Doing the "over analyzing" and "criticizing" is what took away from what should have been an enjoyable hobby. I was listening to "the system" instead of listening to "the music".
I did not say so in my last post but what actually started me to evaluate my place in this hobby was when my wife hired a 3 piece jazz group for my birthday about 7 years ago to play in our home (sweet woman that she is). Until then, I was pretty convinced that some of the finest audio systems I had heard (not mine, but others) could justly reproduce that sound. But it was obvious in the first few moments they began to play that, by comparison, home audio is not even close to live. Not even close. Why not is for a different thread.
One of my audio buddies was at the gathering in our home (he has one of those systems that I thought did reproduce live), looked a me and smiled and it was just so obvious that what we were both trying to accomplish with our audio systems is simply not even close to possible - at least with current technology. So why continue the chase to "perfection"? So I decided right then to begin to chase "enjoyable". And by that I mean, during a listening session, not thinking about the room or equipment or those audiophile "things" that we all chase. But rather, "did I COMPLETELY enjoy the experience?" And that journey is what has finally ended with my current system/room. (A journey no less expensive and occasionally just as frustrating as my previous journey).
A reason that "enjoyable" works for me is there is no universally accepted "standard". So I can achieve it when I decide I have achieved it. Not true if one is trying, with their audio system, to either have the performers in your room ... or you in theirs. Live music is the standard and while we may each hear live differently, we each know live when we hear it.
