Hang the ceiling using an acoustic ceiling to avoid noise.

I have a scatter ceiling in the living room. Looks great and really helped. But it was only the first step.

For acoustic optimization, it's not about music for me, but purely everyday living quality. A room with echo and harsh reflections is simply extremely unpleasant. We have a ceiling height of almost 7 m and no feeling of being in a church. Music comes from rather simple HiFi from Atoll, Naim, Triangle, JM Lab. High-End was once and is over.

although I would still classify Naim as almost high-end ;) even if not everyone sees it that way. You just have to like it. But that's just my personal feeling. This is common in older people: hearing simply declines. It's an irreversible process called wear: the hairs of the cochlear organ (hair cells) wear out. Gone, bam, no more "good" hearing. It's simply promoted by aging itself, intensified for example by motorcycling, club visits, etc. Earlier (around mid-20s) I used to listen to systems around =/>100K for fun (HighEnd fair in Frankfurt, Hotel Kempinski?) I couldn’t afford them, but at least I tried to achieve a decent listening pleasure with cheaper components. But back then I still lacked listening experience; now I lack the "quality" of my ears. Advantage: much cheaper systems suffice to satisfy listening pleasure :oops: I once arranged a room around my system, now I take the space that is available.

I used to arrange a room around my system, today I just take the space that is available.

I feel the same way. In the 90s, you could find me at the Kempinski, also as an exhibitor. The system used to be the altar in the apartment. Today, everything fits in. That’s what I mean by no more high-end. The Atoll, Triangle JM Lab combo is really good. The Naim WLAN cubes combine good sound with the conveniences of streaming and are used more often. This really isn’t high-end anymore. It doesn’t always have to be Gryphon.

If it should be interesting in the Rhein-Main area (and actually everywhere), I can gladly refer a suitable professional acoustician. We work with him very often and the results are brilliant. Since we're already on high-end: in the last cinema project, the Trinnov field service almost left with tears of emotion in their eyes :)

although I would still roughly classify Naim as high end

That also bothered me a bit.

In the Kempinski you could also find me in the 90s, also as an exhibitor.

With what / as whom?

That also annoyed me a bit...

Well, I mean the "old" Naim NAC / NAP amplifiers (certainly not current WiFi cubes – what the heck are they building nowadays?) that already offered XLR "for home" back then when no one had suitable cables :-( Certainly not comparable to, for example, Burmester or others (just came to mind), which I found technically superb at the time. But back then, HighEnd was classified in magazines ("Low" "Mid" "High"-HighEnd ...) and not only the price defined the class. The typical English "soft" sound was praised, minimalist features criticized, but in the right system AND with appropriate material, you could reproduce very good listening experiences (localization of instruments...) with Naim amplifiers (unfortunately, I can only recount how I remember the tests and experiences from back then, maybe my memory deceives me, as almost 30 years lie between).