Er, maybe, but it sure is difficult explaining the pleasure your high-end system gives you to someone who hasn't got a clue what you're going on about because their high-end system doesn't give them the same level of satisfaction.
Is High End Audio Gear Worth the Money?
- Thread starter Ron Resnick
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Snot elitism exists everywhere unfortunately… but I’d have thought seems to be even more so prevalent possibly in audiophile forums than among serious(?) music lovers.Why being a "serious music lover" is mandatory for being an audiophile? Or better, what is a "serious music lover"? Some one that only listens to non amplified music?
Pity it’s a contributing factor in making being an audiophile appear more petty and smaller rather than greater or more noble… throw in elitist pricing and then much of it appears as just decadent and unserious. Perhaps that’s also the generational turnoff.
So music loving is just way cooler and for good reason because music is or can be ultimately art and audio for all its fabulous pretensions mostly craft.
Very little commercial high end audio approaches art from my perspective… I teach design and the industrial design element in audio has always lagged and often is just daggy… and contemporary high end is no more graced with a sublime elevated spirit than is some vintage or some diy.
Who’d spend many hundreds of thousands or even millions on systems on many of the contemporary boxes of tacky awkward bling and disjointed design mostly coming out of electrical engineers with no art or industrial design background.
Atleast with vintage you’ll sometimes see at least good simple composition and some truth through form following function.
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Probably some others do the same, bur recently I learned that dCS has partnered with the Cambridge-based design consultancy Special Agent for their current products. See https://herring-harp-9pes.squarespace.com/work/ultimatelisteningexperience and https://herring-harp-9pes.squarespace.com/about .
The classic design of their Elgar DAC was carried in collaboration with industrial designer Alan Boothroyd, best known for the great looking Meridian 100 series - I still keep my 104 tuner.
It’s not a field of design where it’s easy to pull off timeless aesthetics though for a range of reasons relating to the context of audio components and forming up as a marriage of systems beyond themselves. Fragments synthesising into a whole.
This is the core fundamental challenge not just of the aesthetics in audio design but also in the fundamental music experience itself in audio systems especially in more complex processes often found in high end audio approaches.
The component nature of system building makes unity or cohesion more of a challenge but then the journey of pulling a system together is rarely about off the rack solutions… less is more is just a safer design pathway than when the audio ecosystem is flapping its feathers in a buy me dance and form mixing can be very diverse and conflicting.
It’s being unable to elevate function through to form that caps this off as craft rather than operating as a level of art in design.
That said often it isn’t just good basic form making at play… much of it seems unconfident so the excesses come about as engineers struggle to resolve form and add more and more design flourishes or overt materiality or complicating processes… but like I said it is a difficult discipline to be designing in.
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Perhaps a bit utilitarian, but certainly not typical. The original American Sound turntable from the 1970s.
Hmmm. Glad thats not in my room.
Audio gear as art? Ok. But would you pay for any of it based on looks if it was not attached to making sound? FWIW my wife and I seem to purchase a piece from a local artist once a month.
This article made me realize how much a speaker such as a Wilson is really a midrange and tweeter paired to a sub. The cabinets are separate. Aren't the woofers just subs? The manufacturer advantage is they made the crossover.
I just bought a certified used car from this dealer's mickey mouse program. Are you saying this was a mistake?
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From my own perspective, i try to find a balance. Sometimes i want the system to transport me, but mostly, it's in service of connecting more deeply with the emotion and intent behind the music — not just escaping reality.
Any audio device can allow for a deep "connection". As audiophiles, the only thing that prevents us from getting there is our own critical perception of sound. This is why non-audiophiles don't need high end audio gear to "connect".
As for the intent behind the music, it is obvious that you don't need high end audio for this. You can grasp the specificities of a recording and the specificities of a musician's performance without spending thousands of dollars on a system. Here again, as audiophiles we like to think that a high end system is going to reveal something about the recording or performance, but that is a fallacy.
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Design is, or should be, fundamental to any good consumer brand, hifi included.
One example is the Musical Fidelity A1. This design classic from the 1980s, which was reissued a few years ago, launched the brand. The owner went to Pentagram, now one of the world's leading design companies, and commissioned them to come out with something completely new. Not only is it great design, and was completely radical, it pioneered using the top plate as a heatsink. (It is 20w Class A and gets very hot.)
On a larger scale, Native Design https://native.com/ has worked with many consumer audio and automotive (including automotive audio) companies over decades. The were responsible for iconic designs like the B&W Nautilius, B&W 800 series and B&W headphones. They were also responsible for the design of the Naim Uniti range, which completely rebranded the UK's leading audio company, for the next generations. The chief designer at Native moved over to being head of product design at Focal Naim.
The 30+ year relationship between Native and Laurence Dickie also resulted the Zuma.ai product that I use throughout my house, which is the ultimate in form and function - getting a complete 75w audio system with multi-platform streaming, 24/192 wifi operation and an intelligent lighting system, all inside a unit 135mm high and 95mm in diameter with totally proprietary software and Roon Ready. It took 5 years and cost many millions to achieve.
There are many other examples, in particular Devialet D-Premier. To create the Zuma Lumisonic and Devialet Premier both required a huge amount of innovation to to meet the physical design requirements.
The Daddy of the all is Dieter Rams' designs from Braun. They lacked a bit on the audio performance, several were effectively copied by Jonny Ive for Apple to create some of the most successful audio products ever, like the iPod. (I have a Vitsoe office, designed by Rams 60 years ago.)
What I personally don't like is bling design for its own sake that is not intrinsically functional, which is why all my components are boring black boxes (excepting my turntable and speakers). The turntable is a design classic and my speakers are boring metallic grey boxes with the WAG seal of approval.
If you don't think design is fundamental, you need to look at real world hifi.
Red Dot Design Award
www.red-dot.org
True, anyone can connect to music, but as we get older—and especially as audiophiles—we often need more depth or realism to feel that same spark. Kids get excited by simple things, but adults usually need a richer experience to connect on that level. High-end gear helps bring that out. I think its called - hedonic adaptation.
True, you can get hold of the intent without high-end gear, but better systems don’t invent details, they reveal more of what’s already there.
In short, I would say It’s not about needing it, it’s about experiencing more depth when you have it.
That, or mid-life crisis can explain it.
It's also a question of listening. You can't focus on sound and music at the same time. If something bothers you with the sound, it can be hard to get over it...
Low level detail and increased accuracy may add realism, but I don't find it ever really changes my "understanding" of music. Recording quality is much more significant than system quality in that sense.
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I believe we’re constantly evolving. What once felt right or sufficient at age five no longer fits when we’re teenagers—and the same applies at 25, 35, or beyond. Growth is natural, and so is the desire for better tools, experiences, or even lifestyles. You don’t need to wait for a mid-life crisis to upgrade your life. Wanting better isn’t a crisis—it’s progress.
Of course you can—when you have the right system and the right recording, sound quality and musical immersion don’t have to come at the expense of one another. A well-matched setup can actually enhance your connection to the music, not distract from it.
That’s certainly one of the most condescending things I’ve heard this century. Unless of course you’re talking about kids still in nappies (diapers).
My experience of young adults (to whom I presume you were referring) is that they have far more intellectual, social and cultural curiosity then their parents or grandparents, and by the time you’re in your 60s you’re almost certainly set in your ways and more likely to be most of the way towards boring old fart status, with little better to think about than the next USB cable.
I didn’t really get into audio beyond a perfectly decent but budget system until about 12 years ago when the kids started to have pretty much independent lives and my wife and I had more time on our hands outside of work. Three things got me down this rabbit hole: less people in the house, a bit more personal time and sufficient disposable income. There was probably an element of midlife crisis and what holds me back is the fear of becoming a boring old fart who would rather sit at home listening to music on my own than go to a live show.
I have a better audio system than my kids because I have the time, money and real estate, whereas they do not. One of my kids, aged 28 probably knows more about music than me, goes to lots of live music and is probably far more sophisticated and open-minded than I am. He has a $400 pair of headphones that provide very high sound quality (I know because I have a pair as well).
I’ve heard enough audio systems from budget to extreme high-end to know that the vast majority of a differences arise from the speakers and room acoustics. My personal opinion is that, when it comes round to electronics, from a certain point differences are either marginal or illusory. It defies reason that anything more than a few hobbyists would be interested in those multiple differences. That’s why high-end audio is so expensive, it’s basically a bespoke product.
At the end of the day, being an audiophile is a perfectly respectable and harmless hobby, effectively boys’ toys for mostly men of middle age or more advanced years. Some people collect stamps, which can be equally expensive, and there is no reason why anyone should be any more interested in high audio than they should be in philately.
By the time my kids get to my age, I expect them to be listening to music through systems that haven’t even yet been conceived.
PS. From observing my father, risks of getting old are of developing a sense of superiority and thinking younger people will have any interest in what interests you. I’m at the point that it is far more interesting and beneficial for good relationships to enjoy learning from my kids rather than trying to impart any wisdom or knowledge upon them.
I get where you're coming from, but I see things a little differently.
Younger people might seem more curious, but I wouldn't say they're necessarily more advanced. What they do have is way more access to information. Whether they go deep or just skim the surface? That depends on the person—just like in every generation.
As for audio, I’ve been into it since I was a teenager, same with a bunch of my friends. We didn’t wait for a midlife crisis. We kept at it through work, marriage, kids—just upgraded as we went. One of my buddies has a setup worth close to a million dollars but still drives an old car. Priorities, right?
Speakers and room acoustics matter a lot, I agree. But once the room is good, better gear can make a noticeable difference. It’s not all subtle or placebo.
And audiophilia isn’t just some middle-aged hobby. For a lot of us, it’s a lifelong thing. Music hits hard at any age if you care enough to listen properly.
Not everyone gets old the same way either. My dad’s 78—just came back from several months of trekking in South America, surfs all the time, still goes out clubbing. Me and my siblings are in our 40s and 50s, and we’re active, social, and still learning, and developing. As long as your health is good, age is what you make of it.
My reply here is not about audio per se but more about intellectual, social and cultural curiosity. What might appear to be that on the surface is simply glamming on to these ideals as presented to them via social media. Here in the U.S. I think you are 1000% wrong. Kids and young adults consume a majority of their information via social media and then comfortably reside in whatever rabbit hole they find themselves. This leads to an absolute truncation of their growth and development. They don’t challenge their beliefs or the beliefs of those they identify with. Look at our politics. Both sides. They have little actual experiential knowledge. They don’t play physically. Their friends are people they never met. Just people they play video games with. Birds, trees boring. 4-6 hours/ playing video games. They don’t interact socially (in the flesh) and often don’t even know the names of their schoolmates. Watch them sit next to each other and never look up from their devices. By the time they enter the workforce they can’t handle any conflict and while outwardly pleasant they rarely consider others unless of course they think their actions might lead to social media backlash. He was not being condescending he was being charitable. Of course there are some great kids out there. I’m sure people will chime in with examples but across the board we are raising a generation of people with largely false fixed beliefs with little or no actual experience to support these beliefs.
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