The Truth About Expensive Hi-Fi-Price, Performance, and Why Diminishing Returns Don't Matter (Ep:81)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 23 ส.ค. 2024
- Today's highest-end hi-fi components can cost a lot of money. But are they worth it?
In this video, SoundStage! founder Doug Schneider discusses how diminishing returns and price vs. performance relate to hi-fi. What he has to say might surprise you.
#audiophile #hifi #stereo
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After 55 years in this hobby I've picked up a few things from reviewers like Doug. Here's my 2 cents; use the music you like to identify the specific qualities in music that are of particular importance to you. Musicality? Tonality? Dynamics? Soundstage and Imaging? Resolution? PRAT? If "all of the above"... then expect to spend a bit on gear.
Sins of omission are much easier to live with than 'sins' of commission.
Ear fatigue is a sign of problems in the treble.
Optimal positioning of the speakers is critical. But useless if the speakers are too big or too small for the listening space.
Everything matters but how much depends upon the overall fidelity of the system. The best speaker cable will not make a poor speaker sound good.
When upgrading, start with the source because garbage in = garbage out.
Synergy, synergy, synergy... a modest well integrated system will provide more long term satisfaction than a random collection of semi-incompatible components.
The room matters... a lot. But an inexpensive mix in the room of soft and hard surfaces will prevent obvious disparities in fidelity. Large, reflective surfaces between the speakers will lessen the soundfield.
Find reviewers whose approach resonates.
The best $18. you'll ever spend is for "Get Better Sound" by Jim Smith www.getbettersound.com/product-page/get-better-sound-e-book
Check out: Jim Smith’s Magic Formula for Speaker Placement
forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/jim-smiths-magic-formula-for-speaker-placement.1160118/
Bass and imaging improve with the Sumiko Audio's "Master Speaker Setup Guide"
www.thesoundapprentice.com/2019/11/sumiko-speaker-placement-guide.html
I'm not wealthy, so I must look for high value, high performing components. There are some well-heeled reviewers out there who seek to put themselves and their megabuck audio systems beyond criticism by everyday, working people. A wealthy audiophile, listening to a $30,000 DAC is not interested in proving that their expensive component can matched by something a fraction of the price. As you said, the best performing components will be very expensive but I can still get good or excellent performance by careful shopping, and looking at the detailed equipment evaluations found here and on other channels. Thank You!
Great feedback!
Mr X has a hifi system that cost him $3000 and he’s very happy with it. Mr Y has a hifi system that cost him $30000 and he’s equally happy with it. Mr Y’s system cost 10 times what Mr X’s system cost and gives an overall sonic improvement of about 15%. Is it worth paying 10 times the price for an extra 15% performance? Mr Y evidently believes so and that’s fine. Yes, diminishing returns are applicable to hifi, as they are the motor trade, the movbile phone industry, the fashion trade, Etc. Vut, if paying a lot extra for very little return floats your boat, then the criticisms of others shouldn’t bother you.
Mr Z has a hifi system that cost him $300000. It outperforms mr Y’s hifi by 5%. Mr Z evidently has more money than sense. That’s fine, his money, his choice.
I agree with you 100% -- no issue with what people spend on their stereo systems. My next video addresses all the high-priced stuff again -- and why I don't have an issue with it. My only concern is if that $300,000 system isn't as good as the $30,000 one, or even the $3000 one.
@@dougschneider8243 👍
I agree with what you say. Experience is the foundation of a technically good product. Particularly, if you are looking for a product that truly offers tangible benefits, it is better to turn to someone who has been in the industry for a long time. Tangible technical advantages are rarely achieved by copying a good and well-known product and offering it at a more competitive price. A tangible benefit for the end user often requires innovation and challenging the status quo. This is one of the main reasons why, as you rightly say in this video, truly innovative and better products rarely have a competitive price. Innovation costs time and money, and it is rarely within reach of those without experience.
Many of the "budget hunters" forget that. Development costs.
Usually, the room itself is the weakest link/limiting factor. Also, I feel that there is no such thing as a perfect device, every device has to negotiate a series of trade-offs in design while trying to hit a certain balance. Yes, throwing money into competent design and the best materials/components can solve many problems but many things are intrinsically at odds because that's how physics works.
Good points!
It's true that the speaker and room interactions can have a huge -- maybe the hugest -- effect on what we hear. It's often neglected across all price ranges of systems.
This comment is spot on. The starting point should be the listening environment. If the room is bad it won’t matter the quality of equipment you put in that listening space. What also surprises me is no one talks about our own hearing. Each individual may hear sounds differently. As we age, our hearing naturally deteriorates. It’s hard to justify spending lots of money on high end hardware if a persons capability to hear the highs and lows of music has diminished.
Main problem is how subjective the evaluation of music reproduction is. You could probably get a 100 "audiophiles" to give a 100 different rankings of any components.
Perhaps!
I pretty much agree with you. However, I'd say it doesn't have to cost very much to get top-shelf performance for certain things, like phono cartridges, DACS, and cables. Just my experience.
You won't get too much of an argument from me. But I think this should be interesting -- let's say for a phono cartridge and DAC, which would you single out as providing that?
@@dougschneider8243 specific models?
@@dougschneider8243 Do you mean specific models or which gives "top-shelf" performance: Dac vs. Phono?
@@HansenMath Specific models. I'm just curious what you'd choose to represent, particularly with phono cartridges.
@@dougschneider8243 I feel most Audio Technica, Ortofon, and Sumiko cartidges < $100 are perfectly adequate. I don't think the cartridge is as big a deal as some do. I've walked into great sounding turntable setups, only to find, say, a AT-VM95E was installed!
Very insightful about how important (and rare) design team quality is. After extensive research over several years, these are imo currently the best design teams per product type: loudspeakers & subwoofers: Dynaudio, amplifiers: Rotel, Dacs & transports: Teac, power conditioning: Puritan, analogue cables: Tellerium Q, digital cables: Tubulus. Interestingly, Rotel amplifier quality took a huge leap upwards soon after Marantz legend Ken Ishiwata moved across to Rotel.
Well said. You make excellent points. As a guy with a graduate school minor in economics I can say most of the audiophile arguments about diminishing return are nonsense. Consider this: to a drowning man a life preserver has infinite value, and all the gold in the world is worthless.
That's a pretty good saying. Diminishing returns are certain real, but very, very hard to quantify into something meaningful -- which is why I believe they're meaningless to actually discuss. But the price/performance conundrum, that's real and important.
Very well said !
We are glad to hear it!
Hello Doug… the concept of Diminishing Returns comes into play… 95% of perfection cost 5,000.00. 98% costs 50,000.00. And yes.. great designs are fewer all the time..
Thanks for sharing!
But as I said in the video, you'll always find people who'll tell you that even the smallest improvement means much more to them, so it gets, as I said, "messy" to talk about diminishing returns.
I was hopeful this video would be helpful but I was disappointed. It's just a lot of dribble that just went on and on without explaining about benefits of a higher priced component. Maybe talk specifics about the actual ingredients going into the component box which ultimately explains why things probably get better when you spend more money. You probably have this expertise but did not share it. That's disappointing. Is it the wiring is it the capacitors is it the isolation of the power box is it the volume controls is it the isolation is it the chassis is it the signal path once it's inside the box….. All these things are worth some comments but you're video really didn't get into any of this. I wish someone would spend time on these issues
That's an interesting point(s) -- but I'll start by saying that my point in making this video was not to explain why components may or may not sound better. Instead, it was to get the simple point across that they may or may not -- which, I think, will be surprising to some. But I do plan to revisit this topic in the future because, not surprisingly, it's generating quite a bit of discussion. Thanks.
The reality is much of the esoterically high priced audio gear are priced like jewelry with incredible markups...
This *can* be true, but within the swath of highly marked-up, very expensive gear *is* some good stuff.
It took me 25 years to appreciate the word synergy and understand that it has nothing to do with cost. I sold a pre and mono amps worth 50k for an integrated costing only 5k that matched with my Tannoy Canterburys far better. Now a few years later l want to upgrade my integrated as its so cheep compared to the rest of the system. Duh...
Great lesson!
I am one of those who think that diminishing returns do not exist in audio, except as defined by each of us individually.
Case in point: my rich cousin recently upgraded his already ridiculously good PASS Labs amps, to CH Precision amps.
The upgrade cost quite a bit, even with trade-in.
What difference did we hear? A slight increase in soundstage size and layering, and a bit better bass.
He certainly did not surpass his personal point of diminishing returns.
Let me add, that while I agree that more $$$ does not automatically guarantee better sound, there is a pretty strong corelation.
And yes, while going from a $5K pair of speakers to a $10K pair does not double the sound quality, it will sound enough better to justify the more expensive pair to many people.
@@pandstar I can't agree on "pretty strong correlation." I've often heard where there isn't. Too often.
@@dougschneider8243 Of course there are exceptions, I don't disagree.
There are plenty of giant killers" in audio.
But by the same token, I do think there's still a pretty strong corelation.
I'd certainly love to find a $10K pair of speakers that sound close to $50K Von Schweikert, Borresen, AvantGarde Acoustics, speakers.
Watching this video has made me want to get another skateboard. I must resist the temptation!
Don't resist the temptation -- do it! You wouldn't believe what a budget of $300 to $350 in a skateboard shop gets you.
Amen
In the 80s there were many $200 to $300 junk cd players. Buying a Philips cd80 was money well spent. A few years later, I dished out thousands on a Denon Das1 and Dps1. For the price of the Denon dac I could have bought 10 more Philips cd80s. After listening to the Denon for several hours I hooked up the Philips to compare. My final thought was, well, at least it looks good. They sounded very close to the same. 30 years later, a friend bought me a smsl dac that sounds as good as the denon. Though the Philips and Denon were light years ahead of all the cheap cd players at the time, technology has come so far that even cheap dacs today sound as good, if not better than the old stuff. There was a line that separated worth it to not worth it. I would like to find that line today with newer dacs.
Great story!
Teac UD-701N provides excellent price-performance, Teac is clearly run by engineers not marketing hypesters.
@@connorduke4619 TEAC is definitely known for good gear.
Just like high dollar hifi this video lacks clear and objective information about hifi that the presenter claims to have.
We continue with an empty and hidden speech full of HiFi secrets. Designers teams of design....???
If you know so much, help those who don't know.
Those are fair comments -- but they come from keeping the topic focused and a short length. Once I start naming names, it turns into a 42-minute video, literally. But let me give you a broad example of what I'm talking about. In the 1980s, Canada's National Research Council (NRC), through the work of Floyd Toole, outlined key loudspeaker design objectives that created "winning" loudspeakers in terms of what listeners preferred. I know of countless stories where designers who worked alongside Toole and now armed with that knowledge could produce better-sounding loudspeakers than those without it. That's a case where the designer, through knowledge and the experience NRC gave him or her, could step ahead. BTW, in terms of that knowledge, it's only in recent years that some other companies have adopted it for their designs -- and are now producing better speakers. Let's also look at, say, a couple electronics firms now armed with, literally, decades of design knowledge -- Bryston and Simaudio pop to mind. I know the design teams there. Armed with what they've now learned over 4 (Simaudio) to 5 (Bryston) decades, their designs are superior to anything they've produced in the past, and superior to many competitors. The list goes on...