Learn the secret to musical bliss for 360 pounds. Do you agree that speakers then make the most difference?

[Frank Harvey]

I do agree to that, I would prefer loudspeakers over headphones too. However, the thing you mentioned is that with your borrowed in-ears you are enjoying some music all over again. I'm sure if it is a portable setup than your source isn't very good (by hi-fi standards), yet the headphones make it sound very good. Hence the point of this thread-you can get a very musical setup by spending most of your budget on your speakers.

Its an iPhone 4S. I do keep meaning to have a play with some sound formats, as I find I only listen to a handful of albums when travelling anyway, so I don't need huge amounts of storage space, so I can afford to give them a little more room

Hope you forgive me cheekily editing some of your quote

No problem. I edit out of replies what I'm not replying to as well - no point quoting a whole post to reply to a small section of it

 

[relocated]

Source and amp technololgy is so good that small money buys you a player or an amp that measures well and will provide a clean signal and amplify it cleanly. The weak link is the moving bits of paper, wood, metal etc at the end.

All this talk of matching is irrelevant provided you have a reasonable (CD player say), an amp that will deliver the watts and current that the speakers need and bits of suitable wire in between.

The speakers make all the difference providing you aren't silly and are where the greatest technology and sound quality advances will be made in the future.

+1, jolly well said frog. :clap:

 

[Captain Duff]

In the past I would have gone along with the rubbish in, rubbish out line of thought. And I think it still holds true for analogue as a bad turntable can never be rescued by a good amp and speakers. However, with digital I think the differences between cheap and expensive kit are far narrower. Also of course there are uncomfortable issues such as in the few genuinely blind amp tests that have been held the 'experts' apparently often only achieve random chance levels of spotting the cheap amp among the expensive, or vice versa (cables are normally similar, but let's not go there!).

That then leaves speakers as probably the most important componant when it comes to changing the colour of sound being produced by a system (assuming your amp can drive them properly). Therefore I'm coming round to the idea (and probably far too late) that the ratio of money spent for the various componants in the digital age should be very much weighted towards the speakers...