Speaker priority: high or low???

Foreverhifi, that doesn't make any sense! You mean to tell me I can use a cheap CDP or TT, get only a portion of the signal off of the CD or LP. Then use inferior quality electronics to transfer the signal the source did not retrieve from the CD or LP but have it sound better when it gets to the speakers than a good CDP or TT that retrieves more of the signal and tranports it to average speakers.
It seems fairly easy to understand that a good CD or LP played on a good TT or CDP will recover more of the signal and transfer it through better electronics (which will degrade the signal less) to an average pair of speakers providing better sound quality.
Speakers will never sound better than the signal provided to them. The idea of good speakers reproducing an inferior quality signal sounding great is impossible unless the listener has lowered thier standards to a great degree.
I would much rather own great electronics and average speakers than great speakers and average electronics. The former system will always sound better than the latter.

I never considered the "Speakers are the most important because they are the most flawed" philosophy. There is merit to this.

Squidboyw (Is he really fat?) throws the interesting spanner into the works. Comments like this have been made in the past. Is it possible they are without merit? I did not hear his experiment so I cannot comment with any credibility about the results. If he really heard that level of quality from his admittedly modified Wharfdale Diamonds what does this say about our pursuit of the perfect speaker?

I have long had the opinion that in a balanced system the speakers are the least important componant. This is obviously not to say that speakers are not important. There is no sound without them, although there is no sound without any other componant. I may have to rethink my conclusion but I doubt I will change my mind.

I'm am not an engineer so I actually know little about speaker design. Is it really that hard to design a speaker without major flaws and compromises? Just like amplifiers, there are so many designs and philosophies behind the speakers. Stereophile commented several years ago when when two very popular amplifiers of extremely different design came out that "If one these amplifiers is right than the other must be wrong." The problem was they both sounded great to their reviewer. I think they were a Krell and a Jolida, not that it matters.

So anyway should speakers be moved up on the list of priorities or are they where they should be?

Paul isn't your mutual friend actually named BOB Carver. How good a friend is he that you don't know his name.
In regard to your question; it was never amps vs. speakers. I would be more inclined to ask: Speakers vs. front-end? With this stated I still think amps are more important than speakers.
One of the reasons I did not subscribe to TAS is the utter delusion under which they (Harry Pearson and his priests to the worship of Harry) live. If this dr. green actually said what you quote I would respond with a little surprise and a lot of disappointment. His conclusions are unreasonable but since logic is nolonger thaught in school any twit can spout his foolishness and have it considered just as valuable as a reasoned conclusion.
What are the speakers going to add to the music that was not retrieved from the source or translated to the speakers? I just don't get it.

Tom and Cloudgif, I agree with both of your conclusions. Tom must have gotten home from work earlier than I. It sucks to work for a living.
Although I have to take exception to Cloudgif's comments about digital sources. Every digital source I have ever owned sounded different from the one before. Regardless of how one might argue that the pieces have nearly the same parts inside the differences are huge when it comes to sound. The point might be moot since Tom and I are firmly entrenched in the vinyl camp.
I am not as has been discussed by Squidboy suggesting we own $40,000 worth of electronics but we use $250 speakers. Which is also not what he was suggesting.
My point form the outset was that speakers are no bigger a priority than any other part of the whole and I wondered if people still went by the misguided suggestion that 50% of the cost of ones system be spent on speakers.
As I glance over my shoulder I see that I probably spent 50% of my total cost on my turntable/arm/cartridge/phono section. This, I would suggest is how 50% should be spent, but that's a whole new controversy.

After I buy my new speakers I am looking at adding on to our house. A listening room is one of the things I plan to work on, of course the pretext is to gain a better master bedroom suite upstairs. Without that and a little kitchen addition I don't think my wife would go for it.
I just want to say that I completely agree with everything everbody said throughout this entire thread. Except of course for...

Cliff, any significance to the fact that you end this dialog with a remark about your Veritas???

Asa I don't know how I missed your comments here. I like your starting point and actually used a very similar approach.
Once I thought I had the pre-amp at the appropriate quality level I pursued other things. I tended toward the front end and have now worked my way back to my speakers.
The speakers I own now are by far the weakest link in the chain, but I still am amazed by how good they sound. They will be replaced later this year.
At the most though their cost will only be 20-25% of the cost of my whole system. Call me crazy!

I bought new speakers a month or so ago. I purchased a pair of Sony SS M9 full range speakers. They are American made and designed. I think they sound great since I have good electronics driving them. They are much better than their smaller siblings in ever respect.
I don't know that they have changed my opinion about speaker priority, but they have imprssed me greatly as to how much difference a listener can experience with a better speaker.

Gmood1 I don't think anyone ever suggested using products in their system that are disproportional to the rest of the system in regard to quality. I think the amount of money usually spent on speakers in relation to the rest of the system is foolish. The whole point is getting the music off of the CD or LP, and speakers have nothing to do with this.

I'm not suggesting using $250 speakers on a $30,000 system but speakers have nothing to do with obtaining the original signal. I would much rather hear a superior signal through average speakers than an average signal through superior speakers.

Keithr your example though valid was one of an unreasonable extreme. Who would use $500 worth of electronics to drive $30,000+ worth of speakers? Wilson speakers are so good they probably would sound good with radio shack junk driving them, but don't be fooled into thinking they would be reproducing what actually is present on the CD or LP being played.

No speaker will reproduce what does not get to it from the source.