Saw this on another forum and thought it was well presented:
"As far as playback goes, I would have to say speaker placement comes first.
This comes from my experience of hearing terrible speakers image in terrible rooms, terrible speakers image in good rooms, and vice versa.
At work, we had some sort of all in one DVD player receiver with small cube speakers(single drivers). And even in our concrete/metal room with windows on one side wall, I was still able to demonstrate to my co-workers what imaging and a soundstage was with proper speaker placement.
I've also had a few interesting experiences at home. I picked up a pair of Insignia/Best Buy speakers for my brother. For shits and giggles, I hooked them up to my main rig. Even with their terribly audible driver breakup and lumpy frequency response, they imaged much better than expected . The soundstage wasn't as good as my primary speakers and the images weren't as solid, but they did a pretty good job considering.
Another interesting experience was while tube rolling. I swapped out the preamp tubes in my Manley Stingray for another pair of the "supposedly" same tubes. The soundstage totally collapsed down to the same height of my speakers.
I have also found that transparent gear usually images better, but doesn't have as much of an effect on soundstage. And sometimes swapping out items such as cables(MIT) can have more of a profound effect on imaging and soundstage than changing other pieces of gear(CDP's, amps, etc...).
In conclusion, I believe placement is the most important factor, but any other link in the chain can also have a dramatic effect. "
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