European -vs- US high-end

I agree with Phild. I'd go as far as to make a broad statement that if your budget is $1000 or less per component then European, particularly British equipment is your best bet. It seems that US companies are more interested in the higher end of the market, though there are many European companies also in this segment.
Another key difference is the size of rooms which are driven. Hence European hifi is generally lower power .... and with lower power it's much less expensive to get good audio quality. I'd never go back to a large room ... it's just too much trouble.
On a more somber note ...
If everyone were hifi buffs then perhaps Europe and the US would have a better political relationship at the moment. The current sniping between European and US media and politicians saddens me greatly.

Sean T, the Europeans do not realise sufficiently the shock which was caused by 11th Sept. in your country and how you feel threatened by further attacks, possibly by weapons of mass destruction. The politics your governement is implementing, seems to follow quite naturally and logically from this scenario with the goal of protecting the US from attack. Obviously, the Europeans feel less threatened and hence plead for caution. After all, harsh action would upset their trade deals with Iran and Iraq for that matter and would put them even more in a tight spot than they are in now, if under obligation of the NATO treaty they had to spend more money for armaments and their military. Furthermore, the US have learnt in the Balcan war, that you cannot fight a war according to their doctrine, if you have to consult all the time with European politicians. That's why they are left out in the cold now and they don't like it. Shall we give them all Krells, Rowlands and ARC gear, so they'll shape up???

Re the Canadain stuff. Don't forget SimAudio and the late Sonic Frontiers. Then there's Anthem and Paridigm. Also Energy and Mirage speakers.
Perhaps what Natalie meant was that Canadian gear was superior in value to U.S. and european due to the low dollar value.
Cheers Steve

This forum seems to have flowed forth in a way that is quite surprising considering that I did not think many people would be interested in it. Many excellent ideas have already been presented. Cornfed, dekay and detlof seem to share a rejection of the difference between US and European high-end: as even Disney likes to emphasize over and over again, "it's a small world," so that the actual difference between European and US high-end is negligeable. If, based on this answer, one cannot really tell the difference between European and US high-end, then that failure proves the success of economic globalization. In response to this idea, let me say that I fully recognize the deterritorializing impact of global capitalism, undermining all stable, traditional form of manufacture: but I reproach this capitalism with the view that its deterritorialization is not thorough enough, that it generates new reterritorializations, and regionalisms. Thus we are left with insights like sean's that speakers carry a specific regional flavor.
I would like to go back to the original question and try to give you some background as to why this topic concerns me. First off, I am an American in Europe. Secondly, and more importantly is the fact that it has always been a favorite idee of mine to bring the life of the Old and the New World face to face, by an accurate comparison of their various hifi (not necessarily high-end) products. For a long time, I thought I would approach this like a natural historian. I would begin with the first recording procedures, of course; institute a large and exact comparison between the development of Leon Scott's phonotaugraph, Charles Cros' pallophone, as these two Frenchmen called their failed inventions, and Edison's cylinder-based phonograph, and then go on to an analytic comparison of the American Gramaphone Company, Berliner, and the Compagnie Francaise du Gramaphone, and also examine the early gramaphone turntables, from the jukeboxes in dimestores, the "nickel in the slot" systems, to the private record players at different ages (the Edison's, Thoren's, Garrard's) measuring height, weight, THD, frequency response by the microphone and computer and finishing off the first part of the study by a comparative history of the first cylinders for use in government agencies, flat 78 RPM records, double-sided and long-playing micro-groove Vinylite records, giving the principal technical characteristics. (Much of this research has already been done by Jacques Attali in "Noise: The Political Economy of Music," ff. 90-101).
Then I would follow this up by contrasting the various parallel forms of hifi systems in the two continents from, say, the late 1970s onwards. Some audio engineers (Tim Paravicini. say) often refer to this incidentally or expressly; but the "animus" of audio engineering in the two half globes of the planet is so momentous a point of interest to us audiophiles, that it should be made a subject of express and elaborate study. If I go out in that mall which here in Frankfurt is called the "Sandweg Passage" and look at the US, British, French and German components. The US components are large, robust, "built like tanks" (as the Germans like to say), and seem like they will carry on operating for years longer than the European components. The European components are more compact, "artistic," and seem to possess a suggestive power, sometimes a "finesse" and a "Spielfreudigkeit" over and above the US units. Is this typical of the creative force on the two sides of the ocean or not? Nothing but a careful comparison through the whole realm of high-end can answer this question, it seems.
There is a parallelism without identity in the electronics and speakers of the two continents, which favors the task of comparison in an extraordinary manner. Just as we have two Audio Notes (UK and Japan) alike in some ways, yet not the same at all, both Audio Notes easily distinguishable, so we have a complete flora and fauna in European and US vacuum tube amps, which, parting from the same idea, embody it with various modifications. As the same patterns have very commonly been followed in phonograph, amplifier, and speaker design, we can see which is worked out in the largest spirit, and determine the exact limitations under which the different high-end industries place the movements of musical life in all it manifestations in either locality. To get back to cornfed's beginning, I think Europeans would find themselves in a very bad position if it should prove that European high-end components cannot be sold in the US, but remain unsold, if not somehow designed for American tastes. It may turn out the other way, however, as I have heard one of my audiophile friends argue,--and though I took the other side, I liked his best--,that American high-end is simply European (more specifically, British) high-end reinforced. What do you think? Keep the contributions coming.

Oh NO!!! Now I am hearing the song from Disney's "It's a Small World" over and over in my head. If only "On the Good Ship Lollipop" would come back an take over again.