WC,
I sympathize with your anger at that dealer who dumped on your good faith offers to do business. Just realize that these guys are selling mainly overpriced mediocrities. There is NO audio item that is an investment, because everything audio depreciates with time and becomes a horse and buggy with advances in technology. These guys are just trying make the most money selling their overpriced mediocrities while they can. Look, I can come up with $500K in a few days, but I know the junk out there and I have better things to do with that money. I have a patient with prostate cancer, and I referred him for easy SOTA laser ablation treatment that cost him $27K. Any SOTA procedure is NOT covered by insurance. The main covered treatments involve major surgery and various types of radiation, all of which are associated with common major side effects of incontinence, impotence and many others that are too disgusting to talk about here. He is happy, doing great and is free of side effects. That is $27K well spent, instead of on some audio crap, except for the few things like the CLX-REL which is real value. Why should you care if one dynamic speaker sounds better than another, because they are all demolished by the CLX for clarity, etc.? Unless someone offers to pay you for your reviews, funds your purchases, pays for your medical care and missed work from back injuries in lugging around speakers the size of funeral caskets, don't waste your time and money. Yeah, the Musical Fidelity Titan is powerful and not too expensive, but why bother--just another euphonic piece of mediocrity, according to reviews of it and other MF products. No, I have not heard it, and don't need to waste money/time and hurt my back just to prove the point.
Meanwhile, I have decided to keep the $2000 Mytek Brooklyn Amp which I have had on 60 day trial. It has slightly rolled off highs compared to my peerless Bryston 2.5B SST2, although the highs are more elegant. The rest of the range is truly superb, and better than my Bryston in a few ways, with decent 300 watts into 8,4,2 ohms. It is approximately as good as anything I have heard at home up to $10K. With small tweaks of my Rane EQ which thezaks found for only $90, the Mytek is truly excellent. If it were $5K, I wouldn't keep it, because I regard it as a cheap interim amp while I wait for the Merrill Elements to appear and I can fully study and evaluate them to see whether their cost can be justified. Also, John Atkinson in the Nov issue of Stereophile admits that the Mytek does a nice job of driving the $215,000 Tidal Audio Akira speaker, but then snidely asks who would want to drive an expensive speaker with such a cheap amp. Yeah, he is sucking up to big bucks manufacturers who advertise in the rag mag which pays his salary.
I sympathize with your anger at that dealer who dumped on your good faith offers to do business. Just realize that these guys are selling mainly overpriced mediocrities. There is NO audio item that is an investment, because everything audio depreciates with time and becomes a horse and buggy with advances in technology. These guys are just trying make the most money selling their overpriced mediocrities while they can. Look, I can come up with $500K in a few days, but I know the junk out there and I have better things to do with that money. I have a patient with prostate cancer, and I referred him for easy SOTA laser ablation treatment that cost him $27K. Any SOTA procedure is NOT covered by insurance. The main covered treatments involve major surgery and various types of radiation, all of which are associated with common major side effects of incontinence, impotence and many others that are too disgusting to talk about here. He is happy, doing great and is free of side effects. That is $27K well spent, instead of on some audio crap, except for the few things like the CLX-REL which is real value. Why should you care if one dynamic speaker sounds better than another, because they are all demolished by the CLX for clarity, etc.? Unless someone offers to pay you for your reviews, funds your purchases, pays for your medical care and missed work from back injuries in lugging around speakers the size of funeral caskets, don't waste your time and money. Yeah, the Musical Fidelity Titan is powerful and not too expensive, but why bother--just another euphonic piece of mediocrity, according to reviews of it and other MF products. No, I have not heard it, and don't need to waste money/time and hurt my back just to prove the point.
Meanwhile, I have decided to keep the $2000 Mytek Brooklyn Amp which I have had on 60 day trial. It has slightly rolled off highs compared to my peerless Bryston 2.5B SST2, although the highs are more elegant. The rest of the range is truly superb, and better than my Bryston in a few ways, with decent 300 watts into 8,4,2 ohms. It is approximately as good as anything I have heard at home up to $10K. With small tweaks of my Rane EQ which thezaks found for only $90, the Mytek is truly excellent. If it were $5K, I wouldn't keep it, because I regard it as a cheap interim amp while I wait for the Merrill Elements to appear and I can fully study and evaluate them to see whether their cost can be justified. Also, John Atkinson in the Nov issue of Stereophile admits that the Mytek does a nice job of driving the $215,000 Tidal Audio Akira speaker, but then snidely asks who would want to drive an expensive speaker with such a cheap amp. Yeah, he is sucking up to big bucks manufacturers who advertise in the rag mag which pays his salary.