New MOFI speaker (Andrew Jones)

But to the non-audiophiles even a $399 speaker is a hype. 

That's very true. True story, my own. Several years ago, I sold a lady neighbor my speakers I had at that time for a secondary system, Andrew Jones' ELAC Uni-Fi bookshelves (one tier up the Debut). For $300 cash. When the son learned, he got pissed off. $300 for speakers??!!! Even to this day, every time I see her son, I get a ".... I can't believe you made my mom pay $300 for speakers" look and scoff ... Go figure. I thought I was making her a favor. And I also installed them for her with my stands (for free to her), some speakers cables I had in my drawer. 

"No good deed...."  @thyname   Some won't ever understand. I'm sure she enjoys them. (I have the Debut 5.2 set-up for a TV room and enjoy it there.)

I've met Andrew at a few shows and liked his personality like others. I think his prior designs show his skill as well. I'm curious to hear these new ones now.

@thyname

During my apartment dwelling days, had one lady (whom I never had the chance of meeting) that would send over her husband. Respectful fella and always asked politely when stopping by, "could you please turn it down a few." Shortly before my move from said apartment I’d decided to splurge with a new set of floor standers / sub. Guess who received my old set of floor standers / sub, free of charge? I’ve always wondered what the look on her face may have been when husband brought those speakers home, the ones she despised! Ha

@grislybutter

Not sure why you should be disillusioned by what others are saying. IT's your choice - you should do what you feel like.

if you love music, you won’t be obsessed with gear, because music is perfectly and fully enjoyable with decent $200 desktop speakers, playing from youtube.

I spend quite some time with family watching movies or listening to the wife and kid's songs. We do that on the Pioneer bookshelf speakers that are a lot less $s than what you mention. And it is fun - I agree. But to get the "full on" experience, I go to my main system. With this system I can listen to new (to me, not others) music from artists and genres I have not heard before. It is an amazing experience. In fact Spotify wrapped 2022 tells me that this year I listened to 59 different genres and 1928 different artists, and this is NOT counting the first 3 months of the year that I was with Tidal.And also my collection of silver discs.

With a metaphor, imagine that you love playing soccer but your main focus is not playing but finding the best shoes.

I don't know about soccer. So I can probably relate to running shoes. Flip-flops are bad for running. But with a well designed shoe from Books compared to a cheaper one, you can go on for miles without straining your muscles and hurting the knees. Specialization helps and I have experienced it. So if you are into driving, are you saying that a Mitsubishi Mirage will provide you the same pleasure as a BMW M3 or Porsche GT3? That would be hard to believe.

@thyname ,

Man, that sucks.

But to the common person, "it" (that is how they refer to audio systems) should make "loud music". That's all they care for. Such folks need to be educated. My colleagues told me that they had heard "about high end" audio, but never imagined what it could do.

Unless folks like us put some effort into educating the "not-in-the-know" folks, they will never know to differentiate sound/noise from music.