Audio Alto R101 FR Full Range Loudspeaker | Full-Range | San Diego, California 92111 | Audiogon
Found this today while goofing off on audiogon, pretty, but the price!
Found this today while goofing off on audiogon, pretty, but the price!
That is ridiculous expensive, the driver looks like a Alpair 7 or 10 driver in a TL type of cabinet. This could be made for 400 (if using plywood) a pair or so if you do it yourself. And i made a MLTL pair in MDF to test with a budget of 200€ (drivers, wood finish and so) with the CHN110 that does the same. It does not look that finished, but still...
https://shop.lpmc.be/product/sibelius-cg-weathered-oak/
something like this also, looks like solid wood pensils, 3000 Euro. Still, these are commercial products, they cant just sell it for price of parts
something like this also, looks like solid wood pensils, 3000 Euro. Still, these are commercial products, they cant just sell it for price of parts
$4k for an Alpair 10.3 ML-TL. And perhaps not that well thot out.
Home - AA R101 FR - AUDIO ALTO
https://www.monoandstereo.com/2018/03/audio-alto-aa-r101-fr-speakers-review.html
Retail: €3k. A retail product with a typical 40% margin means the dealer buys it for €1.8k, and the district butor is paying €1k-€1.3k, the manufacturer has to build the product, do the accounting, put them into shipping boxes, store them in a warehouse, on & on.
So i would say, that purchased in a retail shop, the retail price probably well reflects the best buy rating.
Many of us know how well these could perform and we know how to do even better. It also shows why to be a true frugal-phile one hangs around here and builds things.
dave
Home - AA R101 FR - AUDIO ALTO
https://www.monoandstereo.com/2018/03/audio-alto-aa-r101-fr-speakers-review.html
Retail: €3k. A retail product with a typical 40% margin means the dealer buys it for €1.8k, and the district butor is paying €1k-€1.3k, the manufacturer has to build the product, do the accounting, put them into shipping boxes, store them in a warehouse, on & on.
So i would say, that purchased in a retail shop, the retail price probably well reflects the best buy rating.
Many of us know how well these could perform and we know how to do even better. It also shows why to be a true frugal-phile one hangs around here and builds things.
dave
Dave, If I do the reverse math on the crap they are selling at Best Buy, that means the manufacturers are building them for about $50.
I guess that's why they sound the way they do.
This thread makes me very grateful for finding this site, and for folks like Dave, Scott, MJK, Jim Griffin, Bob Brines, Terry Cain, etc. etc.
4 grand for Alpairs in a TL. I still can't get my head around that.
I guess that's why they sound the way they do.
This thread makes me very grateful for finding this site, and for folks like Dave, Scott, MJK, Jim Griffin, Bob Brines, Terry Cain, etc. etc.
4 grand for Alpairs in a TL. I still can't get my head around that.
Alot of BEst Buy stuff is sold because it has a higher margin. But they could also be their own distributor.
But yes, you go backwards from almost any retail product and the actual cost of manufacture is very small… here you go cogi, $10 for drivers and an XO, box bits (including shipping), say $20-40 (they have to be at least acceptable cosmetically) for them…
dave
But yes, you go backwards from almost any retail product and the actual cost of manufacture is very small… here you go cogi, $10 for drivers and an XO, box bits (including shipping), say $20-40 (they have to be at least acceptable cosmetically) for them…
dave
In this case, given the retail source, the price is perfectly reasonable. But those chains of distribution and we are getting more choice directly from the manufacturer, and diy keeps growing.
I am pretty sure this €3k speaker will smke th elast $10k CAD speaker i heard at the local hifi emporium. A Sonus Faber. Given its parts the price is probably reasonable.
dave
I am pretty sure this €3k speaker will smke th elast $10k CAD speaker i heard at the local hifi emporium. A Sonus Faber. Given its parts the price is probably reasonable.
dave
Indeed. Just to expand on what Dave said above, most of these manufacturers fall into a mid-ground somewhere between individual custom builds and mass-manufacturing. In most such cases, assuming a conventional distribution network with dealers & the like, the approximate 'rule of thirds' applies, i.e. the manufacturer sells the product to a distributor for about 1/3 the end retail price. The distributor then does more or less the same to their dealership network.
Taking a $3,000 price to the end-customer then, the manufacturer, out of their $1,000 cut has to pay for all materials, their manufacturing & office facilities, design, equipment, staff wages, pension & other relevant contributions, power and services, business & other national / local taxes, storage, packaging, shipping etc., and still have something left over for profit. The mid-ground is a rather difficult place for companies to be given how competitive this market segment is, the modest number of sales involved, and the lack of room they have in either direction to do much with pricing.
In this case, I suspect it's a nice speaker -as a DIYer I wouldn't personally spend that amount on it, but for those who are not DIYers, a different set of value / performance scales come into play, like any other pricey purchase, be it a watch, car or whatever.
Taking a $3,000 price to the end-customer then, the manufacturer, out of their $1,000 cut has to pay for all materials, their manufacturing & office facilities, design, equipment, staff wages, pension & other relevant contributions, power and services, business & other national / local taxes, storage, packaging, shipping etc., and still have something left over for profit. The mid-ground is a rather difficult place for companies to be given how competitive this market segment is, the modest number of sales involved, and the lack of room they have in either direction to do much with pricing.
In this case, I suspect it's a nice speaker -as a DIYer I wouldn't personally spend that amount on it, but for those who are not DIYers, a different set of value / performance scales come into play, like any other pricey purchase, be it a watch, car or whatever.
Here are some interesting comparisons, particularly the Wilmslow Audio site where you can compare different options 6moons audio reviews: Robyatt Audio Ridge Essence JORDAN EIKONA VTL Dave, some actual measurements of these speakers on 6moons, not simulations.
I don't like to cause disappointment, but those measurements are not of the VTL, they're the anechoic MLSSA plots of the JX92S that were on the Jordan site at the time that review was written. The wayback machine is your friend: JX92S MLSSA graphs The most obvious clue is the impedance graph which clearly shows a single peak at the driver's rated Fs. The VTL was / is not an especially heavily damped design as-is, and would not produce a plot like that.
Be that as it may, the Wilmslow is indeed a good demonstration of what happens, with price almost doubling for a fully built & finished pair in MDF. And that's with a direct sales model from a long-established, specialist company with a relatively wide range of product offerings & some degree of economies of scale on its side.
Be that as it may, the Wilmslow is indeed a good demonstration of what happens, with price almost doubling for a fully built & finished pair in MDF. And that's with a direct sales model from a long-established, specialist company with a relatively wide range of product offerings & some degree of economies of scale on its side.
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I'd be disappointed if they didn't sound like that and more like the simulation.
No doubt; the fact remains however that is the driver response, not the system response of the VTL. I can sympathise, 6moons didn't provide any annotations, so unless the data is looked at critically it would be natural to assume it was of the VTL.
Naturally the FR is still valid above the mass-corner frequency, notwithstanding step-loss etc., since the VTL is a bass load. In practice there will be a resonance train in operation visible primarily in the impedance curve and LF FR (CSD as well of course); the 5th & 7th harmonic may be visible depending on how much damping an individual VTL build has recieved. Personally I doubt there would be too many issues with lateral eigenmodes -they should be at a high enough frequency for light damping to suppress.
Naturally the FR is still valid above the mass-corner frequency, notwithstanding step-loss etc., since the VTL is a bass load. In practice there will be a resonance train in operation visible primarily in the impedance curve and LF FR (CSD as well of course); the 5th & 7th harmonic may be visible depending on how much damping an individual VTL build has recieved. Personally I doubt there would be too many issues with lateral eigenmodes -they should be at a high enough frequency for light damping to suppress.
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