overpriced. You could probably argue the same of the Eidolon which is definitily not twice as good as the Vandersteen 5 or better than a SoundLab electrostat ! You pay for the finish and the smart sales tactics. On amps, I agree the Bryston 4B (never the 7B) may sound a little bit bright in some systems, but not so in all, and much less so once it has broken-in. The Plinius are great amps but in my opinion somewhat overhyped, I would still agree to add them to my solid state list. The Marsh is unbelievably good and my personal favorite, although it doesn't look very good. It gets you near enough to heaven. Thanks for your other recommendations.

Jim, when you say that the crack-pipe remark was figurative I wonder what you mean...figurative of what ? (figurative = serving as illustration) Also, I completely disagree that speakers are easier to upgrade ("For me, it's easier to simply replace speakers only"). Changing speakers frequently will likely throw your system off-balance more than changing any other component ! Now I'm wondering who's really been playing with that pipe. ;-)

Jim, once again, I believe that changing speakers frequently runs a high chance of throwing your system off-balance. Remember that the soundwaves you hear are produced by your speakers, not by any other part of the chain. I think a number of us have given you sound arguments as to why speaker choices are the most critical, and a good place to start. If you do not want to be convinced, so be it. But hopefully other newbies here will see the sense of it. And by the way, I still don't understand your use of the word "figurative", actually less so than before. Or let me give it a try: you're the kind of guy who would first select tyres and then go out and buy a car ?