I love my kit as much as the next bloke but I fear so much of this is a p$ssing contest for people who no longer go out and hear real music and need to look clever or big because they've spent multi thousands on their system. They insist on staying home and playing the same old stuff they've always listened to but trying to justify that by buying more kit, more expensive kit, kit to fix other kit, kit to fix the fact that they only stream, kit that only plays round bits of vinyl, just in the hope it might sound better/different?
Get out to local venues, hear different stuff from people you don't know but in your genre or not your genre for gods sake. Sooner or later it will all be gone and all you will have is what you've got or what's already been recorded. So sad for sure...
Sorry rant over!