What has been your most satisfying component?

good thread. since 1984 i've had 3 pairs of b&w 802's (most recently matrix s3's), so there must be something there i find appealing....the mainstay has been the mac c22 II. my second favorite pre of all time(next to the marantz 7), and its not going anywhere.

I have two. The audio refinement complete. I've managed to own it five different times. I've sold and rebought. I think I'm sticking with it now. Even if I choose to go with another amplifier.

The second one is a mint condition 1978 Yamaha T-1 tuner. I bought it about six years ago and is the only piece of gear I've ever had for more than a year. I don't see it going anywhere. I have owned a couple other tuners, but the T-1 stays around.

Micro Seiki MR-711 turntable with MA-202L 10" tonearm. I've done the Linn, Thorens, VPI, SOTA, Ariston thing, as well as some of the better direct-drives, Denon DP-6000, etc. But this is the table for me, the day that it came, I put my DDX-1000 with Grace 714 arm up for sale.

Audio Research LS-3 preamp...
solid, transparent, performs well w/ SS or tube gear.

The JRDG Consonance preamp w/phono- for approximately $3500 with the line-stage upgrade and sorbothane treatment which came a bit later (stereophile never acknowleged the new mod even though they gave a very favorable review to the original preamp). a very quiet/great sounding AND inexpensive mm/mc phono stage ($300) which i never felt the need to replace, was included. AND, with the new line-stage module ($450) there was easily a 25% improvement in the transparency of the piece. even after experimenting with some fancier preamps much later on, there was improvement in some areas, but the Consonance still sounded great. i see these going for $1000 on audiogon and i just have to smile a little- this was THE FIRST REMOTE CONTROL PREAMP ON THE HI-END MARKET, and the remote is still one of the best i've seen (200 volume steps, one at a time or 10 at a time), a big chunk of metal with phase, record out switching, mono, virtually everything is on there. inside the preamp you can set input and output impedence, plus a whole lot more YOURSELF without tools or solder. IMHO it's pretty special.