When someone tells you it's a $40,000 amp, does it sound better?

@atmasphere wrote:

One example I've seen given to showcase this is college tuition. Colleges found that if they decrease tuition enrollment goes down and goes up when they increase it.

Another example is Campagnolo, a well-known bicycle parts brand. Rather than price according to a formula, they price according to what the market will bear. 

Exactly. For some reason though there's the sense of this permeating blanket of suppressing any notion of such expensive gear being also, and maybe not least a way of accommodating/is a symptom of what you describe above.

However, very expensive and overbuilt monstrosities of amps can also be a symptom of what they're feeding, and the severe bottleneck inefficient and passive filter-heavy speakers represent. When you have to muscle up such power capacity/PSU stability to come near relative load indifference while maintaining headroom, which is really to be strived for with any serious "hifi" setup, it should be obvious the load looked into is (too) significantly draining. It's amusing actually seeing pictures of setups with amp towers (McIntosh comes to mind), per channel, lining up to such heights to even diminish the appearance of the typically small-ish speakers flanking them; here the bottleneck effect of the speakers wrt. to their power requirement is visually striking.

...

At least as inefficient, passively configured and multi-way speakers are concerned I'd be inclined to side with those feeling the bigger/more expensive amps actually do make a difference for the better, because the speaker context calls for their sturdy PSU's and prodigious power capacity, all the while trying to diminish any negative sonic side effects building amps of such massive power volume can lead to. Perhaps a crude/simplistic measure as a generalizing stance at least, my approach (with exceptions) would be to limit linear PSU-supplied amps to no more than ~100W per channel (i.e.: class A/B, lower for class A), and use the more efficient class D topology above that power requirement. The former to the central midrange on up (or if sensitivity and SPL need allows, below that range as well), and the latter below that. If power requirement is an issue in the central to upper octaves, address speaker sensitivity accordingly. 

@atmasphere

Abnormal market behavior where consumers purchase the higher-priced goods whereas similar low-priced (but not identical) substitutes are available. It is caused either by the belief that higher price means higher quality, or by the desire for conspicuous consumption (to be seen as buying an expensive, prestige item).

I wish to take exception at the less than precise and loaded wording of this quote from someone writing on Monash University official website. Just for the record, nothing more.

Delete the word abnormal and it becomes a close (but imperfect) explanation to what theoretical micro-economics may offer, where all manner of consumer preferences are carefully investigated. There is no judgement as to what is normal or abnormal.

There is truth in the words 'belief' and 'desire'.  The motives are not so easily conveyed - that is psychology.

Phusis

I think I have A real interest in what you're trying to say. I believe you're trying to distinguish between efficient and less efficient speakers. Whereas higher power amps are used to drive…… and this is where I run into a problem with what I'm trying to read here.  I guess with the higher powered amps maybe they should be less powerful because if speakers were designed better you won't need all these additional watts which are now being used to push the delicate analog signal through all the filters. And while doing so it may be harmful to the overall outcome of getting Beautiful unimpeded Music signals reproduced.

It can get terribly confusing and I just wish your phraseology could've done a better job communicating what you're probably thinking.

@pennfootball71 

10-05-2022 at 02:54am 

"It is not just price it is sound quality I am after. You probably just heard a lot of budget stuff under 25k most of it is trash."

I don't know what to do with this comment.  What does it mean to be, "after price"?  Are you looking to pay more?  And most gear under $25k is "trash".  Wow.  Just wow.  I'll have to tell my friend that his $20,000 pair of Marantz 9 monoblocks don't sound amazing after all.  He will be so disappointed.

It's truly heartbreaking for all of us who can't spend tens of thousands of dollars on audio amplifiers to realize that we are fated to listen to trash all day long.  That totally sucks.