Years ago I belonged to the Audio Society and went to the meetings. Then it became; instead of appreciation of diversity a competition of price stickers. And the stuff didn't sound any better. Your Mac gear is very good sounding and bulletproof. I would be much like yourself except I thought about building things to learn about the hobby. But now I have too many projects and too much stuff so; go figure! Is it worth it; I may sell off a lot of stuff and get a new set of golf clubs. And another thing is reading the forums and the Joelist; I am beginning to suspect and some of the posters agree that a lot of this is people chasing their tails. How many different amp and speakers designs actually are improvements? I wonder. I think guys like Roger Russel knew a few things and had access to big laboratories and lots of equipment; thats why they still sound good after twenty or thirty years.