I would almost take the opposite view. Back in the 80's and 90's, friends and families all tended to have a hifi system of one kind of another - usually a receiver/amp, turntable and separate speakers. Now when I go into people's homes, I rarely see what would have been considered a hifi system. Yes smart speakers are there, but nothing that has any chance of giving the 'true' audio experience of frequency response, spatial separation and dynamics. And as a consequence for many people I think music has been pushed to the background, becoming a 'filler', if you like, used for when conversation dries-up. None of my colleagues, for instance, ever just 'sit down and listen to music'. They have too many other things to do these days. The same is happening with film, how many people do you know of that sit down to watch a movie, but do so whilst also browsing the web on their mobile devices. The world has become a very distracting place!
I tend to agree... I think a good stereo in the 90s probably sounded closer to ambitious HiFi then, than a Soundbar (or the like) sounds to low-end HiFi now. It also seems that sound quality in music-listening has, for the reasons you describe, decreased. At the same time, consciousness about sound quality for TV systems has greatly increased.
I agree - too may things prevent people from discovering taking their time and attention music which needs also personal developement. I preferred Beatles when I was 14 but I later developed. . It is not the quality problem but mental desire. . My colege who is as much old as me and has theroretical music education was surprised why Moody Bllues do not sound likie those who play blues ( had no time for them?) and how possible today someone would listen to I.S Bach as 50 years ago . He purchased expensive cinema system with Magnat speakers and.... he prefers to watch movies. We are not identical.
agreed…. even as a long time (albeit budget) audiophile its rare for me to sit down at the focus of my speakers and just revel in the sound & imaging, vs it just being background. Or enjoy my classic AKG headphones drilling a soundstage into my head. So that whole focused experience is probably unknown to many these days… (dang kids get off my lawn!!)
Kids and younger adults today have grown up with portable audio as a main source of music, such as an iPhone and ear buds. It's not high end but not bad, but it is also what they are used to. The song itself is the most important and as long as it sounds pretty good, that works. Smart speakers coupled with the Internet don't sound bad at all, and certainly tons better than transistor radios and portable cassette players of yesteryear. They also care less about sterling silverware, good china, crystal glasses, etc. So times change. The challenge for companies in the audio business - to stay relevant - is how to increase sound quality in smaller packages. Bose is a prime example of this. These days getting younger folks to wants to buy FR30s and roll these behemoths into the living room is "culturally" difficult. If the soundbar and wireless remote speakers are good while being also compact, that is fine with a lot of people.
Older millennial here. The low end market provides amazing value today. Been having a blast with all the cheap class D amps that have hit the market. My strategy is to wait for boomers to start unloading their endgame gear into the used market in about a decade.
Great plan. I watched with interest a documentary about a guy who spent a lifetime building his endgame system only to find he had a terminal health issue. The system was auctioned off for pennies on the dollar to lucky people who knew the value of the components. He had a massive turntable that he never listened to that someone scooped up cheep.
One thing I would like to mention Paul, is that fact that auto manufactures have made it harder and harder to install your own car stereo. It is kind of hard to take out a touch screen stereo when it controls heat, ac, heated seats and god knows what else. Another thing is, a friend of mine works for a certain auto dealer which I will leave un-named for his sake. Just changing speakers can light up a code in the cars computer and shut down the stereo. It will actually look for the exact impedance of the factory speaker I have been told. I guess they really don't want you messing around in there anymore and when you can't put your own stereo in it does sell more higher end packages for the car your buying.
Great time to be an old geezer. Excellent streaming services. Relatively inexpensive streaming units. Great R2R DACs. New Class D amps that rock at a fraction of the weight of old school Claas A/B amps (easier on the back). Don't even get me started on how good headphone rigs are.
I think this is similar to what is happening with camera gear. For most people, their phones are now good enough as a camera that they don't feel the need to spend hundreds (or thousands) of dollars on cameras and lenses. For me and for a relatively small number of people with the disposable income and an interest in high end audio and high end camera equipment it is still worth spending the money pursuing an audio or photo dream. But I'm 72 so there is definitely a finite amount of time left for my two favorite hobbies.
As a lifelong drummer, I've seen musical instruments follow this same trajectory. When I was first learning to play in the '80s, the starter gear available was JUNK. It wasn't even real wood, had pot metal hardware etc. Nowadays for the same relative spend the kit you'll get is of much higher quality and, as you said about audio, is much closer to the pro stuff than it used to be. I can only assume this has more to do with manufacturing technology than anything else.
Right now the Chinese hi-fi products are starting to really kick ass; I recently paired a Chinese DAC with some IcePower monoblock amplifiers and a Wiim Mini streamer, and I have state-of-the-art 2 channel sound in my 'second' system. Customers will naturally want better things when they become older and more affluent, but those things need to perform at least as well as the gear being upgraded, and when the Chinese gear performs so well, it's going to be a major design challenge that companies like PS Audio need to rise to.
Excellent points! Those of us old enough recall what the origin of, say, Crutchfield’s was- aftermarket car stereo and oh boy, when I had a 1979 Celica, it was Crutchfield that created a path for to to great in car sound.
@@michaelbloom5342 very cool! I got my 79 Celica in 1980 and by the time 82 rolled around, it no longer had the stock stereo (the radio was a Fujitsu unit). I did a new head unit, front and rear amps, added back speakers and upgraded the front speakers. And I loved going through the Crutchfield catalogs
As a music listener around Paul's age I've gone through a number of "systems" starting in college with a Fisher 500T, Dual 1019 and EV bookshelf speakers. Sounded pretty good to me. But the reason for the system - was music. I didn't really care about "tweaking", etc. I didn't know that existed yet. I wanted to hear music. And music to me was far more natural, acoustic than electrical. This has changed I believe. What is the "reference" musically for many people today? How often is music heard live? My HiFi changed over the years as I could afford better gear but it was a striving for the music above owning gear - mostly. At one desperate point when I was chasing the rabbit gear down the hole I got rid of the whole thing as I recognized I was enjoying the "music" in a crappy car radio more. Why? I was listening to the music and not the gear. It took some years afterwards before deciding to venture back into HiFi. I now have a moderate but nice sounding system that brings me music. I'm working hard to enjoy what I've got and not look to the next best thing. Dinosaur? I'm pretty sure I am.
High end audio has always been rare. Even when I was younger, growing up in the 60s, and 70s, most people that I knew had an off the shelf TT, receiver and speakers. No different than a Bluetooth speaker or ear buds of today. There will always be those for the "good enough" sound, and there will always be those who prefer better.
Or at worse, one of those dreadful one-box mini systems! The only decent ones I can recall were the Denon systems, which were still proper separates, supplied with Mission speakers.
Being an organist, I listen to a lot of pipe organ music. Most of today's popular music reproduction devices fall far short of what I expect to hear. Only a good or preferably a high-end component system and speakers will do. Got to feel those 16Hz pedal notes.
The future of Hi-Fi will be devoid of physical media, and your preamp/amp will be integrated in the speakers with the exception of a few brands that will keep the pre a separate unit altogether. ALSO Big big big ups to Jim Fosgate! Inventor of the aftermarket car audio industry as we know it today. The mans genius, struggles, and perseverance are truly inspiring.
As a car audiophile in the 90’s it really does sadden me to see the state of the industry. Not only do factory speaker’s considerably sound better it is also far more difficult to replace the components.
All true as said, I would kindly like to add that the shift over the years as technology has blossomed has given people more choices in enjoying their particular hobbies, thereby reducing exposure to the marvels of great music reproduction, it is all about the listening and once someone has enjoyed what can be achieved within the confines of their home space; a young audiophile is born, but sadly these environments are now few and far between as more and more stores only shift boxes and many will never experience the moment.
I liked the analogy with car audio and agree. Same with some tiny bluetooth speakers which are fun and enjoyable to hear despite their limitations. That's was unimaginable back in the days.
You’re spot on Paul. My budget is just enough for Schiit products but they sound great. LPs outsold CDs this year and U-Turn sells many thousands of turntables. Interest in audio is indeed coming back. People are finding retro is cool for a reason! After all, what kid doesn’t love a dinosaur?
It's one of the reasons I believe we as a society need to look inward. It's incredible that people can't afford to retire, but have way nicer things than those who could retire from the previous generation. If I lived like people did 30 years ago, I'd have a lot more money.
As usual, I think Paul has a good grasp of the situation. I think the narrowing gap between high end and lower end gear is indeed a big part of it. Technological advances in several different industries have reached the point of diminishing returns, and hi-fi audio is one of those. With modern DSP and cheaper high quality components, simple inexpensive systems can sound better than a great system from even a decade ago. As a father of 4 teenagers, I can say they are still just as interested in listening to music, but they do it with headphones now. The wireless headphone industry is thriving, and there are more hi-fi headphone options than ever before. So, that is relegating hi-fi home audio to the realm of multi-purpose / home theater use. While the sound quality of inexpensive systems is making leaps and bounds, the sound quality of true hi-fi systems has changed very little to any but the most discerning audiophile ears. That's going to change the way audio manufacturers approach product design. I think that "high end audio" will eventually become more exclusive, for a very specific demographic, while every day audio systems will become hi-fi quality.
I think Paul is correct regards the gap narrowing between ‘high end’ hi-fi and smart, Bluetooth speakers. The difference is, that in 10, 15 or even 20 years my hi-fi rig will be pretty much as it is now. Hell I still have a perfectly good, premium amp I bought in the 80s. How many of these smart, Bluetooth devices will still be around and functional in 40 years time? Longevity is integral to ‘high end’ audio. Whereas, these Bluetooth, smart speakers or ‘all in 1’ are updated and replaced more frequently than politicians tell untruths.
You are not wrong in that a Bluetooth speaker needs to be replaced more often. But I think it is not a big deal for most people to replace a Bluetooth speaker. Most people don't need to save up money for that. And every other iteration or so is almost worth the upgrade anyway. Simply because the improvements in sound are quite noticeable. And, like Paul says, soundwise the gap compared to a proper system is shrinking. But I actually think that it won't affect the Hi-Fi market all that much. In fact, it may even get more people interested in it. They hear the difference between a 100 dollar Bluetooth speaker and a 200 dollar one and start thinking about getting a real system.
You hit the nail on the head. The lifestyle systems are built to last only a couple of years before they either break or the technology has been usurped by something new.
About 9 years ago my son brought his step children to visit. The eldest, James had a new I-Phone and had a play list he wanted to show me. He had some Joe Bonamassa songs so I listened to a couple. Then I put Joe playing "Blues of Desperation" running on my old system. Hew was so shocked that it sounded so good.
I 1000% agree with Paul. For most people, today’s lower end equipment is good enough, and gives better value than starter equipment from back in the day. My ear buds for when I take walks are Apple AirPods. I use them because I don’t like walking with over the ear cans, and for some reason the AirPods fit my ears perfectly. Do they sound as good as my Grados, of course not. Are they surprisingly good, and good enough for most people? Yes. The same hold true as Paul points out in car audio. My daughter drives a 2023 Nissan Kicks, a car with an MSRP of $23k. The audio is really good. When I bought my first new car, I replaced the radio within a month, no need to do that today. The bottom line, no matter what floats your boat, from budget, to high end to vintage, vinyl to streaming, in the audio world, these ARE the good old days.
Now days you need to be a tech to change out a car stereo. lol. And a couple of weeks ago my sister said the speakers on her tv were good enough. I was mortified. A big screen with little sound.
@@dandiehm8414 you just made me flashback to the kodak moment days. I miss having a nicer camera where you could tinker with it and change lenses and flashes and experiment with different films to tweak the results. Hmm. I thought the tinkering was always the fun part that you could show pride in.
Even back in the 70s Hi-Fi was not cheap. I bought parts paying for each piece over two to three year periods. Building my system up over time. But on average one bit of gear was still cheaper than the average price of a new car. Now it has become esoteric and I have bills to pay I never had in the 70s for my cable service, mobile phone, subscriptions that didn't even exist back then. Income is spread over more individual outgoings and as Paul has said the gap between the really good stuff and the middle of the road stuff is much much smaller and 'good enough' for the majority. All my friends back then had an 'audio system' and we would go around each others homes and play our records on their gear. We had listening parties. The same thing has happened to the camera and camcorder industry with mobile phones being 'good enough'. It's not just Hi-Fi suffering but once again becoming a hobby for those with higher incomes just as once photography was out of reach for the masses. We are going full circle with the only difference being the masses has a cheaper choice with genuine better quality.
Love my B&O in my S6. I'm glad the era of building a car audio system is over. But I still enjoy my automatic watch, dropping a needle on vinyl, and manually shifting my rim brake bicycle. To me, it is all of the above. We live in amazing times!
The author needs to spend some time in a record store. Gen Z and Millenials are the engines behind the vinyl revival and two-channel vintage market. Are they getting PS Audio, McIntosh, Devore, etc.? No. But they're why there are more turntable makers today than there were 30 years ago. And they're fans of vintage because it can be fixed, unlike 95% of the home theater stuff on the market. I'm 55 and live in the Asheville area. It's not a big town but there are 5 record stores and on any given day I'm the oldest person by a wide margin in any of the locations. And one of the crazy stats is that many Gen Z are buying vinyl before buying the turntables to play them on. This means they're getting together to play their stuff in what is a 2020s version of a 50s listening party when not every kid had a 33 1/3 player. There is a burgeoning business of retrofitting those great MCM console stereos with modern guts so they can play vinyl, stream, and sound good all while looking like they did the day they rolled into the showroom 60+ years ago.
Seventies were great with the stereo equipment. 2024 is still great because I enjoy an amazing high end stereo system for my budget. . I also have a blue tooth Marshall that’s cool and a JBL for the pool. Everything has its place. My car audio system is a Harmon Kardon and has an amazing amp and speakers for an audiophile sound. All good in my world.
Yea its a combo of things. You can get great sound pretty much anyone will appreciate for under 2k these days especially with bookshelf and subwoofer quality. The other thing is the speakers and systems that meet the spouse acceptance factor which include bookshelf and sub systems, along with sound bar and Sonos type systems have become good enough for the music lover and easy enough and attractive enough for the spouse.
Early wave boomer here, still enjoying my vintage, plain vanilla 2-channel system. Most of the equipment I bought new, and that was back in the 70s and 80s. Never cared about surround sound or home theater. I'll stick with vinyl and CDs as opposed to streaming. Old school by choice, plus convenience.
Come on Paul! The majority of people just don't have the money to spend on high-end systems, even if they'd love too & to say vintage audio doesn't compete is just crazy. Even though Sansui & Pioneer made mostly absolutely awful speakers they made some great receivers & amps back in the day. I should know because I have a great vintage system & have been quite happy for years with it after trial & error. That's why they are still so desirable.
Very true, I have a Pioneer receiver connected to some vintage ESS speakers with the amazing Heil Air Motion Transformers and the sound is just amazing, it's like cheating the system. I also have some ESS speakers connected as front mains to my surround system and it's so stunning, brings sounds to life like they are right there in the room and so dimensional and open sounding. I've greatly improved the Heils by applying a 3 inch roundover on both edges of the plastic housing so it smooths the edge diffraction from it's original design, it's stunning the difference it made. Also at the same time it helps prevent the rear wave of the Heil from wrapping around and cancelling out frequencies at the front. It made it so much smoother and refined sounding and the room dimensionality is off the charts.
The difficulty with digital cameras (pocket ones at least) is that the iPhone is so good as a camera, and it instantly compiles and stores the images, making them, easy to share. I bought a Leica compact camera, and hardly ever used it, simply because the iPhone made good, if not better images, sits in my pocket, and I can share images instantly. In fact, I think that the iPhone is a better camera than it is a phone!
Part of the reason is that you can buy a $400 pair of In Ear Monitors that sounds great powered by an iPhone and hear more that is in the music than you can in a $9,000 retail stereo system (in my case, Marsh A200 Amp, passive preamp, a tube cd player, and Sonus Faber Signum //REL sub speakers. Including $3000 worth of power, interconnects and speaker cabling). And to sound as it should, speakers pulled a full meter into the room from the back wall. At the time that SF/REL speaker setup sounded better to me than equivalently priced speakers from Thiel, Dynaudio, ProAc, Vandersteen, basically everything available at that $4.000 price point. And yet my $400 IEM set sounds, to me, much, much better. Better detail, better bass texture and slam, cleaner vocals, better separation, better timbre, better everything. More revealing. More natural. And doesn't bother anyone else in the house no matter at what volume I listen! I doubt I could sell my entire stereo system for more than $2000 at this point. Over the head heasphones and a decent amp for $1,500 total cost would also blow that stereo system away.
I think what is happening is that Hi Fi is improving and getting cheaper, you do not need to spend tens of thousands, I will say for 2 to 3 thousand pounds you can easily get a fantastic sounding system, five years from now that price will be lower, we are already at the point where people question the sanity of paying 5 grand for a DAC or amp.
A few years ago I had assembled a very nice system (Thorens TD160 turntable/grace tonearm, etc) with costly 'classic' amp and speakers. It sounded amazing. Walking into my lounge one day I heard one of my favourite songs playing on it and began wondering if the sound could be improved....and then suddenly realised that I was now listening to one of my favourite songs., and yet all I could think of was trying to improve the bass, or whatever. The enjoyment of the music itself was gone. I now live in a bus and have a pair of bookshelf Misson 700s speakers, and play my music via Bluetooth from my phone through a small, inexpensive Bluetooth amp from Fosi Audio. All my music is now downloaded in.wav format. It sounds fantastic, and at a fraction of the price.
I think you demonstrate another reason the traditional high end audio is a shrinking market. People around the world are shrinking their home space as the world becomes more crowded. If you are living in a 500 sq foot home in a high rise you are not buying traditional separates and FR30 speakers.
To comment on the car stereo aspect, it's funny that, while in the home the trend is for fewer and fewer speakers in any system, in cars now the trend is for more and more speakers. Back in the day my car had two speakers . Now my lastest car has 12 speakers plus a subwoofer built in! But every body just wants that one speaker at home that can do everything. Maybe car audio will go to the sound bar eventually!🤣
A major trends I am experiencing is people want convenience Growing up in the heyday of audio, here is a list of the gear I use to listen to music: Separate amp, preamp, turntable, tuner, CD player, and dedicated streamer. Huge library of CDs and Vinyl. A lot of time goes into turning things on/off and maintaining the albums. My very young barely over 20-year-old coworker. Growing up never not knowing life without a cell phone. His system? Cell phone, music streaming app, and a very good sounding Bluetooth speaker. Owns a few albums for posterity, considering a Bluetooth enabled Turntable as his next upgrade. He likes quality audio just as much as I do, but when he comes home, he just wants to have one box to turn on and get music without the hassle that goes into the care and feeding of my rig.
This letter is like I wrote it! Exactly the same: mechanical watches, cars with manual transmision.... and to add photography with real DSLR cameras. I feel like a dinosaurus too.
Just like some of us still appreciate a manual, let's just look at the bizarre resurgence vinyl has made (even though I don't quite get that one, it's clear some younger folks adore it, even if it is antiquated and expensive). Fine audio is not different. Those who care about and want it seek it. Everything changes, sure. But the more things change, the more they stay the same.
What I find interesting about this is that I know of 2 young people who have purchases very cheap turntables to play what I consider to be an expensive format. This is not a criticism, I just struggle to understand what influences such a choice. Perhaps it comes down to vinyl being seen as fashionable.
It is a farce new records. People are buying 12" CD's. Manufacturers are mastering in digital to Lp's! It is insane! I will stick with my pre 80's Lp's. At least I know it was recorded in analog and mastered in analog. No 1's and Zeros for me and missing audio computer wise!
So dumb. Some of us don’t prefer instant gratification. In a way, prepping the medium helps prepare the mind to listen to an album in full. For some it’s meditation. Who cares if the vinyl has 1’s and 0’s?
My partner and I have polar opposite views and approaches to listening to music. I am ‘old-school’ - I have a traditional hi-fi system, and like physical media - vinyl, CDs even cassettes. The speakers sit in the living room, angled toward the sofa. I do stream, but usually when I’m in my home office or bedroom, and then I use either headphones or some ancient Sony active speakers. She uses a JBL Bluetooth speaker, and streams everything from her phone - usually modern jazz, or 80s soul music. The JBL is excellent - really packs a punch, and I can see the appeal. But for her, music is a background experience, it’s there while she does something else. For me, when I use my main hi fi, it’s to listen to music, maybe with a good book, and a glass of something, but not to the point where I am not paying attention to the music. And I think it’s this, a degree of elitism from the manufacturers, and some of the ridiculous equipment prices that are turning people away from ‘real’ hi-fi. Sadly though, a lot of new music is mixed with phone users in mind rather than audiophiles, and so, a lot of modern music is over compressed, and suffers sonically as a result.
Not gonna lie. Every time I hear my Dad’s $500 Klipsch soundbar, I scratch my head and wonder why I spent $15,000 on my system. A $2,000 soundbar would probably close the gap significantly.
My Windows UA-cam, Dragonfly Red, Audioquest cable and Creative computer speakers (properly placed) sound great and served all my music listening needs, and mý family members'. I don't miss a bit of my previous McIntosh, PS Audio and Wilson Audio gears.
Hah! Funny! I'm also into both HiFi and mechanical watches! I think both will become part of the retro resurgence in the next two decades, much like the vinyl revival last decade!
I remember Mercedes Benz cars had Becker radios some of which had a mechanical autoscan mechanism that just made its frequency indicator slide horizontally with a clunk clunk indefinitely.
As always, the people with the best hearing are listening with the worst audio equipment and vice versa. For the simple reason that hearing starts to deteriorate after your 20's and youngsters usually don't have the money to invest in high quality audio equipment and don't have the time and attention in their busy lives for extended listening sessions. By the time we have the time and money to enjoy high-end, our hearing is far over the optimum.
Any industry has a shelf life. Most businesses go boom to bust within 20 years of starting. A few make it to 30 to 50 years. The really rare ones make it up to 100 years or more. I used to have a car audio business in my teenage years when I was 18 ( now 49). Back then Paul was right you had horrible sound in a car so even people who did not care about sound wanted it replaced for something better. We did not have all this harness crap where you plug and go. You had to test out each wire to hardwire it and then make a custom faceplate from scratch to each car and the speaker mounting plates. The kits were just starting to come out and when it was a kit it was an all in one you have to modify each time which sucked. Today we live in a disposable economy. Tech moves so fast that quality is often way down the list to price and a deal in the moment to play with and use a do dad as a youngster. So with home audio the super high end will have a place for high end income spenders. Then you will have the budget buyers. The middle is what will get squeezed especially as the quality generation gets older and starts dying off eventually. That is what is happening with politics right now. The older generation voters are slowly passing away and the new wave of kids growing up are starting to vote that think differently and reason differently for how they want to live now and in the future. Typically with any generation there is a wave of learning levels with new technology as it is exciting to create and innovate. As people age not all but a majority get used to a certain tech and no longer want to change how they live regardless of what advancements in society are happening. Super old people many do not even have a cell phone and just use snail mail, then some have a cell phone, as the age gets younger they do online, then texting, video chatting, etc. The younger the crowd typically the more tech they do and see value in. There are people that are exceptions of course but talking in generalities.
High-end audio has always been a small group, that's its nature for two reasons: 1) Expense = Most folks are saddled, everything has skyrocketed up in cost from rent and mortgages to cars to care maintenance to healthcare, to utilities to groceries to a hamburger. 2) In this new world of tech convenience and "give it to me faster" and fake pop music and the like, people have gotten away from listening to music. It is just background noise at best. Part of the problem is all the cheap made stuff that cost more than it should, but still more affordable to folks (smart speakers, smartphones, streams, etc) that people prefer now, which makes music sound awful and so one no longer is engaged. So it is hard to makes and sell stuff to disinterested people and those interested, but can't afford it. A third reason is plain ol snobbery. Audiophiles are walking contradictions. They complain how not enough people are interested in the hobby and then do everything they can to keep people out of it. Unless, the future of "high-end audio" includes "entry level" products at least, not to mention start to restore the mid level stuff, it looks bleak. Without those things it only becomes more niche until it implodes in on itself and ceases to exist. There are some well known European companies starting to realize this and trying to bring to market more "affordable" versions of their high-end stuff, but part of the problem is bringing those items to the US market. It almost never happens and when it does the cost is unnecessarily tremendous and the prices end up being astronomical.
Car audio is thriving..and is leading the way.. I think that its time to do 140 db in the living room.by the way..I do a 135 db in my living room currently..haha..
there will always be aficionados and connoisseurs, but the numbers are becoming less and less.This is why high end is getting more and more expensive across the board .Less companies selling to a small market really see that in the U.S. market
yea I have wondered what the 'audio' system would be on the USS enterprise ( Star Trek version ) way back my first 'Stereo ' was a a 15 w /Ch. pioneer, dynaco 25 spk , and an AR. T'table ( all new ) I still suspect IF I came across a new condition setup it'd be fine to me. well, I've come to think 60 w ch is kinda min. Which is as different Idea I guess. point of diminishing returns.
The gap really is not shrinking that much. Can an Apple HomePod or Bluetooth speaker sound good? Sure, although this is typically only true for a desktop system or very small room, and these come nowhere close to what can be achieved with a hi-fi system. Case in point, I am running a tube amp and floorstanders with dual 8 inch bass woofers. A Bluetooth speaker has narrowed the gap with this? 😂😅🤣
I'm sad to see that most modern HiFi audio focuses too much on digital for my taste, things like having a screen and wifi. I prefer hifi equipment that is purely or mostly analog and without screens. My favorite brand is Schiit. I know there are much better ones but they are beyond my budget; Schiit feels fair priced to me. I also prefer their approach to sorround on the Syn & Kraken vs 5.1, DTS, etc.
the future is going more towards sound bars, with built in amps. maybe such that have option for "pro" versions that add 2 more speakers behind you all wireless. the future goes to make stuff easier. for lazier people. on expense of quality. it always has. it will never sound as good as a great surround system. but also you tube will never sound as good as vanyl records, but vanyl records are only for purist and fans nowadays so will speakers and surround be. future is only hearing music from youtube / spotify and only on tv speakers / sound bars. that's what i think
3:30 this! I’ve experienced this on a few mediums now with the cars I’ve owned being a great example. I have a 2019 Subaru wrx right now with a stock premium audio system which sounds pretty good.. before college I dropped like 5k on a aftermarket audio system I use to take to auto shows and although that was much better, the audio system in the Subaru is plenty fine I wouldn’t even consider swapping it out.. same situation I see with graphics cards, visual quality with TV’s or monitors, head sets, ect.. the gap is shrinking and when you can get 70-80% the quality for 1/4 the price it really feels like a waste unless you have the money or are absolutely in need of the best of the best
Let's be totally honest the high end stereo market is way over priced for what you get for your money just like a new car.everything is a big cash grab today
The future of high-end audio is audiophile lossless streaming. I have a pair of KEF LS60 used in my dining room. Hey Paul, when can we get the PS Audio FR30A active speakers? You guys can beat KEF LS60, Piega 701, Buchardt A700 etc.
They probably can beat these speakers, in the same way that compact discs beat lossless streaming of any bit depth and sample rate (better than any lossy MQA of course).
@@Jorge-Fernandez-Lopez Gosh, you must be kidding me. MQA is like MP3 a lossy codec. Who wants lossy digital audio if being audiophile? NOBODY! Welcome to today and not 10 years ago, nowadays we stream lossless FLAC in CD quality or better easily up to 192kHz 24 bits. It’s up to your IQ to judge if 192kHz 24 bits lossless PCM is better than 44.1kHz 16 bits potentially error prone PCM (CDs can have data errors). Obviously streaming already can beat CDs incl. SACD technically speaking. Lossless music streaming is not only lossless but it is also error-free. If you know of any streamed track today that sounds inferior to CD and is claimed to be CD quality, let me know.
@@ThinkingBetter Some, maybe many or even most 192 kHz 24 bits, is «lossless» added noise over the original recording to increase file size for "Hi-Res" clients; easy to see with RTA software. Some (or many) "Hi-Res" files (streamed or downloaded) are worse (not better) in my opinion (easy to prove). The readings of my CDs are error free (after correction), otherwise it would be very obvious. Any bit changed in a 16 bit number can be very apparent if that bit is among the most significant ones. By the way, the streaming services can also get errors from the originals, the ripping, or they own discs. The CD is the original file (except Master, no need of 24 bits and 96 kHz for listening, only for processing, mixing, and headroom for recording...), while the streaming services can add some personal touches (compression, equalization, noise, etc.). I own my files and I can listen music even if it's not available in a particular streaming service, even without connection, on any system. I can even equalize once the files for any room, without having to do it on the fly each time. Streaming is fine, maybe not the best, but fine, it's convenient.
@@ThinkingBetter ls 60 is a average speakerset streaming compressed music sounds better then a cd will cost you much more then a decent cd transport/dac combination. The classe D amp in the kef sounds like a luxe Sonos set compared to a quality class A amp
@@razzman2987 Where did you listen to the LS60? I use them in my dining room and it’s not a room for critical listening but they sound awesome for that room. Their weakness is the bass and it’s not about amp technology. Besides, active speakers have a huge benefit of sort of operating without speaker cables and even more discrete than mono blocks having much better direct control of each driver and much better optimized cross-over filtering. Also, modern lossless streaming can provide higher resolution than ever possible on CD media today. I’ve done A/B testing between CD and streaming myself incl. 192kHz 24 bits streaming and definitely streaming can beat CD quality. And of course it is technically possible to make a PS Audio Aspen FR30 active that can beat the passive FR30 given enough passion and careful engineering.
There was a great interest in good audio systems when there was great music being made and great sound engineers making great recordings. Now we're in a time of cultural decay, little music made today will be remembered and listened to in 40, 50, 60 years. And the people consuming that music are satisfied with whatever they're hearing. There is no excitement in consumers of today's music to have it sound it's best. The result is that there is no interest in great sound reproduction equipment.
@davidhester9897 so it sounds like you are agreeing with Paul seems to be saying. That the hi-end niche brands will one day go the way of the aftermarket car audio outlets
very soon there wil be no classes,everything will be in dgital format till the end no religian too no countries nothing to kill or die for,even no current imagine very soon
you moved from 5 years from now to 400 years from now (maybe 400 maybe more) let's jump to 4000 years and say it all doesn't matter because humans will explore other plants by then...
He just explained a dumbed down society regarding audio. I will go as far to say 78% have no clue what real audio should sound like. I bet it's worse than that.
@@davidspendlove5900 Those people deserve to pay 8 grand for a washboard, a trash can and some pots and pans with some sticks. Being brutal but why not? They have no clue!
Funny how automatic transmission seems to have been the default in US. In Europe, it's the other way around: the vast majority of cars are manual transmission i.e. what you call "stick shift". In fact, over here if you take your driving test in a car with automatic transmission, your licence will only allow you to drive automatic transmission cars.
americans had the money to just put bigger engines and not think of the powerloss and cost in an automatic transmission. also to drive them they didn't care about how much gas it would use as much, again due to being able to afford it by having cheaper gasoline and by just plain having more money to spend on the gas.
This is how things used to be in Europe - now with the proliferation of EV and hybrid vehicles, the automatic (or "no gearbox', in the case of EV) is slowly displacing the manual. The great thing is that in Europe most of us didn't have to put up with the dire 'slush-boxes' from the 70's that sucked most of the power from the engine!
Yes, theoretically it should be the other way around, as roads in Europe (especially here in UK) tend to be more congested and twisty, requiring frequent gear changing, so an automatic would be more useful. But the US typically has long straight roads which, outside if the cities, are less congested, so you can stay in the same gear for many miles without the need to shift. I guess it's the historical thing that early automatics were only any good with large engines which were always more common in US than in Europe.
The gap between mass market Bluetooth stuff and real hi-fi is now closer in sound quality terms? Give me a break!!! Most mass market Bluetooth speaker set-ups I've heard recently can't even compete with hot-rooded Sansui and Marantz receivers from the 1970s. I mean have you ever tried listening to Bluetooth speakers for 8 hours straight and can honestly say it doesn't give me audio fatigue?
you forget about all the 80s faux all-in-one cheapo sets with 7 watts of real power? you can get decentish sound for quite cheap now. remember the horrible multimedia speakers of the 90s too? all that stuff is what the cheaper bluetooth stuff replaces thus the gap is lower to 'hifi', comparing old cheap hifi to new cheap hifi on the other hand is comparing hifi to hifi. what's really annoying with bluetooth devices is that they hide the mode they're in usually from the consumer, so you can end up with better audio quality playing from your phone than your pc due to the codecs used. usually it's better to use a cable though even from a phone rather than the bluetooth. is a real even cheap vintage hifi better? usually sure, but a 90s bottom end boombox from philips is what the bluetooth is replacing.
The "high end" is also full of absurdity which leads to credibility issues. I recently read a Stereophile review where a well-known reviewer spoke of cables "breaking in". Really?
I think a "small" circle but very wealthy will buy " high end ". And let me explain what I mean with small circle and what I mean with "High End" . As Paul mentioned that gap between really bad to decent stereo systems is becoming closer and closer. For relatively small money you can hear in many cases so much better than in the past. Because the technology became better and better and more affordable. So then what do I mean with "High End". No it is not mainly the sound quality, as written before we reached a level even with consumer tech. that is very high. No it will be the the difference in price, build quality and design. People who have money need something where they can show and feel that they are high above. Not in a arrogant way, no, just to see and know that they have speaker that are a piece of artistry, designed and crafted to be special, to show exclusive materials and outstanding design. Something that has a status like a huge grand piano, or a special unique watch. Well of course the sound should be best too, but that is not much if a problem these days. It's like buying a Ferrari, or Konigsegg etc.... That will be the future of "High End" . And with that coming to the "small circle" of super wealthy people. Small is relative. Look in the US alone are 15.000 families with a wealth ABOVE 100Million $, looking world wide that number is extremely high. No high end is not dead nor is Hifi dead. It's just changing. Of course new tech accelerates that process, but it's not killing it. What I think is more concerning, is the relation between the consumer and the artist, musician, composer, director etc... How we pay them, how we show them our interest. With streaming we will see that relationship changing with less and less good artist, because they simply can not gain a substantial income. AI will speed up that change again, because AInwill produce the music, the movies and any other content, that can be the killer of High End and Hifi.
Bravo to this question! The times are changing… Look at what happened to the institution of the America’s Cup. The Americas Cup has a charter which has been destroyed in favor of multi-hulled boats because they just go faster. The powers that be decided to just drop all tradition instead of having separate classes of America’s Cup designs. I know this has little to do with audio but it has everything to do with breeding and heritage which may have everything to do with the history of audio.
Americas cup: Even crazier..Not Multi Hulls(Haven't been for years)..They're MonoHull Hydrofoils 'flying' at 50 knots .Sailing in Spain currently. New Zealand again defending the title.
One thing that's changing as well is the cost of the different pieces of technologies used in the audio system. Combine that with salaries that's not keeping up with cost of living everywhere and people have less options in regards to what they practically can afford. My parents built their house on one salary and with two kids and didn't get a lone until it was time for furnitures etc. These day most people would be the proud owner of a tent trying that. 🎪😂
I mentioned before! This Dinosaur isn’t going anywhere! Terrestrial FM via Magnum, Accuphase, and McIntosh is where my lotto money’s going! (AND A Time- Stamped UPDATE!) It seems 🤔, I’ve stoked the ire of two passionate FM detractors who found delight in trumpeting a, dare I say ? A triumph of a “dead medium’s hasty demise?” …..Interesting.🌹
To listen to what? Compressed, low bit rate digital station feeds to a transmitter with an HD carrier and who knows what else hanging on that signal? At least you won't have to spend a lot of money for your dream. Used FM tuner prices are dropping like a rock.
@@johnstone7697 ….I keep expertly-maintained cassette decks from Tascam, Optimus, and Bang&Olufsen, and normal, and chrome bias cassettes are still manufactured. Any exclusive new music played as promo introductions, and not available in retail, I capture and keep in my own vaults. Even MD’s are still made in Asia. I have T O N S of brand mew blanks! I’ll never pay for XM, or Streaming!
FM radio is a dead industry...what are you talking about? I have a Magnum dynalab Etude, from over a decade ago, with a yagi in the attic on a rotor, and it's all obsolete, 20924, join it it works perfect, so what? FM is AM with no static, it all stinks. Obsolete media indeed
There are two categories of audiophiles... the first one has all the money in the world and just goes bout and buys the best ( after a lot of advice and research) and the second is the one who is into his or her own designs ... by this I mean building their own amplifiers and speaker systems ( like I was at one time..) A lot of people love to be creative and study the theory of audio reproduction and make their very own speakers ...
I’m not sure Sonos is the introduction point today. From there it’s speaker bars, then it’s stereo and home theatre. HiFi remains a luxury niche product. Stable market? Needs stats to really know. I wonder why ppl chase the ‘demise’ of HiFi so fervently?
i bet as paul was talking in the back of his mind he is thinking "we are screwed i wish it was still 1989 five years and we are bankrupt if it keeps going like this"! no disrespect paul i am just being real! hope it doesnt end up that way!
vinyl record i can collection is expensive, tedious and limited to few numbers. on the other hand possibility to find new music with spotify and youtube is huge.
What a great letter. Thank you Arthur in Richboro PA. And thank you Paul for you thoughtful response.
I would almost take the opposite view. Back in the 80's and 90's, friends and families all tended to have a hifi system of one kind of another - usually a receiver/amp, turntable and separate speakers. Now when I go into people's homes, I rarely see what would have been considered a hifi system. Yes smart speakers are there, but nothing that has any chance of giving the 'true' audio experience of frequency response, spatial separation and dynamics. And as a consequence for many people I think music has been pushed to the background, becoming a 'filler', if you like, used for when conversation dries-up. None of my colleagues, for instance, ever just 'sit down and listen to music'. They have too many other things to do these days. The same is happening with film, how many people do you know of that sit down to watch a movie, but do so whilst also browsing the web on their mobile devices. The world has become a very distracting place!
I tend to agree... I think a good stereo in the 90s probably sounded closer to ambitious HiFi then, than a Soundbar (or the like) sounds to low-end HiFi now. It also seems that sound quality in music-listening has, for the reasons you describe, decreased. At the same time, consciousness about sound quality for TV systems has greatly increased.
I agree - too may things prevent people from discovering taking their time and attention music which needs also personal developement. I preferred Beatles when I was 14 but I later developed. . It is not the quality problem but mental desire. . My colege who is as much old as me and has theroretical music education was surprised why Moody Bllues do not sound likie those who play blues ( had no time for them?) and how possible today someone would listen to I.S Bach as 50 years ago . He purchased expensive cinema system with Magnat speakers and.... he prefers to watch movies. We are not identical.
agreed…. even as a long time (albeit budget) audiophile its rare for me to sit down at the focus of my speakers and just revel in the sound & imaging, vs it just being background. Or enjoy my classic AKG headphones drilling a soundstage into my head. So that whole focused experience is probably unknown to many these days… (dang kids get off my lawn!!)
The music system will not disappear .
Kids and younger adults today have grown up with portable audio as a main source of music, such as an iPhone and ear buds. It's not high end but not bad, but it is also what they are used to. The song itself is the most important and as long as it sounds pretty good, that works. Smart speakers coupled with the Internet don't sound bad at all, and certainly tons better than transistor radios and portable cassette players of yesteryear. They also care less about sterling silverware, good china, crystal glasses, etc. So times change. The challenge for companies in the audio business - to stay relevant - is how to increase sound quality in smaller packages. Bose is a prime example of this. These days getting younger folks to wants to buy FR30s and roll these behemoths into the living room is "culturally" difficult. If the soundbar and wireless remote speakers are good while being also compact, that is fine with a lot of people.
Older millennial here. The low end market provides amazing value today. Been having a blast with all the cheap class D amps that have hit the market. My strategy is to wait for boomers to start unloading their endgame gear into the used market in about a decade.
Great plan. I watched with interest a documentary about a guy who spent a lifetime building his endgame system only to find he had a terminal health issue. The system was auctioned off for pennies on the dollar to lucky people who knew the value of the components. He had a massive turntable that he never listened to that someone scooped up cheep.
@@user-od9iz9cv1w I watched that documentary too. Absolutely wild build but also equally sad for the guy.
The great thing about Paul is that he has been able to re-invent his company many times. 50 years of PS Audio is quite an accomplishment.
One thing I would like to mention Paul, is that fact that auto manufactures have made it harder and harder to install your own car stereo. It is kind of hard to take out a touch screen stereo when it controls heat, ac, heated seats and god knows what else. Another thing is, a friend of mine works for a certain auto dealer which I will leave un-named for his sake. Just changing speakers can light up a code in the cars computer and shut down the stereo. It will actually look for the exact impedance of the factory speaker I have been told. I guess they really don't want you messing around in there anymore and when you can't put your own stereo in it does sell more higher end packages for the car your buying.
Great time to be an old geezer. Excellent streaming services. Relatively inexpensive streaming units. Great R2R DACs. New Class D amps that rock at a fraction of the weight of old school Claas A/B amps (easier on the back). Don't even get me started on how good headphone rigs are.
I think this is similar to what is happening with camera gear. For most people, their phones are now good enough as a camera that they don't feel the need to spend hundreds (or thousands) of dollars on cameras and lenses. For me and for a relatively small number of people with the disposable income and an interest in high end audio and high end camera equipment it is still worth spending the money pursuing an audio or photo dream. But I'm 72 so there is definitely a finite amount of time left for my two favorite hobbies.
As a lifelong drummer, I've seen musical instruments follow this same trajectory. When I was first learning to play in the '80s, the starter gear available was JUNK. It wasn't even real wood, had pot metal hardware etc. Nowadays for the same relative spend the kit you'll get is of much higher quality and, as you said about audio, is much closer to the pro stuff than it used to be. I can only assume this has more to do with manufacturing technology than anything else.
Right now the Chinese hi-fi products are starting to really kick ass; I recently paired a Chinese DAC with some IcePower monoblock amplifiers and a Wiim Mini streamer, and I have state-of-the-art 2 channel sound in my 'second' system. Customers will naturally want better things when they become older and more affluent, but those things need to perform at least as well as the gear being upgraded, and when the Chinese gear performs so well, it's going to be a major design challenge that companies like PS Audio need to rise to.
Excellent points! Those of us old enough recall what the origin of, say, Crutchfield’s was- aftermarket car stereo and oh boy, when I had a 1979 Celica, it was Crutchfield that created a path for to to great in car sound.
I bought my first amp from them for my first car, a 72 Coupe DeVille, all the way back in 1987.
@@michaelbloom5342 very cool! I got my 79 Celica in 1980 and by the time 82 rolled around, it no longer had the stock stereo (the radio was a Fujitsu unit). I did a new head unit, front and rear amps, added back speakers and upgraded the front speakers. And I loved going through the Crutchfield catalogs
@@NateEll Fujitsu Ten became Eclipse! Very, very good stuff!
As a music listener around Paul's age I've gone through a number of "systems" starting in college with a Fisher 500T, Dual 1019 and EV bookshelf speakers. Sounded pretty good to me. But the reason for the system - was music. I didn't really care about "tweaking", etc. I didn't know that existed yet. I wanted to hear music. And music to me was far more natural, acoustic than electrical. This has changed I believe. What is the "reference" musically for many people today? How often is music heard live? My HiFi changed over the years as I could afford better gear but it was a striving for the music above owning gear - mostly. At one desperate point when I was chasing the rabbit gear down the hole I got rid of the whole thing as I recognized I was enjoying the "music" in a crappy car radio more. Why? I was listening to the music and not the gear. It took some years afterwards before deciding to venture back into HiFi. I now have a moderate but nice sounding system that brings me music. I'm working hard to enjoy what I've got and not look to the next best thing. Dinosaur? I'm pretty sure I am.
High end audio has always been rare. Even when I was younger, growing up in the 60s, and 70s, most people that I knew had an off the shelf TT, receiver and speakers. No different than a Bluetooth speaker or ear buds of today. There will always be those for the "good enough" sound, and there will always be those who prefer better.
Or at worse, one of those dreadful one-box mini systems! The only decent ones I can recall were the Denon systems, which were still proper separates, supplied with Mission speakers.
Being an organist, I listen to a lot of pipe organ music. Most of today's popular music reproduction devices fall far short of what I expect to hear. Only a good or preferably a high-end component system and speakers will do. Got to feel those 16Hz pedal notes.
The future of Hi-Fi will be devoid of physical media, and your preamp/amp will be integrated in the speakers with the exception of a few brands that will keep the pre a separate unit altogether.
ALSO
Big big big ups to Jim Fosgate! Inventor of the aftermarket car audio industry as we know it today. The mans genius, struggles, and perseverance are truly inspiring.
As a car audiophile in the 90’s it really does sadden me to see the state of the industry. Not only do factory speaker’s considerably sound better it is also far more difficult to replace the components.
All true as said, I would kindly like to add that the shift over the years as technology has blossomed has given people more choices in enjoying their particular hobbies, thereby reducing exposure to the marvels of great music reproduction, it is all about the listening and once someone has enjoyed what can be achieved within the confines of their home space; a young audiophile is born, but sadly these environments are now few and far between as more and more stores only shift boxes and many will never experience the moment.
I liked the analogy with car audio and agree. Same with some tiny bluetooth speakers which are fun and enjoyable to hear despite their limitations. That's was unimaginable back in the days.
I've been listening to this channel for a long time and have to say I appreciate this honest answer!
I think Paul is spot on with this one. No one out of all my friends or relatives cares at all about high end audio.
You’re spot on Paul. My budget is just enough for Schiit products but they sound great. LPs outsold CDs this year and U-Turn sells many thousands of turntables. Interest in audio is indeed coming back. People are finding retro is cool for a reason! After all, what kid doesn’t love a dinosaur?
It's one of the reasons I believe we as a society need to look inward. It's incredible that people can't afford to retire, but have way nicer things than those who could retire from the previous generation. If I lived like people did 30 years ago, I'd have a lot more money.
As usual, I think Paul has a good grasp of the situation. I think the narrowing gap between high end and lower end gear is indeed a big part of it. Technological advances in several different industries have reached the point of diminishing returns, and hi-fi audio is one of those. With modern DSP and cheaper high quality components, simple inexpensive systems can sound better than a great system from even a decade ago. As a father of 4 teenagers, I can say they are still just as interested in listening to music, but they do it with headphones now. The wireless headphone industry is thriving, and there are more hi-fi headphone options than ever before. So, that is relegating hi-fi home audio to the realm of multi-purpose / home theater use. While the sound quality of inexpensive systems is making leaps and bounds, the sound quality of true hi-fi systems has changed very little to any but the most discerning audiophile ears. That's going to change the way audio manufacturers approach product design. I think that "high end audio" will eventually become more exclusive, for a very specific demographic, while every day audio systems will become hi-fi quality.
I think Paul is correct regards the gap narrowing between ‘high end’ hi-fi and smart, Bluetooth speakers. The difference is, that in 10, 15 or even 20 years my hi-fi rig will be pretty much as it is now. Hell I still have a perfectly good, premium amp I bought in the 80s. How many of these smart, Bluetooth devices will still be around and functional in 40 years time?
Longevity is integral to ‘high end’ audio. Whereas, these Bluetooth, smart speakers or ‘all in 1’ are updated and replaced more frequently than politicians tell untruths.
You are not wrong in that a Bluetooth speaker needs to be replaced more often. But I think it is not a big deal for most people to replace a Bluetooth speaker. Most people don't need to save up money for that. And every other iteration or so is almost worth the upgrade anyway. Simply because the improvements in sound are quite noticeable.
And, like Paul says, soundwise the gap compared to a proper system is shrinking. But I actually think that it won't affect the Hi-Fi market all that much. In fact, it may even get more people interested in it. They hear the difference between a 100 dollar Bluetooth speaker and a 200 dollar one and start thinking about getting a real system.
@@marcusbrsp 👍
You hit the nail on the head. The lifestyle systems are built to last only a couple of years before they either break or the technology has been usurped by something new.
@@mpi5850 👍
great video ad perspective! Thank you
Yeah, I remember the days when car audio was a thriving market; for car audio thieves... those days seem to be over now.
The thieves have moved on to catalytic converters and tire slashing.
Some of them started car alarm companies.
About 9 years ago my son brought his step children to visit. The eldest, James had a new I-Phone and had a play list he wanted to show me. He had some Joe Bonamassa songs so I listened to a couple. Then I put Joe playing "Blues of Desperation" running on my old system. Hew was so shocked that it sounded so good.
I 1000% agree with Paul. For most people, today’s lower end equipment is good enough, and gives better value than starter equipment from back in the day. My ear buds for when I take walks are Apple AirPods. I use them because I don’t like walking with over the ear cans, and for some reason the AirPods fit my ears perfectly. Do they sound as good as my Grados, of course not. Are they surprisingly good, and good enough for most people? Yes. The same hold true as Paul points out in car audio. My daughter drives a 2023 Nissan Kicks, a car with an MSRP of $23k. The audio is really good. When I bought my first new car, I replaced the radio within a month, no need to do that today. The bottom line, no matter what floats your boat, from budget, to high end to vintage, vinyl to streaming, in the audio world, these ARE the good old days.
Now days you need to be a tech to change out a car stereo. lol. And a couple of weeks ago my sister said the speakers on her tv were good enough. I was mortified. A big screen with little sound.
Same goes with cameras. For the vast majority of people - an iPhone is good enough.
@@dandiehm8414 you just made me flashback to the kodak moment days. I miss having a nicer camera where you could tinker with it and change lenses and flashes and experiment with different films to tweak the results. Hmm. I thought the tinkering was always the fun part that you could show pride in.
@@teddine7366 I still use DSLRs on my vacations.
Even back in the 70s Hi-Fi was not cheap. I bought parts paying for each piece over two to three year periods. Building my system up over time. But on average one bit of gear was still cheaper than the average price of a new car. Now it has become esoteric and I have bills to pay I never had in the 70s for my cable service, mobile phone, subscriptions that didn't even exist back then. Income is spread over more individual outgoings and as Paul has said the gap between the really good stuff and the middle of the road stuff is much much smaller and 'good enough' for the majority. All my friends back then had an 'audio system' and we would go around each others homes and play our records on their gear. We had listening parties.
The same thing has happened to the camera and camcorder industry with mobile phones being 'good enough'. It's not just Hi-Fi suffering but once again becoming a hobby for those with higher incomes just as once photography was out of reach for the masses. We are going full circle with the only difference being the masses has a cheaper choice with genuine better quality.
Love my B&O in my S6. I'm glad the era of building a car audio system is over. But I still enjoy my automatic watch, dropping a needle on vinyl, and manually shifting my rim brake bicycle. To me, it is all of the above. We live in amazing times!
I agreed with most of it. Great points that provoke some thought. Thanks Paul!
Have a set of McIntosh, bought them in 74. Still going strong. They are still the standard everything else strives for.
The author needs to spend some time in a record store. Gen Z and Millenials are the engines behind the vinyl revival and two-channel vintage market. Are they getting PS Audio, McIntosh, Devore, etc.? No. But they're why there are more turntable makers today than there were 30 years ago. And they're fans of vintage because it can be fixed, unlike 95% of the home theater stuff on the market. I'm 55 and live in the Asheville area. It's not a big town but there are 5 record stores and on any given day I'm the oldest person by a wide margin in any of the locations. And one of the crazy stats is that many Gen Z are buying vinyl before buying the turntables to play them on. This means they're getting together to play their stuff in what is a 2020s version of a 50s listening party when not every kid had a 33 1/3 player. There is a burgeoning business of retrofitting those great MCM console stereos with modern guts so they can play vinyl, stream, and sound good all while looking like they did the day they rolled into the showroom 60+ years ago.
Seventies were great with the stereo equipment. 2024 is still great because I enjoy an amazing high end stereo system for my budget. . I also have a blue tooth Marshall that’s cool and a JBL for the pool. Everything has its place. My car audio system is a Harmon Kardon and has an amazing amp and speakers for an audiophile sound. All good in my world.
Yea its a combo of things. You can get great sound pretty much anyone will appreciate for under 2k these days especially with bookshelf and subwoofer quality. The other thing is the speakers and systems that meet the spouse acceptance factor which include bookshelf and sub systems, along with sound bar and Sonos type systems have become good enough for the music lover and easy enough and attractive enough for the spouse.
Early wave boomer here, still enjoying my vintage, plain vanilla 2-channel system. Most of the equipment I bought new, and that was back in the 70s and 80s. Never cared about surround sound or home theater. I'll stick with vinyl and CDs as opposed to streaming. Old school by choice, plus convenience.
Come on Paul! The majority of people just don't have the money to spend on high-end systems, even if they'd love too & to say vintage audio doesn't compete is just crazy. Even though Sansui & Pioneer made mostly absolutely awful speakers they made some great receivers & amps back in the day. I should know because I have a great vintage system & have been quite happy for years with it after trial & error. That's why they are still so desirable.
Very true, I have a Pioneer receiver connected to some vintage ESS speakers with the amazing Heil Air Motion Transformers and the sound is just amazing, it's like cheating the system. I also have some ESS speakers connected as front mains to my surround system and it's so stunning, brings sounds to life like they are right there in the room and so dimensional and open sounding. I've greatly improved the Heils by applying a 3 inch roundover on both edges of the plastic housing so it smooths the edge diffraction from it's original design, it's stunning the difference it made. Also at the same time it helps prevent the rear wave of the Heil from wrapping around and cancelling out frequencies at the front. It made it so much smoother and refined sounding and the room dimensionality is off the charts.
My young niece looks at my system with bemusement and confusion.All you need is an IPhone and a pair of cans right ?
Not cans - just earbuds. :/
@@dandiehm8414 Hi end audio is a niche.
Great, honest assessment Paul. Same situation exists with cameras and cell phone cameras.
The difficulty with digital cameras (pocket ones at least) is that the iPhone is so good as a camera, and it instantly compiles and stores the images, making them, easy to share. I bought a Leica compact camera, and hardly ever used it, simply because the iPhone made good, if not better images, sits in my pocket, and I can share images instantly. In fact, I think that the iPhone is a better camera than it is a phone!
Part of the reason is that you can buy a $400 pair of In Ear Monitors that sounds great powered by an iPhone and hear more that is in the music than you can in a $9,000 retail stereo system (in my case, Marsh A200 Amp, passive preamp, a tube cd player, and Sonus Faber Signum //REL sub speakers. Including $3000 worth of power, interconnects and speaker cabling). And to sound as it should, speakers pulled a full meter into the room from the back wall. At the time that SF/REL speaker setup sounded better to me than equivalently priced speakers from Thiel, Dynaudio, ProAc, Vandersteen, basically everything available at that $4.000 price point. And yet my $400 IEM set sounds, to me, much, much better. Better detail, better bass texture and slam, cleaner vocals, better separation, better timbre, better everything. More revealing. More natural. And doesn't bother anyone else in the house no matter at what volume I listen! I doubt I could sell my entire stereo system for more than $2000 at this point.
Over the head heasphones and a decent amp for $1,500 total cost would also blow that stereo system away.
I think what is happening is that Hi Fi is improving and getting cheaper, you do not need to spend tens of thousands, I will say for 2 to 3 thousand pounds you can easily get a fantastic sounding system, five years from now that price will be lower, we are already at the point where people question the sanity of paying 5 grand for a DAC or amp.
So true.. the gap is narrowing and for the effort required to bridge that gap, it may not be worth it for a significant portion of the population.
thats the point
A few years ago I had assembled a very nice system (Thorens TD160 turntable/grace tonearm, etc) with costly 'classic' amp and speakers.
It sounded amazing.
Walking into my lounge one day I heard one of my favourite songs playing on it and began wondering if the sound could be improved....and then suddenly realised that I was now listening to one of my favourite songs., and yet all I could think of was trying to improve the bass, or whatever. The enjoyment of the music itself was gone.
I now live in a bus and have a pair of bookshelf Misson 700s speakers, and play my music via Bluetooth from my phone through a small, inexpensive Bluetooth amp from Fosi Audio.
All my music is now downloaded in.wav format.
It sounds fantastic, and at a fraction of the price.
The Mission speakers are second hand, and cost about $100.
I think you demonstrate another reason the traditional high end audio is a shrinking market. People around the world are shrinking their home space as the world becomes more crowded. If you are living in a 500 sq foot home in a high rise you are not buying traditional separates and FR30 speakers.
To comment on the car stereo aspect, it's funny that, while in the home the trend is for fewer and fewer speakers in any system, in cars now the trend is for more and more speakers. Back in the day my car had two speakers . Now my lastest car has 12 speakers plus a subwoofer built in! But every body just wants that one speaker at home that can do everything. Maybe car audio will go to the sound bar eventually!🤣
As a member of Gen Z (unfortunately) I will live in a dilapidated trailer to have the system I want if I have to.
im a zoomer too and i live in a (semi) dilapidated trailer, my system is badass hahaha
Bravo to this question!
A major trends I am experiencing is people want convenience Growing up in the heyday of audio, here is a list of the gear I use to listen to music: Separate amp, preamp, turntable, tuner, CD player, and dedicated streamer. Huge library of CDs and Vinyl. A lot of time goes into turning things on/off and maintaining the albums. My very young barely over 20-year-old coworker. Growing up never not knowing life without a cell phone. His system? Cell phone, music streaming app, and a very good sounding Bluetooth speaker. Owns a few albums for posterity, considering a Bluetooth enabled Turntable as his next upgrade. He likes quality audio just as much as I do, but when he comes home, he just wants to have one box to turn on and get music without the hassle that goes into the care and feeding of my rig.
Thank you Paul
I'm old as dirt and enjoy being an audio dinosaur! Triodes, massive linear power supplies, 18" woofers. Hell yeh!
Your hearing is probably pretty shut.
@@pedrocols Certainly not much above 10k, but I don't listen loud and really appreciate the microdetail.
This letter is like I wrote it! Exactly the same: mechanical watches, cars with manual transmision.... and to add photography with real DSLR cameras. I feel like a dinosaurus too.
Just like some of us still appreciate a manual, let's just look at the bizarre resurgence vinyl has made (even though I don't quite get that one, it's clear some younger folks adore it, even if it is antiquated and expensive). Fine audio is not different. Those who care about and want it seek it.
Everything changes, sure. But the more things change, the more they stay the same.
What I find interesting about this is that I know of 2 young people who have purchases very cheap turntables to play what I consider to be an expensive format. This is not a criticism, I just struggle to understand what influences such a choice. Perhaps it comes down to vinyl being seen as fashionable.
@@jamesfarrow6752Yeah, that's mostly it. It looks cool and collectable to them
It is a farce new records. People are buying 12" CD's. Manufacturers are mastering in digital to Lp's! It is insane! I will stick with my pre 80's Lp's. At least I know it was recorded in analog and mastered in analog. No 1's and Zeros for me and missing audio computer wise!
@@jamesfarrow6752 Played several 1950's "mono" Count Basie Lp's tonight. The sound stage was incredible on my system!
So dumb. Some of us don’t prefer instant gratification. In a way, prepping the medium helps prepare the mind to listen to an album in full. For some it’s meditation. Who cares if the vinyl has 1’s and 0’s?
My partner and I have polar opposite views and approaches to listening to music. I am ‘old-school’ - I have a traditional hi-fi system, and like physical media - vinyl, CDs even cassettes. The speakers sit in the living room, angled toward the sofa. I do stream, but usually when I’m in my home office or bedroom, and then I use either headphones or some ancient Sony active speakers. She uses a JBL Bluetooth speaker, and streams everything from her phone - usually modern jazz, or 80s soul music. The JBL is excellent - really packs a punch, and I can see the appeal. But for her, music is a background experience, it’s there while she does something else. For me, when I use my main hi fi, it’s to listen to music, maybe with a good book, and a glass of something, but not to the point where I am not paying attention to the music. And I think it’s this, a degree of elitism from the manufacturers, and some of the ridiculous equipment prices that are turning people away from ‘real’ hi-fi. Sadly though, a lot of new music is mixed with phone users in mind rather than audiophiles, and so, a lot of modern music is over compressed, and suffers sonically as a result.
We are rare but I'm in my 30s and i still drive a stick shift, collect mechanical watches and love traditional hifi!
When I was my grandkids age, I wanted a stereo system, now they just want an I-phone with blue tooth ear plugs.
Not gonna lie. Every time I hear my Dad’s $500 Klipsch soundbar, I scratch my head and wonder why I spent $15,000 on my system. A $2,000 soundbar would probably close the gap significantly.
Watches, Cars and Hifi…my three passions too
There were more audio tube producers in the late 90's than the 60's.
Tons of high-end speakers today, tho don't know who's buying them all.
My Windows UA-cam, Dragonfly Red, Audioquest cable and Creative computer speakers (properly placed) sound great and served all my music listening needs, and mý family members'. I don't miss a bit of my previous McIntosh, PS Audio and Wilson Audio gears.
Quantity over quality and size due to lack of space is the future.
The continued promotion of vinyl is proof that dinosaurs still exist.
However, being branded a dinosaur is less important than making money.
Hah! Funny! I'm also into both HiFi and mechanical watches!
I think both will become part of the retro resurgence in the next two decades, much like the vinyl revival last decade!
Modern music is mixed to sound "good" on cellphone speakers.
Let that sink in.
In the 60’s, Phil Spector, and others, mixed songs to sound as good as possible on 60’s era car radios.
I remember Mercedes Benz cars had Becker radios some of which had a mechanical autoscan mechanism that just made its frequency indicator slide horizontally with a clunk clunk indefinitely.
Time isn’t changing, in fact it’s the most constant thing. Everything else is changing over time. 🤓😜🙏
As always, the people with the best hearing are listening with the worst audio equipment and vice versa.
For the simple reason that hearing starts to deteriorate after your 20's and youngsters usually don't have the money to invest in high quality audio equipment and don't have the time and attention in their busy lives for extended listening sessions.
By the time we have the time and money to enjoy high-end, our hearing is far over the optimum.
alot of popular music today is recorded in such a way that it sounds poor on a real audio system because they boost the bottom end too much.
Any industry has a shelf life. Most businesses go boom to bust within 20 years of starting. A few make it to 30 to 50 years. The really rare ones make it up to 100 years or more. I used to have a car audio business in my teenage years when I was 18 ( now 49). Back then Paul was right you had horrible sound in a car so even people who did not care about sound wanted it replaced for something better. We did not have all this harness crap where you plug and go. You had to test out each wire to hardwire it and then make a custom faceplate from scratch to each car and the speaker mounting plates. The kits were just starting to come out and when it was a kit it was an all in one you have to modify each time which sucked. Today we live in a disposable economy. Tech moves so fast that quality is often way down the list to price and a deal in the moment to play with and use a do dad as a youngster. So with home audio the super high end will have a place for high end income spenders. Then you will have the budget buyers. The middle is what will get squeezed especially as the quality generation gets older and starts dying off eventually. That is what is happening with politics right now. The older generation voters are slowly passing away and the new wave of kids growing up are starting to vote that think differently and reason differently for how they want to live now and in the future. Typically with any generation there is a wave of learning levels with new technology as it is exciting to create and innovate. As people age not all but a majority get used to a certain tech and no longer want to change how they live regardless of what advancements in society are happening. Super old people many do not even have a cell phone and just use snail mail, then some have a cell phone, as the age gets younger they do online, then texting, video chatting, etc. The younger the crowd typically the more tech they do and see value in. There are people that are exceptions of course but talking in generalities.
High-end audio has always been a small group, that's its nature for two reasons: 1) Expense = Most folks are saddled, everything has skyrocketed up in cost from rent and mortgages to cars to care maintenance to healthcare, to utilities to groceries to a hamburger. 2) In this new world of tech convenience and "give it to me faster" and fake pop music and the like, people have gotten away from listening to music. It is just background noise at best. Part of the problem is all the cheap made stuff that cost more than it should, but still more affordable to folks (smart speakers, smartphones, streams, etc) that people prefer now, which makes music sound awful and so one no longer is engaged. So it is hard to makes and sell stuff to disinterested people and those interested, but can't afford it.
A third reason is plain ol snobbery. Audiophiles are walking contradictions. They complain how not enough people are interested in the hobby and then do everything they can to keep people out of it.
Unless, the future of "high-end audio" includes "entry level" products at least, not to mention start to restore the mid level stuff, it looks bleak. Without those things it only becomes more niche until it implodes in on itself and ceases to exist. There are some well known European companies starting to realize this and trying to bring to market more "affordable" versions of their high-end stuff, but part of the problem is bringing those items to the US market. It almost never happens and when it does the cost is unnecessarily tremendous and the prices end up being astronomical.
It’s too bad about all the compression in the music
Car audio is thriving..and is leading the way.. I think that its time to do 140 db in the living room.by the way..I do a 135 db in my living room currently..haha..
there will always be aficionados and connoisseurs, but the numbers are becoming less and less.This is why high end is getting more and more expensive across the board .Less companies selling to a small market really see that in the U.S. market
yea I have wondered what the 'audio' system would be on the USS enterprise ( Star Trek version )
way back my first 'Stereo ' was a a 15 w /Ch. pioneer, dynaco 25 spk , and an AR. T'table ( all new )
I still suspect IF I came across a new condition setup it'd be fine to me. well, I've come to think 60 w ch is kinda min. Which is as different Idea I guess. point of diminishing returns.
The AirPods generation is already happening now..Hardly any younger people visiting Hifi shows nowsaday. At least in Singapore
Being a youngish person i can pretty firmly say it's likely that i will die without every being able to afford ps audio products lol
Oh, no... The car stereo aftermarket is still huge because of insane prices on extras and alot of bad amps, speakers etc..
what was that?
The gap really is not shrinking that much. Can an Apple HomePod or Bluetooth speaker sound good? Sure, although this is typically only true for a desktop system or very small room, and these come nowhere close to what can be achieved with a hi-fi system. Case in point, I am running a tube amp and floorstanders with dual 8 inch bass woofers. A Bluetooth speaker has narrowed the gap with this? 😂😅🤣
Companies have gone to Uber high cost product where they make more money because just by percentage 1% of 8 billion people is now a large market.
I'm sad to see that most modern HiFi audio focuses too much on digital for my taste, things like having a screen and wifi.
I prefer hifi equipment that is purely or mostly analog and without screens. My favorite brand is Schiit. I know there are much better ones but they are beyond my budget; Schiit feels fair priced to me. I also prefer their approach to sorround on the Syn & Kraken vs 5.1, DTS, etc.
the future is going more towards sound bars, with built in amps.
maybe such that have option for "pro" versions that add 2 more speakers behind you
all wireless.
the future goes to make stuff easier. for lazier people.
on expense of quality. it always has.
it will never sound as good as a great surround system.
but also you tube will never sound as good as vanyl records,
but vanyl records are only for purist and fans nowadays
so will speakers and surround be.
future is only hearing music from youtube / spotify
and only on tv speakers / sound bars.
that's what i think
3:30 this! I’ve experienced this on a few mediums now with the cars I’ve owned being a great example. I have a 2019 Subaru wrx right now with a stock premium audio system which sounds pretty good.. before college I dropped like 5k on a aftermarket audio system I use to take to auto shows and although that was much better, the audio system in the Subaru is plenty fine I wouldn’t even consider swapping it out.. same situation I see with graphics cards, visual quality with TV’s or monitors, head sets, ect.. the gap is shrinking and when you can get 70-80% the quality for 1/4 the price it really feels like a waste unless you have the money or are absolutely in need of the best of the best
Let's be totally honest the high end stereo market is way over priced for what you get for your money just like a new car.everything is a big cash grab today
The future of high-end audio is audiophile lossless streaming. I have a pair of KEF LS60 used in my dining room. Hey Paul, when can we get the PS Audio FR30A active speakers? You guys can beat KEF LS60, Piega 701, Buchardt A700 etc.
They probably can beat these speakers, in the same way that compact discs beat lossless streaming of any bit depth and sample rate (better than any lossy MQA of course).
@@Jorge-Fernandez-Lopez Gosh, you must be kidding me. MQA is like MP3 a lossy codec. Who wants lossy digital audio if being audiophile? NOBODY! Welcome to today and not 10 years ago, nowadays we stream lossless FLAC in CD quality or better easily up to 192kHz 24 bits. It’s up to your IQ to judge if 192kHz 24 bits lossless PCM is better than 44.1kHz 16 bits potentially error prone PCM (CDs can have data errors). Obviously streaming already can beat CDs incl. SACD technically speaking. Lossless music streaming is not only lossless but it is also error-free. If you know of any streamed track today that sounds inferior to CD and is claimed to be CD quality, let me know.
@@ThinkingBetter Some, maybe many or even most 192 kHz 24 bits, is «lossless» added noise over the original recording to increase file size for "Hi-Res" clients; easy to see with RTA software. Some (or many) "Hi-Res" files (streamed or downloaded) are worse (not better) in my opinion (easy to prove). The readings of my CDs are error free (after correction), otherwise it would be very obvious. Any bit changed in a 16 bit number can be very apparent if that bit is among the most significant ones. By the way, the streaming services can also get errors from the originals, the ripping, or they own discs. The CD is the original file (except Master, no need of 24 bits and 96 kHz for listening, only for processing, mixing, and headroom for recording...), while the streaming services can add some personal touches (compression, equalization, noise, etc.). I own my files and I can listen music even if it's not available in a particular streaming service, even without connection, on any system. I can even equalize once the files for any room, without having to do it on the fly each time. Streaming is fine, maybe not the best, but fine, it's convenient.
@@ThinkingBetter ls 60 is a average speakerset streaming compressed music sounds better then a cd will cost you much more then a decent cd transport/dac combination.
The classe D amp in the kef sounds like a luxe Sonos set compared to a quality class A amp
@@razzman2987 Where did you listen to the LS60? I use them in my dining room and it’s not a room for critical listening but they sound awesome for that room. Their weakness is the bass and it’s not about amp technology. Besides, active speakers have a huge benefit of sort of operating without speaker cables and even more discrete than mono blocks having much better direct control of each driver and much better optimized cross-over filtering. Also, modern lossless streaming can provide higher resolution than ever possible on CD media today. I’ve done A/B testing between CD and streaming myself incl. 192kHz 24 bits streaming and definitely streaming can beat CD quality. And of course it is technically possible to make a PS Audio Aspen FR30 active that can beat the passive FR30 given enough passion and careful engineering.
There was a great interest in good audio systems when there was great music being made and great sound engineers making great recordings.
Now we're in a time of cultural decay, little music made today will be remembered and listened to in 40, 50, 60 years. And the people consuming that music are satisfied with whatever they're hearing. There is no excitement in consumers of today's music to have it sound it's best. The result is that there is no interest in great sound reproduction equipment.
Exactly, you hit the nail on the head. Once all of us that grew up in that generation are gone it will all be done with.
@davidhester9897 so it sounds like you are agreeing with Paul seems to be saying. That the hi-end niche brands will one day go the way of the aftermarket car audio outlets
And that is exactly what your parents said about your music😃
Well… who is PS Audio selling to? The market for vinyl is growing CD’s still selling, DAC’s going like fire sale.
very soon there wil be no classes,everything will be in dgital format till the end
no religian too no countries nothing to kill or die for,even no current
imagine
very soon
you moved from 5 years from now
to 400 years from now (maybe 400 maybe more)
let's jump to 4000 years and say it all doesn't matter because humans will explore other plants by then...
He just explained a dumbed down society regarding audio. I will go as far to say 78% have no clue what real audio should sound like. I bet it's worse than that.
Nor do they care.
@@davidspendlove5900 It is sad to say the least.
@@davidspendlove5900 Those people deserve to pay 8 grand for a washboard, a trash can and some pots and pans with some sticks. Being brutal but why not? They have no clue!
Funny how automatic transmission seems to have been the default in US. In Europe, it's the other way around: the vast majority of cars are manual transmission i.e. what you call "stick shift". In fact, over here if you take your driving test in a car with automatic transmission, your licence will only allow you to drive automatic transmission cars.
Yeah... just drove a manual for the first time ever last weekend 😂 and I'm 44
americans had the money to just put bigger engines and not think of the powerloss and cost in an automatic transmission. also to drive them they didn't care about how much gas it would use as much, again due to being able to afford it by having cheaper gasoline and by just plain having more money to spend on the gas.
This is how things used to be in Europe - now with the proliferation of EV and hybrid vehicles, the automatic (or "no gearbox', in the case of EV) is slowly displacing the manual. The great thing is that in Europe most of us didn't have to put up with the dire 'slush-boxes' from the 70's that sucked most of the power from the engine!
Yes, theoretically it should be the other way around, as roads in Europe (especially here in UK) tend to be more congested and twisty, requiring frequent gear changing, so an automatic would be more useful. But the US typically has long straight roads which, outside if the cities, are less congested, so you can stay in the same gear for many miles without the need to shift. I guess it's the historical thing that early automatics were only any good with large engines which were always more common in US than in Europe.
The gap between mass market Bluetooth stuff and real hi-fi is now closer in sound quality terms? Give me a break!!! Most mass market Bluetooth speaker set-ups I've heard recently can't even compete with hot-rooded Sansui and Marantz receivers from the 1970s. I mean have you ever tried listening to Bluetooth speakers for 8 hours straight and can honestly say it doesn't give me audio fatigue?
you forget about all the 80s faux all-in-one cheapo sets with 7 watts of real power? you can get decentish sound for quite cheap now.
remember the horrible multimedia speakers of the 90s too? all that stuff is what the cheaper bluetooth stuff replaces thus the gap is lower to 'hifi', comparing old cheap hifi to new cheap hifi on the other hand is comparing hifi to hifi.
what's really annoying with bluetooth devices is that they hide the mode they're in usually from the consumer, so you can end up with better audio quality playing from your phone than your pc due to the codecs used. usually it's better to use a cable though even from a phone rather than the bluetooth.
is a real even cheap vintage hifi better? usually sure, but a 90s bottom end boombox from philips is what the bluetooth is replacing.
The "high end" is also full of absurdity which leads to credibility issues. I recently read a Stereophile review where a well-known reviewer spoke of cables "breaking in". Really?
I think a "small" circle but very wealthy will buy " high end ". And let me explain what I mean with small circle and what I mean with "High End" . As Paul mentioned that gap between really bad to decent stereo systems is becoming closer and closer. For relatively small money you can hear in many cases so much better than in the past. Because the technology became better and better and more affordable. So then what do I mean with "High End". No it is not mainly the sound quality, as written before we reached a level even with consumer tech. that is very high. No it will be the the difference in price, build quality and design. People who have money need something where they can show and feel that they are high above. Not in a arrogant way, no, just to see and know that they have speaker that are a piece of artistry, designed and crafted to be special, to show exclusive materials and outstanding design. Something that has a status like a huge grand piano, or a special unique watch. Well of course the sound should be best too, but that is not much if a problem these days. It's like buying a Ferrari, or Konigsegg etc.... That will be the future of "High End" . And with that coming to the "small circle" of super wealthy people. Small is relative. Look in the US alone are 15.000 families with a wealth ABOVE 100Million $, looking world wide that number is extremely high. No high end is not dead nor is Hifi dead. It's just changing. Of course new tech accelerates that process, but it's not killing it. What I think is more concerning, is the relation between the consumer and the artist, musician, composer, director etc... How we pay them, how we show them our interest. With streaming we will see that relationship changing with less and less good artist, because they simply can not gain a substantial income. AI will speed up that change again, because AInwill produce the music, the movies and any other content, that can be the killer of High End and Hifi.
Vintage audio, does not compete, high end ive had in the past but now 1 soundbar and 2x 12" subs get ut done with expensive cables
Bravo to this question! The times are changing… Look at what happened to the institution of the America’s Cup. The Americas Cup has
a charter which has been destroyed in favor of multi-hulled boats because they just go faster. The powers that be decided to just drop all tradition instead of having separate classes of America’s Cup designs. I know this has little to do with audio but it has everything to do with breeding and heritage which may have everything to do with the history of audio.
Americas cup: Even crazier..Not Multi Hulls(Haven't been for years)..They're MonoHull Hydrofoils 'flying' at 50 knots .Sailing in Spain currently. New Zealand again defending the title.
@@bryanwilliams3665 Absolutely!
Discernment, in general, has declined. It’s still a quality but the bar of discernment has been reset low, and getting lower.
One thing that's changing as well is the cost of the different pieces of technologies used in the audio system. Combine that with salaries that's not keeping up with cost of living everywhere and people have less options in regards to what they practically can afford. My parents built their house on one salary and with two kids and didn't get a lone until it was time for furnitures etc. These day most people would be the proud owner of a tent trying that. 🎪😂
I mentioned before!
This Dinosaur isn’t going anywhere! Terrestrial FM via Magnum, Accuphase, and McIntosh is where my lotto money’s going!
(AND A Time- Stamped UPDATE!) It seems 🤔, I’ve stoked the ire of two passionate FM detractors who found delight in trumpeting a, dare I say ? A triumph of a “dead medium’s hasty demise?” …..Interesting.🌹
To listen to what? Compressed, low bit rate digital station feeds to a transmitter with an HD carrier and who knows what else hanging on that signal? At least you won't have to spend a lot of money for your dream. Used FM tuner prices are dropping like a rock.
@@johnstone7697
….I keep expertly-maintained cassette decks from Tascam, Optimus, and Bang&Olufsen, and normal, and chrome bias cassettes are still manufactured. Any exclusive new music played as promo introductions, and not available in retail, I capture and keep in my own vaults. Even MD’s are still made in Asia. I have T O N S of brand mew blanks! I’ll never pay for XM, or Streaming!
FM radio is a dead industry...what are you talking about? I have a Magnum dynalab Etude, from over a decade ago, with a yagi in the attic on a rotor, and it's all obsolete, 20924, join it it works perfect, so what? FM is AM with no static, it all stinks. Obsolete media indeed
@@cengeb ….gee, that’s quite a broad brush. never mind using it, just take that whole can, and Jackson Pollock the hxll out of FM. Its easier.🌹
@@johnstone7697 let’s h🙃pe so!
Manufacturer-installed car stereos will Never impress me.
Aftermarket is STILL where it's at.
There are two categories of audiophiles...
the first one has all the money in the world and just goes bout and buys the best ( after a lot of advice and research)
and the second is the one who is into his or her own designs ... by this I mean building their own amplifiers and speaker systems ( like I was at one time..) A lot of people love to be creative and study the theory of audio reproduction and make their very own speakers ...
I don't have all the money in the world, and I have zero interest in building my own amps and speakers. I think you're missing something somewhere...
I’m not sure
Sonos is the introduction point today. From there it’s speaker bars, then it’s stereo and home theatre. HiFi remains a luxury niche product. Stable market? Needs stats to really know. I wonder why ppl chase the ‘demise’ of HiFi so fervently?
i bet as paul was talking in the back of his mind he is thinking "we are screwed i wish it was still 1989 five years and we are bankrupt if it keeps going like this"! no disrespect paul i am just being real! hope it doesnt end up that way!
Not real!
vinyl record i can collection is expensive, tedious and limited to few numbers.
on the other hand possibility to find new music with spotify and youtube is huge.
Stop paying $25 and up for new records. Buy them from estate sales for $1 to $5 each.