There are bargains out there. But the last people you want to turn to for advice are people on this forum bragging theyāre in the music production business. Imagine a famous producer or engineer coming to this forum! I donāt come here for advice. I came here primarily to promote my brand. But with handmade amplifiers from $3000-$32,000 and $20,000 Loudspeakers and $3000 subs, I quickly realized I was in the wrong place but I also realized there were a lot of people like you who needed some help. Since I had a little extra time, I decided to stick around and offer some advice. Because Iām a published writer as well, Iām about to minimize my relationship with this forum. I have to pay more attention to my business. So, regarding prosound people:
Their industry has given us so much great music, yet with poor sound, that most could be classified as garbage, and it could be argued more than any other consumer product in history. I have thousands of albums. I have a separate room to store them in. Probably barely 200 are of refernce quality. Thatās an embarrassment. Hereās why:
As a working musician and a person involved in pro-sound products from JBL to Genelec to BASF to Maxell, 17 years representing Yamaha and 20 years representing Sennheiser, representing over a dozen record labels, plus dealing with hundreds and hundreds of consumer resellers for fifty years. Hereās what I discovered:
in the professional world, a true professional Producer or engineer working full-time, cannot possibly audition hundreds of loudspeakers. No time. An audiophile , conversely, can audition a dozen outstanding products in a day. Because itās their hobby, they do an immense amount of research. The reviewers are well-known and consistent.
when we wanted to sell monitors, if weāre even permitted to, we would demonstrate the product properly because we are professionals. We pick the material and control the demonstration and it always sounds good. Many prosound production monitors sound great. But Iāve been in speaker factories all over the world and every company Iāve been involved with, pro or consumer, aspires to excellence. and they were all pleased about their excellent specifications. and yet they all sounded different from each other.
Iāve seen everything from gigantic anechoic chambers to mainframes doing Numbercrunching, from patented woofer cone manufacturing techniques to the first prototyping machines for building drivers one at a time for analysis. But itās an inexact science. In the final analysis, all these products should be tuned by ear. Flat frequency response could be nearly meaningless. Most of the specifications are in fact meaningless to the average consumer. there are different measuring techniques and thereās no legal accountability. I could say anything I want about the speakers we manufacture.
iāve given you some background so you know Iām not trying to justify a purchase that I had made. Thatās a very common scenario on all forums.
iām going to keep this simple Iāll mention some products from companies I worked with who terminated my company so I am disinclined to give them any false props.
Iāve never been an employee of these companies but rather an independent contractor, Always under contract and usually for a limited period of time, typically 2 to 5 years. here we go:
Most talked about product in the last several years has been the loudspeakers from ANDREW JONES design. although he has done some fairly expensive high-end studio quality products, I think his greatest accomplishment was bringing inexpensive Loudspeakers to the market that punch way above their weight. I donāt mean they played loudly. I mean they played music the way it should be played.
Pioneers consumer division had about three of his models but pioneers future is uncertain and he is no longer involved with that company. He produced Loudspeakers for Elac that were simply remarkable From $200 a pair to $500 a pair. The $500 model was so good that when we auditioned the samples, my son and I looked at each other and laughed and said we could actually use these for the rest of our lives. Understand that our main system is well in the six figures. So thatās quite a statement.
itās possible that those products jumpstarted a response from popular brands like Polk and Klipsch introducing some really good sounding product well under $1000 a pair. Bring a CD of music youāre familiar with and visit some audiophile salons who put their reputation on the line and listen to their budget products. Do not go to the big box stores for Loudspeakers. Although some of the brands I mentioned are now expanding into those areas so thatās OK.
Yamaha decided to get back into the audiophile end of the business. Understand that the only thing driving the industry is surroundsound receivers. Remarkably, Yamaha introduced eight integrated amplifiers. They all sound good. They start about $250 retail.
The British take their turntables very seriously. Rega is a huge player at the entry level. You will also find inexpensive wonderful turn tables from Music Hall, MoFi, Dual And others. You can do this under $500 including the photo cartridge.
Buy a Blu-ray player that does streaming and buy a subscription for $25 to Tidalā millions of songs and albums in full bandwidth, matching or exceeding CD performance. You can buy a Blu-ray player like this for $150 and itāll sound great. CDs are now over. I donāt worry if you have some because you can play them on the Blu-ray player. Youāll find there are far less CD players available now.
so, in the final analysis, check out audiophile oriented forums and look for the bargain articles in magazines like absolute sound and Stereophile. If youāre in great Britain, youāre in great shape because they have a lot of bargains reviewed by credible people.
Forget about going to the big box Guitar store and buying a pair of cheap powered monitors. You will not be able to do meaningful comparisons in the store with material youāve brought along. They will have a limited selection. And by the way they can sound very good but youāll have little opportunity to compare the product to the competition. Your sales person will be a minimum wage child.Ā»
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https://www.quora.com/Is-there-such-a-thing-as-affordable-audiophile-grade-audio-equipment
