No more "High End" for me...Back to Reality Audio

I spent way too much time and money during the shutdowns having lots of fun buying and selling and researching. 

Sometimes (no just about all the time)....The fun for me is in the research....AND THEN the HUNT!......Trying to find that one piece "everyone is raving about"....Ordering it, waiting for the FedX/UPS truck sittying on the sidewalk, Unpacking, Hooking it up, hating it (can't understand what everyone was raving about), returning it......Can't tell you how many times that happened in the two Covid Years......The UPS store knows me by name!

 Last week I bought a little, four tube amplifier kit of a fellow on one of the audio classified sites for $100 (s5Electronics K-12G)...Built it in about 2 hours....Hooked it up and compared over a number of days to VTA ST120 Dynaco clone and First Watt F5v2......The amp is horrible. Buzzes like a swarm of bees and hums a tune I don't recognize(if you put your ear up to the speaker)....But it sounds FANTASTIC...You can't believe 8 watts into KEF LS50 Metas would even work, nevermind sound like it does.....Something is wrong with the whole High End HiFi picture.....

Recent "Law Of Accelerated Returns" thread presents opposite argument to this. Perhaps each of us reaches a certain peak, at this point we're either motivated or stimulated enough to seek the higher peaks or turn back since the climb already undertaken has been taxing enough.

Law of accelerated returns says cost/benefit ratio all in favor of benefit, law of diminishing returns say costs quite high compared to benefits, law of no returns says costs far outweigh benefits. The last being gist of this thread.

I've been in all three camps at various times in my audio journey. Spent most time in diminishing returns camp, well over twenty years here. Only recently have I entered accelerated returns camp, the sound quality of present setup has finally reached the peak where live non-sound reinforced music, best sound system ever heard and sound quality of my dreams live. The difference in height between that peak of diminishing returns and accelerated returns is significant.

But it sounds FANTASTIC...You can't believe 8 watts into KEF LS50 Metas would even work, nevermind sound like it does.....Something is wrong with the whole High End HiFi picture.....

@rbertalotto 

Not really: there is a reason Nelson Pass named some of his product 'First Watt'. Most of the time that's all the power most people are using- the extra power is for peaks (most of the time). If you have a good clean first watt, you can do a lot with that, and this has fueled a great deal in high end audio!

Again- high end audio is driven by intention, not price.

(If you worked with that little amp to solve its noise problems, I suspect it could be sorted out.)

what do you think lightning strikes cause?? 

In my world lightning strikes are different from power surges, which are caused by the power company. One way a power surge can occur is if there is an interruption of power, the magnetic field in the power transformers upstream from your house collapses. When this happens, the transformers put out a very large voltage (this is the same principle used to drive spark plugs in a car). Because of the load on the transformers the surge might only be 50-60 volts.

A lightning strike by comparison will do well over 1000 volts! So I draw the distinction in that manner.

@moofoo Yes, it's my YT channel. I'm glad you found my posts useful! Cheers, Janos