Vote

I think it is still the PS3. Blu-ray, plus it is the best-sounding CD player out there. I put this up against any high-end CD player.

WDTV Live.

Althea Musica Vega Record Player

The HRT Music Streamer. This product means that high-end sound is no longer the plaything of the rich. And I can only wonder what this company will do for its next magic trick!

M2Tec HiFace.

Custom-made earplugs with a light 9dB Filter—for live concerts too loud without earplugs. Linear damping, so I can hear as well as without the plugs, only at a lower level. I attend live jazz concerts one to two times a week. Every second or third concert, I use them.

Sonos, again. It is still redefining the way I listen to music. As an audio value, nothing can touch it.

Aurum Cantus Voila! A truly incredible speaker. However, being Chinese, it lacks prestige.

Wadia 381 CD player. Astonishing performance, markedly better value than prior Wadia SOTA gear. Why doesn't Stereophile review Wadia other than the 170?

Anthem AVM50 V2

Grado PS1000 cans. Thus far, they're the best headphones I've ever heard (and I've heard a great many in my time). It's also a late night peace-keeper at my house.

Weiss DAC2

Meridian F80

Berkeley Audio Design Alpha DAC

Wilson Audio MAXX 3, Monitor Audio PL300, McIntosh MCD500, McIntosh MC2301.

My new Ftinex loudspeaker cables.

The new Heed Audio DT digital transport. There are some good CD transports at this price, but none that sound this organic.

Oppo BDP-83

Shindo Apetite

The Ayre KX-R preamplifier. The single most-impressive audio component I have ever owned and a shocking good value (considering that it is not particularly inexpensive).

Cambridge DACMagic

It is a small black box that changed my CD player: the WD202 from YBA—the first external DAC from YBA! An extraordinary product for a "small" price (€690)!

The Kanto Ipair5 powered two-way speaker system. A complete iPod integration product with outstanding sound and imaging. Beautifully built cabinets in a piano finish. The remote control allows you to navigate through all the iPod menus, including volume control and bass & treble levels—it also has two additional inputs for a separate CD player or other MP3 inputs. Great price too, and the best sound I've heard for iPods at this price range ($359).

The Von Schweikert Unified 3 loudspeakers! Also, Nova Physics' The Memory Player.

AudioEngine 2s

The VPI Classic 'table with the JMW 10.5i arm. Tell me what's better for twice the price! A real gem at a bargain-basement price tag.

The PS Audio Perfect Wave transport & DAC. We now finally get to hear the full potential of the CD medium.

Stereophile. Without it, I would be an audiophile lost at sea.

Wadia 781i

The Onkyo/Integra line of networked A/V receivers. These are the FIRST line of UPnP/DLNA compliant receivers which support hi-rez (96kHz/24-bit) audio content streamed from a network server. The Linn DS line are the only other devices I know of that comply with these standards and support hi-rez audio. I'd nominate the DS line, but the line was introduced in 2008. UPnP/DLNA will evolve into a very user friendly architecture for networked entertainment devices and will make other consumer digital audio solutions obsolete.