Musician vs. audiophile

??? not sure about crappy portable players, but how about $150k of pro audio equipment less instruments? I doubt that it doesn’t sound better than crappy portable player. For casual listening many do not care, but when it comes to recording they obviously do not use portable recorder or mobile phone. Musicians that are being recorded either at their own studios or other professional ones expect certain level of quality and they’re listening to themselves not through the portable player.
Musician that is neutral to audiophile equipment can more objectively describe performance differences more fair  on the bottom line.

Playing unplugged around a fire vs playing on stage through monitors or in an acoustic space like a studio cannot be fully replicated through a stereo. There are aspects she recognizes like dynamics, transient speed or tone in the Best Buy stereo but all gear offers a compromise. You like the sound your getting and you enjoy it great. Enjoy the music and forget the microscope. 

stringreen, the most brilliant musician I've ever known said the same to me when he heard his first high-end system (mine) in 1974. He knew the music of his favorite composers (J.S. Bach, Mozart, Beethoven) so well from studying the scores, that whatever his "flip-down" record changer (!) didn't reproduce, his mind filled in. And that was perfectly acceptable to him. Not all of us possess that ability!

The absolute worst system I ever heard belonged to a musician who played in the National Symphony Orchestra. Ironically perhaps, he was also a dealer for Cello and owned those really gorgeous piano black finish 8 foot tall Cello speakers driven by four (count em) Cello amps and had what inestimate to have been $10K worth of room treatment. Ever since then I just kind of assume musicians are pretty much, well, deaf.

almarg's first comment touched on a XLR/RCA connection situation that I recently encountered.  Following Parasound's method for bi-amping (also Audio Adviser support), I used XLR cables to the first A23 for the mids and tweeters.  Then I used the "loop out" RCA connections for the second A23 amp to push the bass.  It sounded terrible.

I contacted an engineer at Maple Shade Audio and he explained what was going on with my system.  It was completely out of phase.  XLR connections are faster and say 6db's louder than RCA's.  Yes, the bass was weak and very muddy.  I had a pair of XLR "Y" cables made and the old JBL's never sounded so good