Some people think I'm opposed to paying more for "good" audio gear, but that's not true. While I don't think you have to pay huge amounts to get high quality, I'm not a fan of cheap junk either, even if it sounds just as good as products that are more durable and have knobs that feel better etc. But sometimes paying a lot of money gets you a product that is truly dreadful.
This really hit home for me a few years ago at a Stereophile show in New York City. I saw a pair of loudspeakers that cost $16,000 per pair that were noticeably worse than Behringer Truth speakers costing $80 each. Where sensible speaker designers aim to avoid cabinet resonance, this model included vibrating wooden plates on the side to intentionally add resonance, sort of like the sound board of a piano. In fact, that's the analogy the manufacturer used in their marketing material.
In the same room was a fellow hawking very expensive tube power amps. I forget the price, but it was a lot more than, say, a quality amp from Crown or Bryston. The sales dude made a big deal about the fact this his amp had none of that nasty negative feedback that's "known" to sound bad. I guess he thinks 10 percent distortion sounds good. He also bragged that the blue lights that serve only to adorn the tubes were real light bulbs, rather than those nasty sounding LEDs his competitors use.
What prompts this post is a review of a $12,000 CD player in the July, 2012 issue of Stereophile. This CD player uses tubes and transformers to add a bit of that analog distortion some people like. I have no objection to this, even though subtle distortion is easily achieved for a lot less than $12,000. What really struck me about this CD player is that it's hopelessly incompetent, with fidelity far worse than a $40 CD Walkman. According to the review it does not use over-sampling like all other modern CD players, and the D/A has no reconstruction filter. So its output contains all the digital hash and aliasing that should be filtered out. In this CD player the output actually does contain digital steps! Even though the reviewer acknowledged these defects, as did John Atkinson in the sidebar with his measurements, both writers still concluded this is a fine piece of gear that sounds good and deserves your consideration. Wow, just wow.
--Ethan
This really hit home for me a few years ago at a Stereophile show in New York City. I saw a pair of loudspeakers that cost $16,000 per pair that were noticeably worse than Behringer Truth speakers costing $80 each. Where sensible speaker designers aim to avoid cabinet resonance, this model included vibrating wooden plates on the side to intentionally add resonance, sort of like the sound board of a piano. In fact, that's the analogy the manufacturer used in their marketing material.
In the same room was a fellow hawking very expensive tube power amps. I forget the price, but it was a lot more than, say, a quality amp from Crown or Bryston. The sales dude made a big deal about the fact this his amp had none of that nasty negative feedback that's "known" to sound bad. I guess he thinks 10 percent distortion sounds good. He also bragged that the blue lights that serve only to adorn the tubes were real light bulbs, rather than those nasty sounding LEDs his competitors use.
What prompts this post is a review of a $12,000 CD player in the July, 2012 issue of Stereophile. This CD player uses tubes and transformers to add a bit of that analog distortion some people like. I have no objection to this, even though subtle distortion is easily achieved for a lot less than $12,000. What really struck me about this CD player is that it's hopelessly incompetent, with fidelity far worse than a $40 CD Walkman. According to the review it does not use over-sampling like all other modern CD players, and the D/A has no reconstruction filter. So its output contains all the digital hash and aliasing that should be filtered out. In this CD player the output actually does contain digital steps! Even though the reviewer acknowledged these defects, as did John Atkinson in the sidebar with his measurements, both writers still concluded this is a fine piece of gear that sounds good and deserves your consideration. Wow, just wow.
--Ethan
