@Samzx12
Sam, my apologies, this should be a friendly forum, I never said you are naive', I doubt you are. What does my opinion matter anyway, I think the more expensive is better is 'wrong' which is a better way to say it. I'll give you a for instance. Someone was selling a $4,000 Kenwood power and preamp on craigslist for $400. I dont think he got his money's worth with the $4,000 :)I wouldn't touch it for $400.
Getting into more respected equipment: My dealer (it's an addiction I guess) alternates usually between Cary and McCormack seperates, which run $5,000. That's $15,000 for the amp and cd player. His name is John L Vandersteen, in Chicago, he was an audio engineer for some big companies, he designs and sells his own speakers now, and he explained to me the difference in cost between the components used in high end vs. extremely high end, which was not that much and ultra high end which is costly. He explained that the name plate accounts for a huge percentage of 'markup' and 'market price'. He's a respected sound engineer as best I can tell, a high end audio dealer, someone who build gear and knows costs, and has let me hear expensive stuff for many hours.
So the Cary and McCormack gear that I've heard for many hours doesn't sound 'better" to me than Musical Fidelity or Jolida gear which costs LESS THAN 1/3rd the price, it sounds different. A Cary name tag will add a certain cache', like a Rolex. More expensive usually means better, but my understanding is that the costs of the making these components is not nearly as great as the price, so a lot goes into paying for the name. If it were the R&D you are paying for, I imagine B&W (as big as they are) could never be beat based on their budget...and I bet Kenwood has a high budget too. And I think they still make crap at whatever price.
