Who is the best reviewer?

[microstrip]

Hi

To each its own. I fail to understand what a person means by "sheer sumptuousness of the sound" especially when the same person tells me later If something has fidelity doesn't that mean that it reproduces the sound as is? i-e "sumptuousness" included ... Call me literal but this is to me wordplay not a trial at describing the sound (or lack) of an amplifier By the way by all accounts the Classe is a good amp ...

Frantz,

As the author of this sentence is a member of WBF, maybe we will be the best person to explain it. As I told you I understood what he means, but being a non native english writer I am not the best person to go in details.

But it seems as you do not understand what it means, inadvertently, you are misquoting his sentence when you cut it : "something that stereo systems often sacrifice in the pursuit of fidelity, in its most banal form, which is to say the mere reproduction of detail for its own sake." is very different from "something that stereo systems often sacrifice in the pursuit of fidelity" .

 

[Orb]

Frantz,

As the author of this sentence is a member of WBF, maybe we will be the best person to explain it. As I told you I understood what he means, but being a non native english writer I am not the best person to go in details.
.

Damn your english is excellent, I blame The Simpsons for us native writers
Cheers
Orb

 

[FrantzM]

Frantz,

As the author of this sentence is a member of WBF, maybe we will be the best person to explain it. As I told you I understood what he means, but being a non native english writer I am not the best person to go in details.

But it seems as you do not understand what it means, inadvertently, you are misquoting his sentence when you cut it : "something that stereo systems often sacrifice in the pursuit of fidelity, in its most banal form, which is to say the mere reproduction of detail for its own sake." is very different from "something that stereo systems often sacrifice in the pursuit of fidelity" .

I will go further and grant you the whole sentence

something that stereo systems often sacrifice in the pursuit of fidelity, in its most banal form, which is to say the mere reproduction of detail for its own sake.

It still is wordplay to me. I am also a non-native English writer and I do fully understand the difficulty of conveying perceptions into words .. it remains that these don't tell me much and leave too much to anybody's interpretation.. Is it beautiful wording? yes? Does that tells me what separate this amp to another ? Not really .. I may have become cynical about the review process but , frankly and repeating myself here, not telling me much.

 

[Randall Smith]

Mr.Smith,

Have you heard this DAC?

Why is it that you always seem to jump on Mr.Bedworth everytime he posts something on this forum?

Nicholas goes into great detail justifying the price of a $70k DAC. But ultimately, here is the question: Would he even pay accomodation for it? In other words, is he willing to actually write a check for $35,000 (thirty-five THOUSAND dollars) in REAL money for this DAC? He says, "you get everything you paid for." Would he pay $35,000 ($70k retail) for the Technical Brain amps that no one will touch on Audiogon for significantly less? This is not Monopoly money. When you make the statement that something has good "value", it has to mean something. I feel his explanation poetically falls flat, much like his use of room correction with the Technical Brain review.

 

[mauidan]

Nicholas goes into great detail justifying the price of a $70k DAC. But ultimately, here is the question: Would he even pay accomodation for it? In other words, is he willing to actually write a check for $35,000 (thirty-five THOUSAND dollars) in REAL money for this DAC? He says, "you get everything you paid for." Would he pay $35,000 ($70k retail) for the Technical Brain amps that no one will touch on Audiogon for significantly less? This is not Monopoly money. When you make the statement that something has good "value", it has to mean something. I feel his explanation poetically falls flat, much like his use of room correction with the Technical Brain review.

You avoided my first question, so I guess you haven't heard the Trinity DAC.

If your reviewers give a ultra high priced component a rave review, do you require that they are prepared to buy the component?

IMO, "value" statements are relative to the reviewer's point of view.

TAS's RH thinks the $5K BADA is a "spectacular bargain." Someone using a $500. DAC, probably doesn't share his opinion.

RH is currently using a $65K preamp, $140K amps and $200K speakers,
should he prepared to buy these components before he makes positive comments about them?

AFAIK, Mr.Bedworth hasn't published any review of the Technical Brain amps.

 

[Randall Smith]

You avoided my first question, so I guess you haven't heard the Trinity DAC.

If your reviewers give a ultra high priced component a rave review, do you require that they are prepared to buy the component?

IMO, "value" statements are relative to the reviewer's point of view.

TAS's RH thinks the $5K BADA is a "spectacular bargain." Someone using a $500. DAC, probably doesn't share his opinion.

RH is currently using a $65K preamp, $140K amps and $200K speakers,
should he prepared to buy these components before he makes positive comments about them?

AFAIK, Mr.Bedworth hasn't published any review of the Technical Brain amps.

No, I have not heard it. My post wasn't about the sound, but about the justification of price. I do not need to hear it to know it costs $70,000.

And no, value is not relative to the reviewer. These products do not exist in a vacuum, but relative to one another. How does the $70K Trinity DAC sound compared to the Weiss DAC202? A DAC that costs 1/10th of the price. Is the Trinity TEN TIMES BETTER? By your argument, if there were a $1m DAC that the reviewer really "thought" was a good value, then there you go . . . it's a great value!. It shows a tremendous lack of real world perspective, especially in the world of Hi-End audio.

Your comment about RH . . . precisely. If you get them on permanent loan, without paying a dime, you have NO CLUE how to ascribe value to them in regards someone that actually has to buy them with real money!

 

[KeithR]

To whoever decided comparing upper echelon audio to Ferraris was legitimate--- an F360 Modena Spyder costs 160k in 2001 compared to a F California at 190k today (MSRP only--i realize options get pricey on F-cars). That is only a 19% increase.

In 2001, the CJ Art was probably top of the line preamp at 15k (and was one of the first two boxers--the Ref 2 was 9k as another reference)----now there are preamps 3-4x as expensive (Balabo, Soluution, Lamm, Shindo among others). The most expensive cable in 2001 was probably the Nordost Valhalla---at $3200 a meter (which was well over 2x as expensive as anything else on the market at the time). There are now ICs 2x as expensive all over the place (KS and AQ to name a few). Regarding speakers, the Wilson X1 was long time the champ at 80-90k as I recall----but now there are a multitude of 200k super speakers.

These numbers of course are nominal, not real dollars. The bottom line is high end audio inflation is dramatic. I have been in this hobby since 2001 and have seen it first hand.

 

[Alan Sircom]

Your comment about RH . . . precisely. If you get them on permanent loan, without paying a dime, you have NO CLUE how to ascribe value to them in regards someone that actually has to buy them with real money!

I don't agree. The reviewer's ability to ascribe value is entirely unrelated to whether he or she invests in the equipment they use. First, the equipment the reviewer uses represents a reference point against which they evaluate other products. It's not a 'jolly' or a 'perk', it's a tool of the trade. Unfortunately, the nature of the reviewing beast means it's a tool of the trade that few in the trade could routinely afford, but to suggest the reviewer cannot execute all aspects of their job without owning the tools they use to do that job is as logically inconsistent as insisting the person who drives the train, owns the train.

Second, reviewer value judgments based on their own payment can give an artificial skew based on the discrepancy between how much the earnings of the reviewer those of the putative real-world owner. This happens at all levels; if I have enough disposable income that I can buy a Squeezebox Touch more or less on a whim, concluding that it's fantastic value for money holds no water for someone who had to save up for six months to buy one. The same happens in reverse; my value judgement of a product that costs so much I would need to take out a second mortgage to own it is going to be very different from someone for whom it constitutes a month's salary, and different again from someone who could buy it with loose change.

The way to ascribe value to a product means setting it in context and viewing it through the eyes of the prospective buyer for that product. Does it do what it is supposed to better, worse or equal to the rivals? That holds if it's $100 loudspeakers or $100,000 amplifiers.

 

[Ron Party]

To be fair to Randall, Alan, you took one sentence from his post and ignored the rest.

 

[Alan Sircom]

To whoever decided comparing upper echelon audio to Ferraris was legitimate--- an F360 Modena Spyder costs 160k in 2001 compared to a F California at 190k today (MSRP only--i realize options get pricey on F-cars). That is only a 19% increase.

In 2001, the CJ Art was probably top of the line preamp at 15k (and was one of the first two boxers--the Ref 2 was 9k as another reference)----now there are preamps 3-4x as expensive (Balabo, Soluution, Lamm, Shindo among others). The most expensive cable in 2001 was probably the Nordost Valhalla---at $3200 a meter (which was well over 2x as expensive as anything else on the market at the time). There are now ICs 2x as expensive all over the place (KS and AQ to name a few). Regarding speakers, the Wilson X1 was long time the champ at 80-90k as I recall----but now there are a multitude of 200k super speakers.

These numbers of course are nominal, not real dollars. The bottom line is high end audio inflation is dramatic. I have been in this hobby since 2001 and have seen it first hand.

No.

If you extend the Ferrari analogy, what's happened to audio in recent years is that there are a heck of a lot more F70s these days. If you judge things purely by comparing the top of the ranges, yes there are more ranges playing in the top tier today. That is a function of the huge change in the global audio market.

In fact, if you look beyond Ferrari and look at the supercar market over the last two decades or so, there are a lot more cars costing $200,000 and above now. And 'above' is now a lot more 'above' than it was. But it's worth bearing in mind that the existence of seven-figure Bugatti Veyrons have little bearing on the price of a Town Car.

In audio, there is also a healthy bunch of better-than-ever products that still keep the audio world going for the rank and file audiophiles. Rather than bemoaning that Balabo or Soulution and the like have added a new layer of super-expensive products, think how close something like a C-J ET5 ($9,500) gets to an original ART ($19,000 in today's money, adjusted for inflation) and how much better the $20,000 GAT is above that 2001 product.

OK, so there's that sinking feeling that audiophiles get when they realize the best is beyond them. But the second-tier products today are excellent. They always have been.

 

[Jeff Fritz]

I don't agree. . . . but to suggest the reviewer cannot execute all aspects of their job without owning the tools they use to do that job is as logically inconsistent as insisting the person who drives the train, owns the train.

Hey there Alan! OK, let's follow this one on out . . .

If you were in the market for a train . . . would you go to the guy that is borrowing a train to drive (and can borrow trains at will), or to the owner/operator who bought the train, services the train, has to make a living with the train, might go out of business if the train is crappy, etc? Who has a more vested interest in discerning the train marketplace? I'm asking the latter guy for advice.

What if the DAC and train cost the same? (Oh . . . that's another thread )

 

[Alan Sircom]

To be fair to Randall, Alan, you took one sentence from his post and ignored the rest.

Agreed, but the points still hold. In some respects, I think it's almost impossible to make value judgements on products if they are too far outside your normal remit. We have to extrapolate and walk a mile in someone else's shoes. But it makes it almost impossible to separate our own existence from those of the intended client if we think about prices in our own terms.

In the case of a £70k DAC, I have no idea how to relate that into a setting where I can think someone would think that justifiable. In the same way that I like a glass of wine of an evening but would struggle to understand how to relate that to drinking Mouton-Rothchild as a daily tipple. But I know of someone who does just that.

I suspect exactly the same usual rules apply. The Arcam rDAC is good, but the Ayre QB-9 is better. It costs a lot more, but it sounds better, so the difference is potentially justifiable. If I tried a Zanden or an Audio Note and it sounded better than the Ayre, the same holds. And if a $70k DAC sounds better still, the same still holds. You can argue that there comes a point where the level of improvement is not commensurate with the added expenditure - and I wouldn't disagree - but that point varies from person to person, and how deep their pockets are. The difference in price between a Cambridge DACMagic and a Musical Fidelity M1DAC is entirely justified for me if there's even a relatively small increment in performance, because relative to my income the price differential is relatively small. It's conceivable that the same process of justification would even extend to a $70k DAC. That may sound crazy, but given I know that there's a three-year waiting list for a 150' yacht that works out at roughly a million bucks a foot, such things are not outside of reality. Just not our reality.

 

[Randall Smith]

Agreed, but the points still hold. In some respects, I think it's almost impossible to make value judgements on products if they are too far outside your normal remit. We have to extrapolate and walk a mile in someone else's shoes. But it makes it almost impossible to separate our own existence from those of the intended client if we think about prices in our own terms.

In the case of a £70k DAC, I have no idea how to relate that into a setting where I can think someone would think that justifiable. In the same way that I like a glass of wine of an evening but would struggle to understand how to relate that to drinking Mouton-Rothchild as a daily tipple. But I know of someone who does just that.

I suspect exactly the same usual rules apply. The Arcam rDAC is good, but the Ayre QB-9 is better. It costs a lot more, but it sounds better, so the difference is potentially justifiable. If I tried a Zanden or an Audio Note and it sounded better than the Ayre, the same holds. And if a $70k DAC sounds better still, the same still holds. You can argue that there comes a point where the level of improvement is not commensurate with the added expenditure - and I wouldn't disagree - but that point varies from person to person, and how deep their pockets are. The difference in price between a Cambridge DACMagic and a Musical Fidelity M1DAC is entirely justified for me if there's even a relatively small increment in performance, because relative to my income the price differential is relatively small. It's conceivable that the same process of justification would even extend to a $70k DAC. That may sound crazy, but given I know that there's a three-year waiting list for a 150' yacht that works out at roughly a million bucks a foot, such things are not outside of reality. Just not our reality.

I agree. I sometimes think that people shop to purchase the best audio product within a price range and not necessarily the best product independent of price. Some audiophiles find a price range that they can afford and then pick a product within that range. Now, I am not saying that audio products that are outrageously expensive are not among the best available, but each product should be grounded in the reality of real world competition. Proper measurements and some good and honest listening would go a long way in getting to bottom of it. Dare I suggest a blind test?

People can spend their money in any fashion they choose, but when a reviewer defends a products 70K retail price by saying "Seems to me, that in this case, you get everything you paid for, expect, and deserve." What does that mean and how did he come to this conclusion?

 

[Alan Sircom]

Hey there Alan! OK, let's follow this one on out . . .

If you were in the market for a train . . . would you go to the guy that is borrowing a train to drive (and can borrow trains at will), or to the owner/operator who bought the train, services the train, has to make a living with the train, might go out of business if the train is crappy, etc? Who has a more vested interest in discerning the train marketplace? I'm asking the latter guy for advice.

What if the DAC and train cost the same? (Oh . . . that's another thread )

Hi Jeff, How's things!?!

Good point. But I still think the answer is not clear cut. Especially as the implication of this is that the only people who can review high-end equipment are those who can afford high-end equipment. That might be a good ultimate solution, but does it mean the reviewer ends up being selected on the size of their bank account and not necessarily their ability to discern good audio and express that discernment well. Of course, the fact many seem to be lacking in both bank account and discernment doesn't help make my case.

Back to my train analogy. Ultimately, I'm not sure. The guy who drives the trains for a living has a pretty significant chip in the whole train-driving game. But so does the owner, who has a stake in the operation.

 

[microstrip]

(...) People can spend their money in any fashion they choose, but when a reviewer defends a products 70K retail price by saying "Seems to me, that in this case, you get everything you paid for, expect, and deserve." What does that mean and how did he come to this conclusion?

It is true that our long established notions of perceived value are relative. I have listened a few times to the Alexandria X2 and if I had the financial capacity I would buy it and consider a good value - I have never heard a speaker doing what a X2 does. I recently heard the Metronome Kalista top system (transport and tube DAC) - more than usd 70000, surely. Heard with my usual test recordings the differences between it and my CD player were striking, perhaps more than the differences between my speakers and the X2 in fundamental aspects related to aspects of reproduced music that approach us of the real thing. But If I had the money I would spend it on the speakers with much easiness.

 

[MylesBAstor]

So let me understand this logic. My review mean more if I'm willing to pay full price for a product than either industry accomodation -- or choose not to buy the product at all?

For instance, I review a solid-state amplifier and give it a good review, appreciating what it does well. After all, isn't a reviewers job to describe the sound of a DUT? OTOH, it just doesn't for me, do what I want in an amplifier; but it might for someone else since we know that in the end, there's no perfect piece of gear. No, just tradeoffs in design objectives and balancing out different variables.

 

[Jeff Fritz]

Hi Jeff, How's things!?!

Good point. But I still think the answer is not clear cut. Especially as the implication of this is that the only people who can review high-end equipment are those who can afford high-end equipment. That might be a good ultimate solution, but does it mean the reviewer ends up being selected on the size of their bank account and not necessarily their ability to discern good audio and express that discernment well. Of course, the fact many seem to be lacking in both bank account and discernment doesn't help make my case.

Back to my train analogy. Ultimately, I'm not sure. The guy who drives the trains for a living has a pretty significant chip in the whole train-driving game. But so does the owner, who has a stake in the operation.

I don't think one needs a $200k speaker. A pair of Revel Salon2s, for instance, would put many super-expensive speakers to shame. It would be a fine benchmark for most any reviewer.

I do see your point and I'm not offering a perfect solution. I just fall on the own-your-reference-system side of the fence.

 

[Jeff Fritz]

So let me understand this logic. My review mean more if I'm willing to pay full price for a product than either industry accomodation -- or choose not to buy the product at all?

Not at all. This is a very narrow window regarding value judgement. The point, in simple terms, is that it is hard to have a clear concept of value when you never have to purchase anything.

Oscar Wilde: "A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing." Could have been said of many a reviewer . . .

 

[mauidan]

No, I have not heard it. My post wasn't about the sound, but about the justification of price. I do not need to hear it to know it costs $70,000.

And no, value is not relative to the reviewer. These products do not exist in a vacuum, but relative to one another. How does the $70K Trinity DAC sound compared to the Weiss DAC202? A DAC that costs 1/10th of the price. Is the Trinity TEN TIMES BETTER? By your argument, if there were a $1m DAC that the reviewer really "thought" was a good value, then there you go . . . it's a great value!. It shows a tremendous lack of real world perspective, especially in the world of Hi-End audio.

Your comment about RH . . . precisely. If you get them on permanent loan, without paying a dime, you have NO CLUE how to ascribe value to them in regards someone that actually has to buy them with real money!

Once again you avoided answering my all of questions, so I'll ask again:

If a Soundstage! Network reviewer gives an ultra-high priced component a rave review, are they required to be prepared to buy the component?

IMO, Hi-End audio has never been about a "real world perspective."

Just like any other activity that people are impassioned about, it’s about people seeking the best.

 

[Orb]

No.

If you extend the Ferrari analogy, what's happened to audio in recent years is that there are a heck of a lot more F70s these days. If you judge things purely by comparing the top of the ranges, yes there are more ranges playing in the top tier today. That is a function of the huge change in the global audio market.

In fact, if you look beyond Ferrari and look at the supercar market over the last two decades or so, there are a lot more cars costing $200,000 and above now. And 'above' is now a lot more 'above' than it was. But it's worth bearing in mind that the existence of seven-figure Bugatti Veyrons have little bearing on the price of a Town Car.

In audio, there is also a healthy bunch of better-than-ever products that still keep the audio world going for the rank and file audiophiles. Rather than bemoaning that Balabo or Soulution and the like have added a new layer of super-expensive products, think how close something like a C-J ET5 ($9,500) gets to an original ART ($19,000 in today's money, adjusted for inflation) and how much better the $20,000 GAT is above that 2001 product.

OK, so there's that sinking feeling that audiophiles get when they realize the best is beyond them. But the second-tier products today are excellent. They always have been.

Just as a reference here is a list of what an article feels is the priciest supercars, as Alan says they are way over $200k.
http://editorial.autos.msn.com/slideshow.aspx?cp-documentid=1100714#2

I checked a few of the prices and they seem to match pretty closely.
Cheers
Orb