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The best audio system on earth?

I know what I think is the best system is. It’s all relative for me it’s box count cost sexiness and shear enjoyment and thrill.

Mines a Chord Hugo TT DV L200 mk 2 an HX1.2 and Obelisk 2s
 
Samsung TV an echo and dual with an AT95e knowing that the Linn Naim source first needs challenging.

TBF I do us the Hugo for my £350 Samsung and I have a well tempered mk2 simplex and DV karat D something mk4 that does rock and roll
 
I haven't read the whole thread, but the best audio system on earth was the one on which you first heard <insert favourite band here> . I remember putting a tape of <favourite band> in my mum's Sanyo midi system and I couldn't belive what I was hearing. Like a visceral reaction - 'what IS this?'

Now we are are all older, and have been listening to music for years, that specific excitement is hard to capture. I still love new music, and I love to hear it on as good a system as I can afford, but nothing will beat that feeling of discovering something for the first time, when you are young, with little previous musical knowledge to compare it to.

Perhaps this audiophile thing is an attempt to recapture that feeling, that moment that hit you. Sometimes you can come close.

Realise I have gone massively off topic here. In sum, music is an incredible, magical thing whether you listen to it on a Boots Walkman or the system in the OP.

Sometimes I need to remind myself of that when I start thinking ' not sure that bass is tight enough'.
 
Woodface said:
I’ve never been impressed by the super systems when I’ve heard them at shows, albeit 20 years removed.
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Do people really think super systems are always the best that can be had? I don't think they do. I think almost all people here are much more grounded in reality than Oscar Wilde's cynic who "knows the price of everything and the value of nothing".

At shows I have heard super systems that sound very good on source recordings I can trust. Also others that seem to be tied to sounding impressive with particular types of demo music but which I could not evaluate due to the absence of broader, familiar recordings. And there have been others that did not engage me at all leaving me to wonder whether I was missing some point about them that other listeners got.

Then there have been many much-less-super systems that have engaged me very well. There seems to be no obvious correlation between price and value beyond some point. Just super system price anchoring IMHO to try and nudge up the value judgement of as many people as possible.

Ultimately over the past few years I have always returned home from a show, listened to some music on my own not-super system and thought "aah ... that's how it should be".

As per @exliontamer above I am sure there's an element of being used to my own system. Just as I have found that the first good recording of a piece of classical music can instantly become my favourite version. That initial impression does take time to evolve. However, over the past six-plus years I have heard super systems that might be a rival to what I have, but much more expensive and IMHO not necessarily better in my context.
 
Agree, John, that context is everything. I suppose if you have the money for that system, you can build a listening room for it / buy the building that it's in. Problem solved.
 
John Phillips said:
Do people really think super systems are always the best that can be had? I don't think they do. I think almost all people here are much more grounded in reality than Oscar Wilde's cynic who "knows the price of everything and the value of nothing".

At shows I have heard super systems that sound very good on source recordings I can trust. Also others that seem to be tied to sounding impressive with particular types of demo music but which I could not evaluate due to the absence of broader, familiar recordings. And there have been others that did not engage me at all leaving me to wonder whether I was missing some point about them that other listeners got.

Then there have been many much-less-super systems that have engaged me very well. There seems to be no obvious correlation between price and value beyond some point. Just super system price anchoring IMHO to try and nudge up the value judgement of as many people as possible.

Ultimately over the past few years I have always returned home from a show, listened to some music on my own not-super system and thought "aah ... that's how it should be".

As per @exliontamer above I am sure there's an element of being used to my own system. Just as I have found that the first good recording of a piece of classical music can instantly become my favourite version. That initial impression does take time to evolve. However, over the past six-plus years I have heard super systems that might be a rival to what I have, but much more expensive and IMHO not necessarily better in my context.
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Couldn't agree more.

I hate the way they are built up to a price, fancy casework, difficult to drive speakers requiring a killer amp etc etc. I think we are blessed in this age to be able to enjoy incredible high fidelity on a very modest budget. I look at some of the Wim products & think within their envelope they will probably deliver a more enjoyable sound than many 'super systems'.

Just as you can pay a lot of money for a bottle of poor tasting wine.

Lets be honest you really don't need to spend £10-20k on a system to have great sound at home.
 
Tony L said:
FWIW here’s the room in question:


(10 minutes in if my direct link doesn’t work)

PS As many here know I’ve pretty much lost all interest in modern audio. Certainly this sort of stuff. The best audio of the golden age was all about finding new and innovative ways to bring high quality home audio to the majority of listeners. Quad, Klipsch, Leak, Garrard, Thorens, AR, Rega, Naim etc were never cheap, but they were all attainable. Far too much modern audio is the exact reverse to my eyes; the selling of very old technology to a super-wealthy elite just by adding increased mass, bling and pseudoscience. I watched the whole show walk around above and as usual found it hugely depressing. A once innovative and vibrant industry reduced year by year to recursively selling the same stuff encrusted in ever more bling to ever richer people. A quick look inside Trump Tower before the bailiffs arrive.
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10 seconds of audio clip in that video and all I can hear is 80% room reverb.
 
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