... and spending time learning about your listening environment and making a few adjustments can yield results as great or greater than some 'fine point' and potentially expensive equipment 'upgrades.' I'm not knocking all upgrades, some make a huge difference. I went from a top-of-the-mid-range Onkyo all-in-one to Outlaw separates and that made a distinctly noticeable difference. While on the other hand, replacing a 5-year old CD player was a toss up - either any differences were hidden by other factors, such as listening environment, or even though small differences were noted, changes on the 'plus' side and on the 'minus' side were roughly equivalent.

While slightly off the primary topic, I’ll just toss in that, if your room and SAF will allow, I think that, without exception, everyone who posted in this forum regarding genuine acoustic room treatments reported substantially improved sound within a very reasonable budget. IMHO, room treatment needs to be elevated in priority from near-bottom status on many people’s list to well above the minutia of some types of equipment upgrade.