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The most important link in the chain...

Hello everyone!
Over the years, I've read numerous different opinions on what is the most important link in a system chain. Somehow, in most audio reviews, you will come up with a statement about the importance of the category of the component being reviewed. "If the source is poor in performance, nothing can be done to improve the sound", "Preamp is were everything goes in and leaves from. If preamp is incapable of letting the information flow, result shall be poor", "Power amp sends the signal to the speakers. If power amp is incompetent, so shall be the signal and, hence, the music", "No matter how good your system is, if speakers are bad, everything else is in vain" etc etc. You can see similar statements concerning interconnects, speaker cacles, power cables, filters, power etc. I've read an interview of a 70 year old audiophile with a system costing $200,000 saying that power is 50% and equipment rack is 30% of the overall performance of the system! I think you see were it is getting to...
In your opinion, which is the most important link in the chain and why would that be? If thread proves popular, we might be able to create some charts; see how the audiogoners feel and think about that issue.
Thank you all!
myronk
t_bone
1,182 posts
 
I would have said "the room" is most important, but now that I read some of the other responses, I would tend to agree with the people who said that the most important "component" is the listener (and his/her priorities). I noticed when I thought about it how difficult it is actually to quantify how important the room is and making the listening area 'right'.

Seperately, I thought Mrjstark's breakdown of percentages was interesting, resembling lists I have seen before. It is substantially different than mine though it is easy to make a case for his breakdown, especially for a $10k system. At $5k, the 5% for cables/accessories is a bit low, even for doing that part DIY.
mrjstark
1,112 posts
 
Hi T bone.
Well it is somewhat low, but it reflects my own view on cables and tweaks in general. To give you more accurate numbers I did looked at my system a little closer. Percentage is just a guide line......I am not sure if I fit in my own rule table........??????
Lets see....(basic system like I said) :
*speakers $7000 (my cost $4,200)
*amplifiers $4000 (-----$2800)
*preamp $2600 (-----$1700)
*source $4000 (-----$2400)
*cables/tweaks/accessories $1,600 90% new
So......yes you were right....it is just under 10%.
However, voltage stabilizer is also used by my video components.
jaybo
4,478 posts
 
the software
talon4
185 posts
 
Jaybo makes a good point. The software makes a huge difference too. With digital, cd disc recordings are much better than say 10 years ago. But even today, there are large differences in recently done recordings. I've been buying alot of Japanese import cd remasters lately. For the most part, they are significantly better recordings than the average cd that you can buy at Best Buy. Of my Japanese imports, I have cd, cd/sacd hybrid and sacd only and almost all of them are done in DSD. As the technology gets better, so does the resolution to the master. Stan
mrjstark
1,112 posts
 
Yes, it makes the difference but it isn't THE MOST IMPORTANT. Some (many,many) albums can not be found on XRCD etc......does it mean that we should give up on our fav. artists ?? What about LPs.......Stan?
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