SPeakers 90% of your sound

Ah, to hear even a mediocre system in a great room would change many minds here. The room is without question, to my mind and experience the single most important factor in good sound. It will expose both weaknesses and strenghs of a system, as noted above, to a greater degree than any component. Speakers and amp interface are equal, pre-amp sends the small signal to the amp/speaker and is second to the room.

The source is very important in that it can really improve dramatically the system performance beyond getting the room, pre-amp, speaker/amp right. A great source component in a system that is flawed downstream is not going to make a disernable difference.

I believe it so much that I am in the process of finally carrying out what I believe to be true, designing and building a dedicated room. It seems at this point to be the best investment I can make in improving what I currently have which in my estimation isn't even close to being realized.

S23chang

My point is that on an absolute level the acoustic properties and dimensions of the room matters the most regardless of the obstacles in the way, WAF, dimensions etc. You can only get so much good sound out of a poor room regardless of treatments. No silk purses from sows ears, please! What is of interest to me is how folks spend large sums of money changing out gear in the hopes of attaining better sound when the culprit is the room and the end result is they will never be fully satisfied. It they were satisfied, why do they continually change out gear? The room is that critical in realizing the best attainable sound. I'm not saying that the solutions for getting a good room are practical. That has nothing to do with it at all. A mediocre room can be treated to get as good as it is capable of being and this is probably the case for 70-80% of audiophiles. Maybe the remaining 20% are the lucky ones. I'm currently in the 70-80 group and know it, realize my options are limited short of moving or building another room which I am lucky enough to have the space for.

Your remarks may be tongue in cheek but while you are talking about other elements that influence sound to varying degrees, I am talking about the most important component in realizing it. Of course this is just my humble opinion :)

S23chang, my home is quite humble as you note, sure isn't a mansion but will be a bit closer with the added space :) I am building it precisely because of reasons you state, I can't treat any other suitable room to the degree necessary to obtain the effect desired, WAF to be precise. She is getting more real estate and I am finally doing what I have been haggling over for the past 3 years. I'm lucky in the respect that I have the space to do it.