Ratios of spending for a sound system

I was just in another thread that was talking about why or why not one should spend big bucks on a cd/SACD player etc.....

It got me thinking.

If you were given a $100,000 budget to buy a dream system, what percentage of the budget would you allocate to these categories:

Digital front end (includes players of all kinds or dedicated servers and DACs etc)
Turntable and cart
Amplification (this includes any costs associated with pre amplification , power amp or AVR capabilities)
Speakers
Cables and interconnects
Specialized audio equipment furniture
Room treatment.

 

Half for speakers and room treatment, sort the rest out.

 

50% speakers. 20% amplification. 20% source. 10% cables, power other accessories.

 

I think that the pre-amp and amp are part of the speaker performance. Great speakers = garbage in garbage out and need great amplification. Therefore I would go 35% speaker, 35% amp/preamp and 30% for the rest.

 

40% speakers, 30% source components (TT, Disc players) 20% amplification, 10% cables/accessories.

 

Not sure if you can really break it down to specific percentages, but I would likely go 3rds...... 1/3 cables/rack/room treatments, 1/3 amps/front end, 1/3 speakers.

 

$30K - Speakers (Spendor Sp-200 is 25K I don't see any need to go much farther )
$20K - Integrated Amp (ARC GSi75)
$8K - Digital Source (ARC Reference CD6)
$15K - Turntable/Cart/Preamp (I'll stick with my Oracle Delphi/SMEV and add a nice cart.
$12K - Cables/Accessories/Power/Headphones/streamer/etc

(What can I cay, I am an Audio Research Slut!)

That leaves a good bit of wiggle room since the GSi75 fills several of my needs (DAC/Phono)

Once upon a time I would have said that digital sources are not worth a big uptick in cost, but then I started listening to some of ARC's reference CD's and admit that I was wrong. I do think that the Turntable generally gets way more of a percentage of system cost than it's worth, but I freely admit that I am in an analog downswing. Digital brings me far more enjoyment these days.

 

The size and shape of the room tend to determine what speakers sound good there. I'd have to listen to some and make up my mind before divvying up the rest of the budget. But in most rooms, a pair of subs would be in the budget, for sure.

 

65% front end
25% amplification
10% speakers

 

Never thought of it that way and I'm not about to start.

 

20% front end
25% amplification
!5% speakers
5% cables ect
15% whisky
20% wimmin'

 

If given $100k, I'd take the first 20% of it and pay off my daughter's school loans.

 

Right around:

40% Speakers
20% Amp/Pre
10% Digital Front End
10% TT
20% Accessories & Room treatment

 

SPEAKERS first! Everything else second. (and you guys who spend bank on cables are nuts)

 

And what cables have you tried?

 

I've been building up my own system in recent years - if I could start again I would definitely have a good chunk on improving the room where the system would be placed as first priority.

Bad accoustics in room to start = bad at finish, no matter the spend. Get someone in to do the reports - it's money well spent if you are thinking of dropping 100K

10% room planning / accoustic tests / recitification (like resonance trapping / improving under floor etc)
40% speakers
45% components
5% cabling & misc

 

40 turntable and cart
30% amp
20% speakers
10% cables

 

30% Speakers (inc. cables)
25% Amp (inc. cables)
25% Turntable and cart (inc. cables)
10% Digital front end (inc. cables)
10% room treatment

 

And what cables have you tried?
And in which system did you tried?

 

I've tried many different cables in all of my systems. But I fail to see the relevance in that at all, let alone to this thread.

 

The first thing I would do, before even looking at gear is to address my electrical situation and see with the help of others what I could do to get cleaner power. I would then address my racking and isolation/vibration platforms. I'd also buy a KLAudio RCM.

The first piece of gear I'd focus on is the turntable. There are a number of tables I'd wanna look at, such as ones from Oracle, Kronos, SME and Brinkmann. The next natural purchase would be a dedicated phonostage.

After that I'd start looking for a nice high-end integrated amp (preferred), but a power/pre combo wouldn't be totally out of the question.

I already love my speakers, so there's a good chance I'd upgrade to the next model, the Genesis Maestro (formerly the G5.3f).

And lastly....cabling. I'm a firm believer in good quality cables, but I don't think it's necessary to go ultra high-end.

 

10% on audio gear
90% on a two year long round the world trip

 

Eh, we could put together a really, really nice system for half that...

 

Based on my current setup (not $100K) my breakdown looks roughly like this...

25% - Speakers
25% - Amp
25% - Turntable/Cartridge
15% - Digital Front
10% - Cables and Treatment

I don't think this is THE answer, just how mine is currently constructed after lots of experimentation and gear swapping.