JM and Ajani,
Your interchanges with each other are exactly why I have dismissed, and never have tried to understand the whole audiophile label. You cannot get a real answer to what an audiophile is. Some say its a love of music played through high quality equipment, some say its a lover of music, some say its a love of the equipment, and everyone has such hard a fast believe that they are right in their definition, that is sounds like everyone is wrong.

How can I believe or even understand what an audiophile is if nobody can agree to what it is?

I am left with so many impressions based on what I have seen. Some guys spend a ton of cash on their systems and had every tweak you could imagine. Quite frankly it sounds like crap. But they bragged continuously about how much it cost. They claimed they were audiophiles. Lover of equipment perhaps? Others claim they were audiophiles, and love great music. They usually had poorly set up systems with no line symmetry, which means no imaging. The loved the music, and wanted to hear it from their favorite seats in a room. They were not looking for a concert hall sound - just that it sounded good with good recordings.

I have had so many impressions, but absolutely no consensus to what "audiophile" means.