Please tell me.

Drum75, like yourself, when listening to music I don't have audiophiles sitting in my living room evaluating my system each time I fire it up, only on rare occasions. So it really comes down to pleasing yourself. I'm not positive but it seems that musicians, at least the ones I know don't care much about high end gear and are content to hear their music through gear similiar to your older HK. If I could theorize a little bit I believe that musicians are more focused on the music where as most audiophiles are defined by both their gear & the music.

What preamp are you using?

OK, I'll take it a step further and admit I'm loving having tone controls back in my life. It's been a long time. I like the option of adding a little bottom end to a recording that needs it by just turning up the bass. I had convinced myself that this was sacrelig!! Is there even such a thing(besides sunfire) as a pre amp with tone controls anymore? I realize if I go to Circuit City I could probably find one but there has to be a quality pre amp that caters to someone like myself.

Drum75, now you have really crossed the line--------- but since your a musician you are forgiven, (just a little humor here). There is a new affordable preamp offered by Halo (Parasound) that has defeatable tone controls (they are truly out of the signal path when they are defeated) so you can enjoy both audiophile sound or processed sound. It is the P3 and it retails new for $800.00 and can be purchased used for around $450.00 on Audiogon at times. Look into this quality but affordable preamp, do some research, you will be happy you did! The other alternative is to add a subwoofer to your current system for added bass response.

Yeah, I figured I crossed the line with that one. I'm usually more careful with what I say on hear but I was just in a mood and let loose... lol. I'm happy to hear people on here can appreciate a musicians approach. I have been enjoying messing with my old HK. It's cool to hear it on my Dyn's with all high end componants. It's kind of a reference to all the $$$amps that have passed through my system. I checked into the Halo pre amp and it sounds interesting. It has mixed reviews but definately looks like a nicely built piece for the money. I'm probably gonna buy one to check it out. I've heard a lot about Rel subs but I usually only use a sub for HT. For music I would need one that was real fast and punchy... but musical. Any suggestions?