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Price vs performance

There is a misconception among audiophiles that price is an indication of performance. However consumers are unaware of the ratio of cost of parts to markup. This ratio varies from one speaker to another.
if a 10k speaker uses 2k on parts and the rest is on markup, and if a 5k speaker uses 4k worth of parts and 1k markup then the costlier speaker is not going to provide better performance. Despite this audiophiles will refuse to believe that a cheap speaker can outdo the more expensive one. 


Speaker companies can set whatever price they see fit. Sometimes the price is deliberately elevated to increase the perceived value and performance. It can just be a game of one upmanship. This has nothing to do with the performance of the speaker. 

It's not as if ALL loudspeakers on the market are put in one room and listened to and then priced according to performance. What actually happens is audiophiles rate the performance of a speaker based on its price, which is the antithesis of what should be happening.

magazines and reviewers alike commit the same fallacy all the time. They will only ever jokingly compare a magico with say a mid priced B&w. All because of the price difference. 

But even if we put all loudspeakers in a room, no two audiophiles would ever agree on the order of the performance anyway. Audiophiles' opinions are therefore unreliable.

Audiophiles use price as an indication of quality because they have no ability to sit in a perfectly designed acoustic environment and then compare every speaker they want to hear and spend weeks or months doing this. 

Audiophiles are not in a position to do a blind test even if they wanted to. Instead we only get to hear speakers in extremely poor demo rooms and only for a few minutes under pressure from the salesperson

Revel have been known to do blind tests. I think these tests proved that there was no correlation between price and performance.

Distortion can be perceived as warmth. wider and deeper stereo images can be seen as better even if it's not accurate. Neutrality can be perceived as cold. 

In conclusion, audiophiles have no clue how to decide whether what they're hearing is good, bad, accurate, or imaginary.

Price is not an indication.








kenjit

Showing 10 responses by mijostyn

mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,178 posts
 
Now this is not a reflection on any one here and I do not want to upset anyone. Really, truly, unbelievably excellent Hi Fis are extremely rare. Most for us have heard good systems and have a good idea of what we like and prefer in sound and you can make a very good system for not ridiculous money and the very most expensive systems I have heard were far from the best, in some instances because they were in crappy rooms. But experience is everything in this endeavor especially if you are involved in setting up systems for others. Most of us learn what works by trial and error which is part of the fun and many of us started when we were kids. I built my first Dynaco Stereo 70 when I was 13. There were no computers back then so if you wanted to burn yourself on a soldering iron you had to do it on Hi Fis or ham radios. In a way it is more fun trying to make a killer system on a limited budget because you have to get creative. Anybody can buy stuff if they have the money. I see more poorly set up expensive systems than poorly set up intermediate systems. I was once asked to visit a house in Coral Gables FL to see if I could improve a system. The guy had Tympany IIIs push right up against a wall bi amped with 4 Mark Levinson amps. The first thing I told him was that we were going to have to move the Tympanys at least 3 feet out from the wall. "My wife won't let me do it." Do you have another room you can set this up in?
"No." I apologized and told him there was nothing I could do under these circumstances and that he might consider getting himself a pair of Beveridge s. I never heard back from him. I think he thought I was just trying to sell him another set of speakers. 
I wish that all of you will be able to create a system for yourselves that at least on rare occasion can fool you into believing you are at the live show. It is an amazing thing when you hear it.
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,178 posts
 
Does this include the SAT tonearm?
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,178 posts
 
Exactly and that is what can make this so frustrating at times. There are tricks that we use. When I  am evaluating bass for example I put on a live Dave Holland quartet album where Dave does a long solo piece and covers the entire scale. I listen as he goes up and down listening for changes in the intonation of the bass, changes in volume at certain frequencies. There should not be any. Is there a bass standing in front of me or is it all over the place. I have seen him live 4 times and took careful note of how his bass sounded just as if I were evaluating a system. I have something like 20 pet recordings I use for this purpose. I always close my eyes when I am listening seriously. Visuals are a distraction. This is a far cry from actually enjoying the music by the way. When I am enjoying music I am not seriously listening. Serious listening is work. The live performance of acoustic instruments is the standard regardless of our memory and listening capability. This is why we have to train ourselves to listen critically and collect the tools/recordings to do so. Always at the listening position with eyes closed. You have to love the faux audiophiles that tell you your system images great from 30 degrees off axis. 
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,178 posts
 
First of all there are examples of equipment that undeniably represent great value. Maggie 20.7s, The Acoustats in their day, Parasound JC1
RIP, The Sota Sapphire, The Kuzma 4 pt 9. 
It is not a matter of taste. If two of us go to a concert we hear exactly the same thing but remember it differently and actually from a sound perspective very poorly. Our audio memories stink. We remember the show visually and may remember whether or not we liked the sound system a very unfortunate variable. This is one of the reasons you always evaluate a system with purely acoustic instruments with a recording you know to be excellent. Accurate is accurate and not a matter of taste. A string quartet in a specific venue sounds like it sounds whether it suits your taste or not. A system is accurate or it is not. If it suits you to excuse the performance of your system by saying it suits your taste then fine. Euphoric is not accurate is is a pleasing distortion. If I set up an AB test and use exactly the same system but just turn up the volume 1 db. everyone here will think the louder system sounds better. Most audiophiles are out to sea without a compass.
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,178 posts
 
Ivan, We may hear things differently because we are paying attention to different aspects of the performance but there is only one standard the real performance. The very best systems play everything well from rock to a harpsichord. I would be willing to bet most of us have never heard a real harpsichord in person. Out to sea without a compass. Subjective is just another excuse for euphoric distortions. Many of us are arguing about this cable and that interconnect. There are good cables that do not interfere with the sound and bad cables that do. There is nothing in between. This is probably the best example of how gullible audiophiles are. 
You are right in that perfection is unattainable but it is a target and a reference and I have heard systems that come scary close at the listening position with eyes closed. Stop making excuses for inaccuracies even if you like them. Now would it not be nice if we could have a discussion on what type of loudspeaker is most likely to project an accurate "picture" of a live performance?
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,178 posts
 
Whether you guys like it or not audio memory is very short in humans. It is much easier to remember what something looked like than what something sounded like. You can characterize it, " the bass was too loud." but that is about it. Yes, recordings frequently s--k but that does not change the performance of live acoustic instruments in a specific venue.
Very few live rock concert have decent sound. I don't go for the sound. I go for the show. Recordings off the sound board usually sound much better. If you do not listen to and study live acoustic instruments even just a piano then you are out to sea without a compass. All those other audiophile characterizations of sound are laughable. My favorite is rhythmic. "This amp has good rhythmic timing," What? The drummer may have good rhythm but the amp? Sustain?  What, do you turn the volume down between notes? This sounds to me like people trying to describe stuff they do not understand. There we go with the mythology again.
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,178 posts
 
jdub, Daiquist DQ 10s were a very airy detailed easy to listen to speaker and were very big among the audiophile group for almost a decade. All the drivers except the woofers were mounted in space, no box which was unique in the day. Their one big shortcoming was that they could not cast an image. There was no sweet spot. Some people interpreted that as them having a very large sweet spot. Go figure.
Mahgister, I can remember what something sounded like is descriptive terms but I can not remember the sound. For certain their is an emotional connection with music. I have no idea if my unconscious memory has any idea what is going on. It hasn't told me.
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,178 posts
 
peterm you obviously have never used a Goldmund turntable
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,178 posts
 
Musical memory and Audio memory are two completely separate issues.
Musical memory is more associated with reading and training your voice or fingers to hit a certain note. It is not trying to remember the fine details of what something sounded like. That audio memory is short in humans is a demonstrable scientific fact which does not mean there are not some of us who are better at it than others. But, thinking that you are far above the bell curve is pretty arrogant. If it costs more and looks better it must be better. To many of us are suckers for marketing. The fine art of lying to people to get them to buy your stuff. 
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,178 posts
 
Oh, right on cd," the value of nothing." There is some expensive equipment that is expensive because it is made in America or Europe and is very expensive to make. Atma-Sphere amps and preamps are a good example. They are all point to point wired which is extremely labor intensive. Are they worth it? Well, that is a personal judgement. Certainly you have to have the money to do it and lets not be jealous of the people that do. There are many serious audiophiles who are wealthy and can afford stuff like this and that keeps these companies alive and people at work. Plus it is always fun to dream, to have something to look forward too. I would much rather have an Atma-Sphere MA 3 than any Boulder. I'd much rather pay for hand wiring than a CNC machine. I want to pay for performance not jewelry.  
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