This isn't intended to be any sort of recommendation or review of the equipment I am using now but more a friendly reminder from experience.
Since I've had my system in its present form I've really been enjoying listening to music, re-discovering stuff I've always loved and getting to know quite a bit of new music too. I've also been reading more books, enjoying more films, and actually spending my recreation time relaxing. It has made me realise that the hi-fi obsession has been somewhat out of control and that all the testing, box-swapping and this forum have overtaken my life too much. Although most of the combinations of kit I've had here haven't touched the spot there has been about 4 times when things have come together to a point where I was enjoying the music and where I could have comfortably stopped. One was a system based around the Rotel RA-01 with Arcam CD73T and MA B2s, another was my Cambridge 740C and 740A set-up with Mezzo 2s, and the other was a system based around a Creek 4330R. The 4th is my present system. Any of these systems could/should have been a chance to settle down but instead the obsession with trying to get that little bit better led me through all sorts of 2nd rate stuff and lots of messing around buying, selling on Ebay, and plugging and un-plugging different combinations. I have tired of it all, and I've been round the circuit more than enough times to know when everything is right.
The moral of the story? If you are really enjoying your music, question whether you really need to make that next change. Value what you might lose as well as what you might gain. The whole point of all this hi-fi malarky is to get closer to the music. If the music draws you in, gets your feet tapping, moves you emotionally then your system is right. So why change it? Why not just relax, enjoy what you have achieved and also leave room for all the other things you enjoy in your life.
Listening in these past few weeks I've realised how removed I've become from some of the music. Some albums and works I'd forgotten, some had become shadows of themselves. Relaxing and enjoying them in wonderful sound is quickly re-invigorating them and, at the same time, the space left by the end of all the hi-fi messing has allowed me to re-invigorate some of my other interests. I could have done this by stopping with any one of those systems mentioned above.
Since I've had my system in its present form I've really been enjoying listening to music, re-discovering stuff I've always loved and getting to know quite a bit of new music too. I've also been reading more books, enjoying more films, and actually spending my recreation time relaxing. It has made me realise that the hi-fi obsession has been somewhat out of control and that all the testing, box-swapping and this forum have overtaken my life too much. Although most of the combinations of kit I've had here haven't touched the spot there has been about 4 times when things have come together to a point where I was enjoying the music and where I could have comfortably stopped. One was a system based around the Rotel RA-01 with Arcam CD73T and MA B2s, another was my Cambridge 740C and 740A set-up with Mezzo 2s, and the other was a system based around a Creek 4330R. The 4th is my present system. Any of these systems could/should have been a chance to settle down but instead the obsession with trying to get that little bit better led me through all sorts of 2nd rate stuff and lots of messing around buying, selling on Ebay, and plugging and un-plugging different combinations. I have tired of it all, and I've been round the circuit more than enough times to know when everything is right.
The moral of the story? If you are really enjoying your music, question whether you really need to make that next change. Value what you might lose as well as what you might gain. The whole point of all this hi-fi malarky is to get closer to the music. If the music draws you in, gets your feet tapping, moves you emotionally then your system is right. So why change it? Why not just relax, enjoy what you have achieved and also leave room for all the other things you enjoy in your life.
Listening in these past few weeks I've realised how removed I've become from some of the music. Some albums and works I'd forgotten, some had become shadows of themselves. Relaxing and enjoying them in wonderful sound is quickly re-invigorating them and, at the same time, the space left by the end of all the hi-fi messing has allowed me to re-invigorate some of my other interests. I could have done this by stopping with any one of those systems mentioned above.
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