What Is Most Important?

A good recording.

It’s amazing how they have that knack of sounding good on whatever system you play them on - from PC, ghetto blaster, car, home system to headphones.

Here’s a good example from 1956 that I’ve yet to hear sound bad.

Apparently it was produced by none other than George Martin.

@nutty

The media is the largest changing variable in how any system performs. IMHO

I’d agree also.

There’s a huge market in reissues and remastering, and just once in a while, they get it right.

I’m not sure about classical releases but with pop, more often than not, the original CD issues from the 1980s still remain the best.

A good example is the Beatles, where more or less everything after Revolver is best found on the original 1987 releases.

With classical, I suspect that since far more care was taken of the original recording quality, subsequent remastering is usually less of a concern.