We entertain a lot at our home, and when people come over for the first time they always comment about the stereo systems. I have a designated music system in almost every room of the house, and a lot of times people ask "can you really hear the difference between that and a $200 radio?" so of course I throw a system on so they can hear it, some can't tell the difference between my 1200 watt 2.2 system and their cars radio tuned to an fm station, but others can't believe the difference in what they thought sounded "good" and what does sound "good".
So anyway we had a few friends over about 2 weeks ago {my butcher gave me a boneless rib roast that someone ordered and cancelled, we cooked it up and invited a few people over}, my friend John brought his brother and sister in law with him for dinner {they were with them when we invited them over and we had plenty for everyone}.
Johns Brother and sister in law like most others noticed the stereo systems, guitars, and juke boxes and asked us if we liked music, lol... I said "yah, we listen to more music than we watch tv" and he was really impressed with my front parlor {where I spend most of my time listening, the room has no tv}. So I asked him what his favorite song was while I turned on the dac, Their favorite song was Bruce's Human Touch, which of course I have on my ipad. As it played and I let them sit in the center, I could tell they were hooked.
Him and his wife brought it up a few times through the night, mentioning they had room in their house for a music only system, and asked what something like that costs. I told them they can get a really impressive system for under $3000 and after we ate, we gave them the complete tour of the house and I showed him my 2.2 csb1 system that only cost a couple thousand to put together, before the night was through he asked if I could make a list of what he would have to buy, and I explained you have to go and look and listen for yourself and pick what you like, since his wife was also worried about aesthetics...
We went online and I showed him a couple things, he really liked the systems with the subs and liked how "full" the room sounded when the subs were in vs out.... After a few minutes on the web he made a list...
denon 697 $250, single sb1000 for $499, pair of sierra 1's B stocks for $830 {I let him hear my sierras} so for under $2000 he would have a nice system, he also wrote down the other sites I showed him, Outlaw, emo, HSU, ect...
Well I figured he may order that stuff sometime in the future, since most people will forget about it by the time they get home, but He called me the next night and a said "I made the order", so I said "great, for under $2K that will be a nice system" BUT it turns out he spent a little more than that, he ended up buying...
An Emotiva DC1 and XPR2 for around $2200 total with all the cables the emotiva rep said he will need...
a set of Sierra towers for almost $3000 in piano black
and a pair of sb13 ultras for $3000 in piano black
SO he spent almost $10K on his first designated music system!!! He asked what I thought and I was kind of floored, I said "it should sound amazing" and he asked if I would change anything and I told him the subs are over kill and I would change is them to uls15's but when he looked them up there was no piano option so he got dual svs sb12's instead and cut the price down a couple thousand. BUT he really didn't want to, I had to convince him his room is only 300sq feet with >9 foot ceilings and with too much bass the system will be way off balance and degrade sq, his reply was "can't I turn them down?" in which I said "sure, but why spend the extra $2K on what you aren't going to use, if you really want to spend another couple thousand I would go with better towers" he agreed and liked the sierras so that was settled, I also told him he could easily get away with an xpa2 vs the xpr and save almost another $1000 but he liked how the xpr looked with the dc1?
So that's another addicted audiophile to add to the books, just dropped $8K on a 2.2 that he never heard in person {there is of course the trial period, so not too much risk there} but I'm sure he will be happy with it... I like the sierra towers a lot, I own the sb12's and have had others buy them that also love them, the xpr amps and dc1 dac I heard at emo events and they work like the others, solid equipment for a good price.
He texted me last night {I didn't see it until this morning} and said the last of it is due in today and if I had time to walk him through setting it up later on, I told him to call me when it arrives and Ill come over and set her up with him, After all I have been addicted for a long time so the hour drive up to his place is a small price to pay to get to listen to another system...
