2. misc-audio
  3. 1299270380

Is there any bad sounding high-end gear--?

I was reading the thread here today about biased reviewers-
it got me thinking, out of the stuff which is reviewed in the publications which serve the high-end arena, is there really any bad sounding gear?----I am talking about from what I call the golden era of High-end, 1990---2000, stuff from the major players like ARC, CJ, Krell, MLevinson, Jadis---etc-----I use this time frame as this was the pre-Chinese era when most gear was from the US, we also saw stuff from Italy, France and Swiss made stuff.

When I have purchased something and not liked it, I always struck it up to a system mismatch----

If anyone can provide what they bought and really thought it was terrible, I'd be interested to know what it was.
128x128justlisten

Showing 2 responses by marakanetz

marakanetz's avatar
marakanetz
5,473 posts
 
To me most of Joseph, Revel and B&W speakers sounds horrible. To the same degree I'd count Merilyn VSM.
The most Unique speakers in that case are Martin Logans. They sound horrible in any set up and any room.
In amplification I'd count in this category Cary amps, preamps and digital players. Heard them many times not even once liked any.
Although, there are lots of fans for the equipment listed in my bad sounding list. Someone might hate for instance Aerial or Totem speakers that I have and belove set up with Sunfire/Classe gear and it's all normal. We're free to express our personal preferences.
marakanetz's avatar
marakanetz
5,473 posts
 
Tonykay,

I would also share your thoughts about speakers that cost larger than luxury vehicle. Regardless, if some R&D done you can get same or better performance for your room getting away 20 times less.

Recently I've auditioned http://www.amazon.com/Event-Opal-750-watt-Active-Monitors/dp/B0020J23L8 and was truly impressed with price for performance.
More to discover