Perhaps we should stick with midfi...

"(for the most part we agree for instance that Bose is crap),"

Ok, audiophiles agree Bose is crap, but who has actually set up a system with Bose speakers the way they would with a popular audiophile brand? Who has selected just the right amp and preamp to make a pair of Bose speakers sing? Who selected the right CD played, turntable and cartridge to get the most sound out of Bose speakers? What about interconnects and speaker cables? Who set up their system with the right equipment and then, with the advice of a so called acoustical expert, treated their room to get the best sound from a pair of Bose speakers?

Has anyone here ever done any of these things? Probably not. Yet everyone agrees Bose is crap.

That's actually a good post, Rrog. I misspoke. Bose is sort of the John Tesh of speakers. Kind of an inside joke amongst the insiders. Yugo; Gallo; Red Lobster. They try so hard to be all things to all people that they become caricature-ized. The funny thing is, I was at the local Krispy Kreme today, and was blown away by the fact that they'd put a pretty expensive Bose setup in the ceiling, and you know what? It didn't sound bad! Of course, my expectations weren't too high!
So I should have said Bose is a joke, not crap.
**My wife is a designer for a local builder, and sells Bose. She however is NOT an audiophile, and will never read this!**

I'm sure if everyone of us went out and spent 60k on a system, NONE of us would have the same exact components. OP bought someone elses "ears". In that case, odds are not good for happiness no matter what the price. Odds are better that most of us could spend half that and end up with a better system because it would be based on our "ears". Hard lesson learned.

I think the OP achieved his objective.

Sincere thanks to all those posted - especially to lengthy posters who took the effort and time to share words of experience and wisdom...

They will help me and others get to the land of sonic-nirvanah.

I uploaded 2 pictures here :

http://s915.photobucket.com/home/Joong-In_Rhee

One is the new hifi system that's been lonely, and the other one is the beloved $1000 midfi system.

From chatting on other audio forums, I found out that my midfi system is pretty good. ADS speakers are well liked by many audiophiles, Onkyo Integra M-504 power amp is recommended by some experts as a good midfi piece, the Toshiba SD-9200 is top of the line DVD player with upsampling to 24/192 specs.

I just got lucky and ended up assembling a pretty decent souding system for not much money, and when I bought the hifi system expecting it to be many times better, I was sadly disappointed...

I am coming to like the new system a little more though - classical music (especially piano and strings) sound good on it. The reason I still prefer my midfi system is that female vocal music sounds better on the midfi system (and over 90% of my listening is that).

Perhaps B&W had classical music in mind when they designed the speaker... I am not sure.

I am a musician and I played on Steinway pianos and Stradivarius instruments before, and perhaps when I spent that much mulah, I was expecting something similar to the real instrument sound...

It ain't that for sure !

I am gonna try to find more music that sounds good on it, since I found out classical piano and strings sound good on them.

So to all the audiophiles who's searching for the realistic sounds, please look somewhere else than my system.

Maestro Jung Myung Whon (famous Korean conductor) prefers the sound of his hifi system to actual orchestral sound he conducts, so I know that a good hifi system can sound relistic - his system consists of McIntosh CD, pre, power, and 15 incher co-axial Tannoy speakers.

Perhaps it's the sony XA777ES (SACD player) and the B&W 802 D combination that's the culprit - both gears have been described as "annoying" when not matched well in a system. I am gonna try to mix and match my gears like some of you suggested...

I am glad I got into the land of SACD though - clearly sounds superior to regular CDs, and on Amazon, I can buy them for about the same price. Perhaps we should all make that jump sooner than later - all the digital lovers (rather than Vinyl).

I am sorry this got to be so long, but it was fun and educational for me.

Happy listening to all...

Horseface, I think I am gonna join you and hunt down classics on used market - sounds like sheer fun...
It's affordable, and just fun to try new things in this hobby - thanks for the tip.