Joining here from Portland/Oregon to widen my audiophile horizons.
I've been mostly a lurker in forums for about 15+ years, working my way through bits of equipment to develop my interests, with an occasional custom built component.
I'm fascinated by what seems to really matter with audiophile hardware vs. what really doesn't, and what's in the middle. For example, the matrix of: Things which improve measurements but aren't even audible to the human ear, Things which *are* audible to the human ear but we have a hard time or don't know how to measure, Things which really don't affect even something measurable in the audio spectrum... you get the idea.
The simplest summary of my current best results are: Like using digital reproduction and like class A transistor amplification with some "character" to it. My favorite setups so far are to use a Pass Labs amp with a high-end DAC whose output levels are lowered via a resistor-based passive preamp.
