Riddle me this...

The general theme of this thread is right on!
I agree with the one word summary, marketing!
Lots of marketing sell lots of products. Marketing costs lots of money. Money for large marketing budgets comes directly from the margin (profit) on the products they sell.
It doesn't cost a whole lot more to make a more powerful amplifier but to make a more powerful amplifier that is really better (or maybe just not worse) will cost a fortune. As for digital, I used to work for a semiconductor manufacturer that makes some of leading DACs used in equipment made around the world. Do you have any idea what the cost is to the audio equipment manufacturer for a single DAC? In high volume <$2.00. Small volume maybe $10.00! Have you priced "extreme" DAC upgrades from manufacturer xyT? The same goes for 'high qulity' MOSFETs and linear bipolar output devices.
Anyone want to guess what the marketing budget for Krell and Levinson is as a pecentage of sales? I think 18%-20% is my guess.
My experience is with Aloia. Again, low power and from Europe. Not exactly inexpensive but not in the stratosphere either. Excellent build quality and well, the sound is quite nice at least for me.
So, here's to Lugnut, let it trickle down!

Something I've been wondering -why does (almost) every new product from Krell, Martin Logon, Musical Fidelity, Levinson, McIntosh...you know the list get immediately reviewed in "the" mags while Audio Aero, Tenor, Piega, Sound Labs...almost never?

My buddy drives Totem Ones with a Bedini 25/25 and has no urge to "super-size". And less of us average guys can afford to now that we are being "trickled on" again.

The marketing hype surrounding BIG WATT amps is even more pronounced in the mid-fi car audio market where the number of watts is often stamped prominantly on the product itself and its packaging! (Nothing is said as to the quality of the amplification.) From a marketing prespective, this makes a great deal of sense - give consumers what they are looking for, even if they don't know what they should be looking for. An extremely high percentage of the potential consumers of these products are young, foolish boys who have no idea what they're about to do to their ears!

Brian Miller asked me to comment on this thread from the McIntosh perspective. We have made smaller 100 or 120 watt amps in the past. These were good amps but were slow sellers and have been discontinued. In the case of McIntosh the consumer likes a certain size amp and small ones are not it!
The type of music played and its dynamic range must be a consideration as far as what power is needed. Most music will only require one or two watts at a normal background listening level on average efficiency speakers. I really can not handle Britney Spears at more than 20 watts! If you are using a full symphony orchestra at a realistic playback level you may need hundreds of watts per channel on peaks. 10 times the power doubles the volume so you will run out of watts quickly. Most people are surprised when they use one of our large amps and see how much power they need on the watt meters. It depends on the speakers and how loudly one listens.
We do have consumers use our largest 1200 watt amps on very efficient horn loaded speakers. Why? Because they can I guess.
The challenge is to have a very high signal to noise ratio which our double balanced design will permit, in excess of 124Db. Unless the S/N ratio is high the music will be lost in the hiss.
The new high resolution formats require an increase in signal to noise ratio and higher power to cope with the additional dynamic range.
One solution to the problem is a way to monitor and limit the peak output of an amp which we do with our Power Guard circuit. This looks at the input and output waveform of the signal as it passes through the amp. If the signal starts to show a difference this lights an LED driven by a wave form comparator. The LED's light is received by an optically controlled volume control which will turn the volume down and back up in one 1000th of a second. This will limit the highest point of the peak but allow the amp to continue or be turned up farther. If the amp volume is increased all of the music will get louder except for the highest peaks. This will control overload distortion at the speed of light using light beams.
When an amp clips a burst of distortion is created and by its nature will be sent to the tweeter. This harmonic distortion will be many multiples of the original frequency and the speaker crossover will send it to the tweeter. We are seeing an increase of this type of tweeter failier due to DVD-A, SACD, 96/24 and other high dynamic range recordings since they use more power at same perceived listening level as the older more compressed sources.
A single dome tweeter is hard pressed to handle more than 100 watts. They can only move so far and can dissipate so much heat.
The answer to how much power is determined by the speaker efficiency, listening distance, type of music and the dynamic range of the recording. The definition of high fidelity is the accurate reproduction of the original wave form as it was recorded. For many recordings and cinema soundtracks this will require high powered amps.
Thank you,
Ron Cornelius,
McIntosh

I am surprised no one has mentioned the 47Lab Gaincard - the epitome of the minimalist amp - 25wpc (or 50), small # of parts, very minimalist design and circuit. Sounds great!

-Ed