high-end gear

[blaymire]

I’ve been looking round the various hi-fi forums (including this one) and what I have noticed in particular is the number of posts where people criticise hi-end (expensive) items of ‘kit’ ??, there never seems to be any critisism of cheaper stuff (and there is plenty about !!) and although it is a lot cheaper , it is still bad and it still costs money.
The latest rant I can find is about Koetsu cartridges (Mr Progmeister I believe) so the question I would like to ask you is this; have you ever owned one installed in your system ? .
I had a Koetsu black for many years , and although it wasn’t the most expensive model, it still gave me many years of contented , happy listening ,fact of the matter is , I wore it out and could not afford to get it re-tipped .
It is not only cartridges that come in for critisism, all manner of high-end stuff is targeted .
My point is this ; nobody forces anybody to buy this expensive ‘kit’ , surely the people who do , make their own minds up as to whether it is worth the money , so is it jealousy that makes people have a ‘Dig’ at those who own such exotic ‘gear’???

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

The hi-fi industry especially the so called high-end is a bordering on criminal rip-off, that is what we go on about. AND the stupidity of people willing to pay that rip-off. It has nothing to do with product per-se, as bargains can be found to justify those products as Applemarc found with Koetsu.

Let us look at reality, for a start about 50% of the price you pay goes into the pocket of the retailer. If foreign product then about 30% goes to the distributor. So the real cost of the product is about 20% of what you pay, and with most hi-end manufacturers they take about 15% of the remainder 20%. So in reality you wonderful product being sold to you for say £1000 costs £50 to make, can you honestly tell us that is not criminal. It can be even worse when a stone to put *on* your hi-fi that can cost £1000, shear lunacy.

No other industry is this bad.

[Fretless]

I did have a very expensive Mark Levinson system on loan for several years, the owner had no room for it and eventually reclaimed it.

During that time I found that I much preferred the musicality of my humble 80's NVA pre/power combo to the surgical sterility of the American powerhouse.

Through experience I have learnt that 'less is more' and carefully combining components is more important than throwing money at a system.

[blaymire]

but you still don't get my point do you ?? , nobody is putting a gun to the head of people and telling them to buy , you seem to be classsing people with high-end systems as stupid as regards other industries , we are talking about this one are we not ? and anyway , there are massive mark-ups in most products , not only hi-fi

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Show me another industry with such ludicrous prices. People talk about watches but there is real engineering in a watch mechanism, not pretend bullshit.

[_D_S_J_R_]

Look. Some people have huge disposable incomes and the few who are audio enthusiasts, require bespoke bling-boxes that cost a fortune and that offer some sort of exclusivity. I've dealt with some of the Absolute Sounds portfolio in my retail career and can confirm the worth of a Koetsu Black, which lacked the hand-tweaked cachet-loaded persona of the Red and Onyx models, which were individually coloured-up to sound all sexy and 'analogue' in comparison. One day, I'll have my Black repaired (broken coil wire) - and yes, it IS a very good cartridge.

Let me mention an exalted and very expensive preamp - the ARC Reference (doesn't matter which one!). The policy is to introduce a new model, do an 'SE' upgrade costing £1500 or so around eighteen months later and then another eighteen months later, introduce a 'new' model and repeat the cycle. Dammit, they've had around ten 'versions' to get it right, yet a precision attenuator or properly supplied op-amp chip line buffer are actually better in fidelity to the source fed them. Of course, there's nothing to make a noise about if all that's inside is a chip with a handful of passive bits around it but not in the signal path. Another example is Krell and its D'Agostino derivatives. Why use one well specified transistor when a line of ten in each rail (twenty in all per channel) looks better, all running hot - and I haven't even reached the output stage yet!!! (apparently, a number of driver transistors all linked together makes for a 'faster' sound...). I currently have a KSA50S here and at sensible domestic levels into an easy load, a simpler and far cheaper NVA A70 eats it alive for clarity and 'emotional connection. I dare say that if the speakers had a cruel loading and massive reactance, then the Krell might perform better as it could use it's 60 Amps peak output. On music into 'normal' speakers though, it's really no better than my HH pro amp, which is also burdened with 'features' necessary to its original role in studio - input board offering on-chip balanced or single ended input, long ribbons down to the driver boards with brick-wall 20hz filtering and more cables to the output MOS-FET boards.

You know, back in the day, Naim did have the right idea. It's just that they got caught up into using already obsolete circuits and refused to properly update their designs until fairly recently and even then, it's still basically the old RCA PA amp from the 50's with a single rail preamp circuit (OK, the fancier pre's now offer a twin rail +/- 12V supply), which pre-dates a Quad 33/303.

So yes, I do feel that Top End is more of dream-fulfilment than actually extending performance. Sales of such gear is limited in many markets, so they have to have their prices bumped up to cover this. High prices mean they have to LOOK the part too, and this kind of finish isn't cheap. The bits inside though, are ten a penny (really) and Glenn Croft has proved with his charming produce that a proper design is better than a more basic design but made with fancy boutique bits.

Lastly, Twenty six years ago, I owned an ARC SP14 preamp, which retailed then for £2500. I replaced it after eighteen months or so with a Croft at £900 and got a sound at least as good, although the thing didn't look as nice...

[Lindsayt]

I own some high end kit. EMT 930, EMT 950, Studer A807, Coincident Frankenstein (prototypes), EV Patricians.

Feel free to critisise them. They're not perfect.

Anyone on an average UK wage could have bought them over the course of a couple of years. They'd just need to keep their mortgage / car payments / vices down to manageable levels.

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

They are not high end Lindsay apart from in performance. They were never sold as overpriced under performing hi-fi jewelry. What you have is collectors items, that is a different disease though far more understandable.

[Progmeister]

I had a Rosewood in my system for six weeks with the option to buy it. I decided against it because I preferred a much cheaper option. Not because of the difference in price but it simply suited my system better. I don't understand how my name came up here?Though I have my suspicions.
What system are you using at the moment? Do you have exotic gear of which i should be jealous?

I’ve been looking round the various hi-fi forums (including this one) and what I have noticed in particular is the number of posts where people criticise hi-end (expensive) items of ‘kit’ ??, there never seems to be any critisism of cheaper stuff (and there is plenty about !!) and although it is a lot cheaper , it is still bad and it still costs money.
The latest rant I can find is about Koetsu cartridges (Mr Progmeister I believe) so the question I would like to ask you is this; have you ever owned one installed in your system ? .
I had a Koetsu black for many years , and although it wasn’t the most expensive model, it still gave me many years of contented , happy listening ,fact of the matter is , I wore it out and could not afford to get it re-tipped .
It is not only cartridges that come in for critisism, all manner of high-end stuff is targeted .
My point is this ; nobody forces anybody to buy this expensive ‘kit’ , surely the people who do , make their own minds up as to whether it is worth the money , so is it jealousy that makes people have a ‘Dig’ at those who own such exotic ‘gear’???

[brit-pop]

Good design and engineering has always been worth paying for. If that thing happens to be aesthetically appealing to you that might also be worth paying for.

Mind you I'd buy a nice handmade guitar before I bought a koetsu.