I'm amused watching people from the homeland of the capitalist model deriding its reality and the profit motive.
There is no intrinsic value in a diamond ring.
There is no intrinsic value in a first pressing of a (insert name of your favoured and since demised artist here) record.
There is a component value of less than $50 in a $750 iphone
The value attached to an item is often the result of emotion. That emotion may arise from rarity, craft, or manipulation (among other things). It is still of value to the buyer.
There is no intrinsic value in a diamond ring.
There is no intrinsic value in a first pressing of a (insert name of your favoured and since demised artist here) record.
There is a component value of less than $50 in a $750 iphone
The value attached to an item is often the result of emotion. That emotion may arise from rarity, craft, or manipulation (among other things). It is still of value to the buyer.
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"If you're one of those fools who believe in such marketing hype, then enjoy the thinning of your wallet as those companies laugh at you"
Sony is an interesting company in this regard, as they market to a wide range of audio phoolery, from the "iHome" level to something like their $8.5k DMP-Z1 Digital Music Player. Now there's a company suckin on all the teats available - not just high end.
FWIW, they'll give you FREE SHIPPING (their caps) with every DMP-Z1. As if that would throw me over the brink of making a purchase. $8.5k man; it staggers the mind what this box can do (over those costing 1/10th) and what media you'd have to play, what headphones / speakers you'd have to use with it to be able to tell. Oh, silly me - Sony media and headphones...
Sony is an interesting company in this regard, as they market to a wide range of audio phoolery, from the "iHome" level to something like their $8.5k DMP-Z1 Digital Music Player. Now there's a company suckin on all the teats available - not just high end.
FWIW, they'll give you FREE SHIPPING (their caps) with every DMP-Z1. As if that would throw me over the brink of making a purchase. $8.5k man; it staggers the mind what this box can do (over those costing 1/10th) and what media you'd have to play, what headphones / speakers you'd have to use with it to be able to tell. Oh, silly me - Sony media and headphones...
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YOU are being ridiculous. Stop embarrassing yourself (as if you caredMy neighbor brought me a phono preamp this evening.
He wanted my professional opinion of it.The preamp in question cost him $20 at the local Sunday Flea Market.The box was an EAR 834P stand alone RIAA phono preamp.
I'll let you all google the thing - photos, reviews, etc. This product originally cost around $900 new, and on some current sites is going for $2500, used. For that, you get 3 12AX7's and some parts in a fancy box with rediculous claims that uneducated audiofools often shell out money for.
)Not this one. Sadly for you I DID google and found your claims ridiculous overblown.
1) $900 is a pretty reasonable price for an Audio product , in this case a specialized Tube preamp.
IF they were asking, say, $10000 or 35000 you might have a point, but for $900 you do NOT.
2) found a Lenco Lovers site https://www.lencoheaven.net/forum/index.php?PHPSESSID=49ss07pua66ir1r8dhtujced41&topic=26658.0
(Maybe you call Lenco a snake oil fly by night Company or product?)
who like, better say Love this product so much that they decided to clone it, design and produce whatever´s needed for that,etc. They will in fact DIY them. Google that word.
And no, it does not mean to become a member of a similarly named site and sit all day behind a keyboard dissing others, but actually getting the needed parts, all good quality (I mean _good_quality_, not _snake_oil_ parts) and, you won´t believe this: actually grab a soldering iron, a couple pliers and screwdrivers, a few other tools and a.s.s.e.m.b.l.e it.
3) they will group buy needed parts and make them available for members. Kit cost? 400 US Dollars. VERY reasonable I might add, even cheap for what it is. And you find fully assembled, branded, guaranteed $900 retail price high? I suggest some Economy 101 classes. Better yet, start by Economy 0.02 and advance at your own speed, don´t feel overwhelmed.
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Mind you all, I'm well aware of manufacturing costs, overhead, wages, business expenses, etc etc...And yes, that naturally computes into the mix for what a given product retails for.
Otherwise, a business could not survive very long.And I'm also aware of the small turnover of "esoteric products" that only capture part of the "audiophile" market.
Certainly a fancy phono preamp isn't selling as popular as bathroom toilet paper would.
But to inflate the costs so wildly on something, the only excuse is........greed.
And that to me is insulting, and the way a lot of product manufacturers have lowered themselves to.
Some of you snipping at me can blab all you want.Doesn't phase me one bit.
Otherwise, a business could not survive very long.And I'm also aware of the small turnover of "esoteric products" that only capture part of the "audiophile" market.
Certainly a fancy phono preamp isn't selling as popular as bathroom toilet paper would.
But to inflate the costs so wildly on something, the only excuse is........greed.
And that to me is insulting, and the way a lot of product manufacturers have lowered themselves to.
Some of you snipping at me can blab all you want.Doesn't phase me one bit.
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I really want an Electronluv amplifier. Yes, because of how it looks. But then I bought a la Pavoni coffee machine for its looks, and funnily enough it works beautifully. Like my Oracle Delphi turntable. Both well worth what I paid for them.
Look at the economics. If you have no income but the sale of one of these a month, you can't offer them for less than a couple grand. No matter what the parts cost. Simple arithmetic.
Some 'audio manufacturers' sell power amps for $ 50k. If they are lucky, they sell one or two every year. Again, the parts and labor cost here are almost irrelevant.
It is a business model. Why is that somehow wrong?
Jan
Some 'audio manufacturers' sell power amps for $ 50k. If they are lucky, they sell one or two every year. Again, the parts and labor cost here are almost irrelevant.
It is a business model. Why is that somehow wrong?
Jan
My thoughts about that:
https://www.diyaudio.com/forums/ful...e-driver-based-loudspeaker-5.html#post6089139
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While I agree that a lot of gear is way overpriced for designs that have been rehashed over the years like the Williamson, this particular piece of gear seems to be fairly priced. I do mostly DIY and while I could build this for around $200 it'll still look like crap. Getting a finished looking piece is more than half the battle. Doing metalwork goes beyond my ability or toolset.
I spent 41 years of my life working for Motorola designing products including cell phones and two way radios. The "rolled up product cost" is the total parts, labor and overhead to turn a bunch of parts into a product. A high end phone from the early analog days through the smart phone years has a rolled cost of $100 to $150. Parts account for about half of that. The most expensive part is the display. Yes, phone tech has changed a lot during that time, but so has manufacturing processes, and the level of integration. The cost of everything comes down when the production volume goes up. The old Razr had more components in it that a smartphone does today. The total rolled cost of the RAZR was $105 at the end of its production run. Motorola sold them to the cellular carriers at about $200 each. Retail was $450 (some of that was subsidized by the carrier or hidden in the service fees). Product volumes were about 1 to 3 million units per year. 10 million plus units per year are typical today.
We made two way radios for the public safety (police, fire....) markets. Unlike cell phones, a person's life often depends on that radio working. They are designed and tested to much higher standards, and built with better quality parts.
The parts cost, and rolled product cost is about 2 to 3 times that of a high end cell phone. Product volume is about 10,000 units per year for the mid tier radios, far less for the top tier stuff. Given those numbers, what would you expect the selling price for these products to be? The market, the after sale product support needed, and many other factors go into determining the actual selling price. Let's just say that they make even the trendiest audiophile stuff look cheap. Budget models start at $2500 each. High end units with trunking and encryption, well over $5K...and these?
APX NEXT Overview | Two-way Smart Radio - Motorola Solutions
I have no idea. I did a lot of the development work on the GaN RF power amp inside it, but I left Motorola almost 6 years ago. The "APX Next" just started shipping late last year.
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Since the 1980s the first high-end (whatever that means) audiophile companies pushed boutique style gear in the showrooms of audio fairs we have the problem, that behind some of those 10mm golden polished faceplates everyone with only a little knowledge can spot parts inside, that are not worth being employed behind such bling bling housings.
Companies simply are well known of their customers, who often have no clue whats the inside parts are worth and how that corresponds to the cost and labour of the whole unit.
For that to enlighten, one could say we should have an uncorrupted press which could test and rate this gear for the customer to choose the best price/ offer relation. But unfortunately, the press is corrupted in audio magazines, that are sponsored with ads from those manufacturers, who's products it should rate from an objective viewpoint.
So we have, for about four decades, the strange situation that companies grow in the audio high end field, which fail to give a good value in terms of sound, but continue to attract customers with the most bling bling gear on any audio fair. Simply because they deliver absolute standard circuits made in cheap asian countries and put them in a box with golden frontplate and fabulous tests in audio magazines, which we all knew, are corrupted from the company ads which products are tested in the same magazine.
Only dumb and really knowledge less people don't understand those principles. And they are effectively in action since decades. Nothing new under this sun. The customer should judge by his own knowledge and that means, to be a qualified judge, some knowledge of the stuff you are going to buy is necessary. No magazine will do that for you.
Companies simply are well known of their customers, who often have no clue whats the inside parts are worth and how that corresponds to the cost and labour of the whole unit.
For that to enlighten, one could say we should have an uncorrupted press which could test and rate this gear for the customer to choose the best price/ offer relation. But unfortunately, the press is corrupted in audio magazines, that are sponsored with ads from those manufacturers, who's products it should rate from an objective viewpoint.
So we have, for about four decades, the strange situation that companies grow in the audio high end field, which fail to give a good value in terms of sound, but continue to attract customers with the most bling bling gear on any audio fair. Simply because they deliver absolute standard circuits made in cheap asian countries and put them in a box with golden frontplate and fabulous tests in audio magazines, which we all knew, are corrupted from the company ads which products are tested in the same magazine.
Only dumb and really knowledge less people don't understand those principles. And they are effectively in action since decades. Nothing new under this sun. The customer should judge by his own knowledge and that means, to be a qualified judge, some knowledge of the stuff you are going to buy is necessary. No magazine will do that for you.
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I am currently finishing a simple DIY single-ended tube amp (Tubelab SSE). I have very little expendable income to spend on home audio equipment, or hobby stuff, for that matter. I figured I could end up with a great sounding amp without having to pay thousands for it.
With this project I have tried to purchase good quality parts, but by no means have I bought premium parts. For example, I'm using Edcor transformers which are good quality, but no where near the cost of the high-end stuff. My chassis is a $36 aluminum Hammond. Tubes are current production, not NOS. Etc.
Still, for this basic project I'm already well past $500. It could very easily have become a $1k amp if I'd gone with premium tubes, high end opt's, custom chassis, etc.
My point is obvious: to manufacture and sell a quality amp like this in the US, and still make a modest profit, would run the price up a good amount. It's the same with guitar amps. You can buy a brand new Vox AC 15 (made in Asia) for less than the cost of a high quality domestic kit.
Anyway, I could probably never buy a US made tube amp as good as the one I'm building for less than $1k.
With this project I have tried to purchase good quality parts, but by no means have I bought premium parts. For example, I'm using Edcor transformers which are good quality, but no where near the cost of the high-end stuff. My chassis is a $36 aluminum Hammond. Tubes are current production, not NOS. Etc.
Still, for this basic project I'm already well past $500. It could very easily have become a $1k amp if I'd gone with premium tubes, high end opt's, custom chassis, etc.
My point is obvious: to manufacture and sell a quality amp like this in the US, and still make a modest profit, would run the price up a good amount. It's the same with guitar amps. You can buy a brand new Vox AC 15 (made in Asia) for less than the cost of a high quality domestic kit.
Anyway, I could probably never buy a US made tube amp as good as the one I'm building for less than $1k.
Thats true until today, good quality parts will cost a fair amount of money. Thats why a tube radio set was at premium price if bought from a reputed company in the 1950s/1960s.
And a simple TV tube apparatus was even more premium priced, due to the many tubes it contains.
But this gear was made in the US or europe, not asia. And so the parts were of good quality and the labour cost was high. Without selling for profit and labour cost, we see what goods parts are now could bring a DIY gear in rising up the value. The same amp, as a high end bling bling model, would cost several thousand dollars. Thats the difference.
If you want DIY quality gear, you have to pay for it. It will be relative cheap compared to known high end gear, but mustnt come short in terms of sound quality.
To buy real cheap is to buy asian tubes DIY sets and assembling at home. Nothing could beat those prices. You may could have ended with a complete set for about $150 but nobody could judge the quality of the china transformers. I would judge them fairly poor quality compared to US models.
And a simple TV tube apparatus was even more premium priced, due to the many tubes it contains.
But this gear was made in the US or europe, not asia. And so the parts were of good quality and the labour cost was high. Without selling for profit and labour cost, we see what goods parts are now could bring a DIY gear in rising up the value. The same amp, as a high end bling bling model, would cost several thousand dollars. Thats the difference.
If you want DIY quality gear, you have to pay for it. It will be relative cheap compared to known high end gear, but mustnt come short in terms of sound quality.
To buy real cheap is to buy asian tubes DIY sets and assembling at home. Nothing could beat those prices. You may could have ended with a complete set for about $150 but nobody could judge the quality of the china transformers. I would judge them fairly poor quality compared to US models.
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Exactly. But, I chose the parts for my project in direct relation to the quality of my turntable, cartridge, phono preamp, speakers, and listening space.
There's always that point at which a mediocre piece of gear will nullify the stellar qualities of a super-premium component. My old, discontinued Fostex FE108∑ drivers sitting in my Buschhorn II's will only reproduce music to a certain level of quality regardless of the amp. Same with my Music Hall TT/Goldring cartridge: they're only going to feed a signal of a certain quality to any amp.
Given these components, I'm building an amp that is better than my speakers and TT, but within reason.
What I never want to get into is that insane circular trap where I keep wanting to upgrade speakers to match the amp, then upgrading the TT or cartridge to match the speakers, and then upgrading the amp to match them in quality. That never ends!
What you didn't mention is the "luxury" of a manufacturer to be able to purchase and stock parts for their products "in quantity" and purchased at "quantity/bulk" prices.
You're building a "one time thing" and it costs you a good amount, yes. Suppliers discount "bulk" orders substantially less. This allows for more of a profit margin for those manufacturers.
Yet..... some get too greedy, like my original posts describe.
You're building a "one time thing" and it costs you a good amount, yes. Suppliers discount "bulk" orders substantially less. This allows for more of a profit margin for those manufacturers.
Yet..... some get too greedy, like my original posts describe.
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