Quote Originally Posted by audio amateur
I think you're a little nuts to base that 50K around a 5K speaker. It's not a bad speaker, I've heard it, but for that kind of money he could get something waaaay more exotic (that sounds better, too.)

Funny that even if I had that kind of money I'd never spend so much on audio equipment. Well that's just me.
I bet you're having fun in the process so enjoy! (Oh, and helping the UK economy can't be a bad thing )
Well, I dont' have as such a big problem with 10% on speakers, but it sure as heck depends on the particular speaker. There are a few speakers that might warrant that approach, IMHO, that might include the Magneplanar 3.6R.

Thus my $50k stereo music system might look a bit like what follows -- I haven't confirmed the prices of all items which could be a lot higher or, less likely, lower. One constraint is that it must work in my current 12' x 20' listening room.
  • Magneplanar 3.6 - $4800
  • Rythmik D15 SE subwoofer - $1000
  • Pass Labs XP-10 preamp - $5000 ??
  • Pass Labs X250.5 power amp - $7500 ??
  • Ayre C-5xeMP universal stereo player - $6000 ??
  • Ayre USB DAC, (forthcoming product) - $8000 ??
  • Transparent inteconnects - $3000 ??
  • Transparent speaker cables - $2000 ??
  • Dedicated Vista or Win7 music computer - $700, plus
    • 24" monitor - $300
    • 2 TB NAS, RAID 1 - $750
    • Foobar2000 - free
    • dBpoweramp Reference - $36
    • Tag&Rename - $40
Total, (loose estimate): ~$39,000.


Of course, to make up the $50k I could upgrade to Magneplanars to Sound Lab, Quad, or Analysis Audio, but then the premise of a low speaker ratio wouln't apply.