A $3k dac with a $100 BOM would probably be more or less the equivalent of what people sometimes dismiss as pathological. e.g. I'm not interested in talking about pathologically priced items.
Please offer an example, I see AKM or ESS reference designs here all the time that are dismissed as mid-fi at best. Please document the increase in BOM needed to make them acceptable.
Only BOM?
No other costs? Nothing else matters? Hummm....
Help me out here as I try to think about it.... What's the BOM to make an AD797? for a 5532?
*Electronics BOM. Cases can get silly.
Mark, you can look at the 1000 part costs as well as any of us, and can tell it's awfully hard to price up your components, providing you stay with reliable industrial parts and not get into high margins boutique stuff. To suggest that a $500 dac, which is already high cost, and a 3k dac aren't within a 6x factor of one another's BOM seems difficult to swallow. We fully expect these stratospheric cost components to be luxury goods.
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On that basis $300 of parts might not be out of bounds for $3,000 dac. Benchmark DAC-3 sells for $2,200 and has IIRC a 6-layer PCB. Probably a few hundred dollars of stuff inside. Don't know how much exactly.
For a DAC made in much lower quantities with more exotic parts like discrete SC-crystal oscillators, it might be a fair amount more for a small yet real improvement in sound quality.
Scott,
I don't know how much opamps cost to make, IIRC you said before to the effect that AD797 doesn't cost more to make than other opamps do, marketing sets the sales prices.
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Yes, manufacturing costs are real costs. So is labor. So is electricity to run the plant, etc. But BOM is for materials only.
If we could get back to your original issue, that I quote prices sometimes rather than other metrics: For the case of JC and digital reproduction, I believe the sound he is looking probably would cost him around $5k to $6k to actually obtain. Doesn't mean anything in that price range would do it, only that there could be one he would like the sound of.
Quoting him a BOM needed for parts won't give him any useful information in his search for digital audio that he likes the sound of. (Kind of looked like TNT was trying to tell JC something similar, perhaps without being too explicit.)
Anyway, I was trying to provide information to be helpful to JC and to let him know that there is nothing wrong with having 'champagne' listening tastes (the problem for him is a beer budget, same for most of us in some areas maybe including other than dacs).
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I am working toward that goal Mark. I already have a new DAC, now I have to get the rest of the digital hookup. Except for your input, Mark, the only route to CD reproduction that I believe will give optimum performance would be MSB, but they are just too expensive. I want to avoid CD's almost entirely and go the hi performance route for digital playback, like Richard.
For the record, I know that the OPPO 105 just is not enough, even at SACD or 24-96K, CD is almost a joke.
For the record, I know that the OPPO 105 just is not enough, even at SACD or 24-96K, CD is almost a joke.
IC and retail audio are so different that they cannot be fairly compared.
If we have 100 dollars invested in a product, it has to sell for more than 2 times to have a profit. 3 times is about as low as you can go. That goes to a distributor and they need same 3X markup. The retailer needs his 3X markup... (usually 5X). There is your $1000 plus price to consumer.
IC are sold not thru retailer stores. Either direct from factory or a high volume distributor only. The iC package weight is very much lower.
Shipping costs are approaching product value. An audio power amp can cost hundreds to ship. Free shipping? hahaha. sure.
Direct sales from manufacturer to consumer via internet should lower those middle-man markups and reduce costs to consumer. However, a lot of that savings will get offset with increasing shipping charges.... espec for USA which is almost an island separated by two large oceans on each side.
THx-RNMarsh
If we have 100 dollars invested in a product, it has to sell for more than 2 times to have a profit. 3 times is about as low as you can go. That goes to a distributor and they need same 3X markup. The retailer needs his 3X markup... (usually 5X). There is your $1000 plus price to consumer.
IC are sold not thru retailer stores. Either direct from factory or a high volume distributor only. The iC package weight is very much lower.
Shipping costs are approaching product value. An audio power amp can cost hundreds to ship. Free shipping? hahaha. sure.
Direct sales from manufacturer to consumer via internet should lower those middle-man markups and reduce costs to consumer. However, a lot of that savings will get offset with increasing shipping charges.... espec for USA which is almost an island separated by two large oceans on each side.
THx-RNMarsh
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The limiting factor of customer acceptance for class A designs.
Very true. Shipping costs is a large driving force to go to smaller. lighter products. Digital. high effec amps and SMPS. Such as the BenchMark power amplifier. The future of PSupplies with large heavy transformers is ending. Or prices will be higher and sales will suffer.
(IMO)
THx-RNMarsh
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yes, I understand for the best Hi Perf audio results. Also, waiting for a really good small high effec power supply that does no harm.
Just saying size and weight in the main stream matters a lot to reduce costs and increase sales volume; From business perspective.
-Richard
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