I Must Have Music In My Life

I've been trying to achieve the audiophile nirvana of a great stereo audio system. The last few years I've been upgrading my equipment and taking advantage of new technologies.
One of my greatest delights, relatively recently discovered, is that I can listen to the Boston Symphony Orchestra concerts live on Saturday evenings via computer tune-in but played through the audio system, even though I'm living 3000 miles from Boston now.
I'd be happy to hear from any other audio buffs or music lovers (hopefully both).

This page is a permanent link to the reply below and its nested replies. See all post replies »

SW-User

hello there, I'm a cheapskate audiophile

laotzu92 · 70-79, M

@SW-User i used to be; and i assure you i don't buy at the nosebleed levels of equipment found in [i]The Absolute Sound[/i].
Fortunately the lower end gets better all the time. What I don't understand is how so many people can be satisfied with MP3s and earbuds.

SW-User

@laotzu92 yeah, a decent pair of headphones is not that expensive and they last. My craptop has really noisy onboard audio so I have to use a USB interface but that wasn't a lot of money. The most expensive things were the speakers but luckily the room they have to fill isn't that big and we saved money by sticking with 2-channel stereo and got a random Sony receiver that happened to be 50% off and was more than good enough.

The bane of my existence is compression artifacts, it's just horrible with headphones. Pretty much everything I want is available in lossless formats, though, and the size isn't an issue anymore. It's not such a problem on loudspeakers but I use headphones 80% of the time.

laotzu92 · 70-79, M

"craptop" took me a bit of figuring out. ha!
the way I get the BSO broadcasts is via a Sonos Connect which hooks between computer home network and amplifier so I can hear radio stations from anywhere.
I probably will be two channel forever.

Codrin · M

@laotzu92 MP3 and AAC + earbuds may be suitable when travelling or jogging, for example, but it is a kind of 'can-music' :) Many people use them for HiRes flac files (24-bit/96 kHz or higher) are still expensive. I agree about BSO, although I'd have much to comment about the contemporary American style performances. Andris Nelsens is a great Letonian conductor, anyway.

laotzu92 · 70-79, M

@Codrin Nelsens is a tremendous improvement over James Levine as music director (and apparently without Levine's sexual predator issues).
i still prefer physical discs to HiRes because of permanence of product and availability of liner notes. Also I buy SACDs, although my system is now capable of DSD 128 files.
Thank You for Your input.

Codrin · M

Since some few years ago, many digital releases include the booklet. As for a Hi-Res file 24-bit/96 or 192 KHz, it for sure sounds better than a cd (16-bit/44 kHz). Very close quality to a SACD.

I agree that the system must be at least entry HI-FI level for the differences to be distinguish.