For me it's wherever the choke point in the chain is and that's a relative thing for each setup and each person's needs.  It's a dynamic, continuously changing thing.  Unless you have LFF masters.

44/16 is good enough with good modern DACs.


I like the copy machine analogy when it comes to stages. Each amplification / buffer stage in a DAC or amp is a copy machine. Once you start making too many copies, it doesn't look so much like the original. Also some copy machines are better than others. This is why simple high quality circuits with few stages sound better.

wow that's the longest post I've ever seen. 

i say headphones and speakers always first. then amping and then source but it depends what your looking for and want. by concept all amps should sound the same and should be a ''straight wire with gain''. most good power amps are like this. it's usually the preamp that offers the coloration or that ''special'' sound to the mix. it also highly depends on the topology design as well. lot of amps like to have their own ''sound signature'' but that usually involves amp designs for more audiophile/consumer applications. professional power amps usually offer you that ''straight wire with gain'' but that's still very debatable cause it depends on the individual perception of sound and what they personally feel.

preamps though usually has the biggest affect on sound of a power amp though that's why lot of professionals and even some audiophiles like using a ''passive'' preamp approach cause they believe going passive offers absolute transparency and natural/neutral signal inside and out. i use the passive approach myself but that's cause i have no active preamps(except one on my sansui 5000x) and it's just easier for me since my interface has good enough voltage swing to power my amp at full output and i like the nice clean sound i get. headamps i have no idea to be honest cause i have very little experience with them and feel no need of pursuing them since i feel i'm doing fine driving my headphones off of speaker outputs of my power amps and receivers. if i want a different sound i probably invest in different preamp or something but so far i'm more then satisfied. that's me though.

reason why i say source last is cause soundcards performance improved a lot. this ain't the early 90's anymore where the south and north bridge was still separated and software cpu cycling is in their infant state anymore. software and hardware has became much more advance/effcient and soundcards has too. for simple playback and very basic recording it is fine to use. people tend to exaggerate onboard sound a lot.if your into recording and need balanced outputs and inputs and extra headroom then it can be worth the upgrade. most stuff anyways is limited to 16/44 still. for music listening and playback things like onboard or a cheap soundcard(soundblaster audigy 2 or behringer UFO202) is perfect and will function very  well. using 24/96 or 24/192 is just for extra headroom for recording.

it all depends what you want and your needs but getting best speakers or headphones you can afford is always most important.