This is a silly hobby.

You know, Viridian is correct.

I have a buddy who collects watches. I wear a Tag Heuer I bought 2 years ago that to me seemed nice enough. But my buddy buys watches that cost many multiples of my Tag's purchase price, just to have them. Of course they all do the same thing: Attempt to accurately display the current time. And it gets funnier- some of the more expensive watches he owns are quite inaccurate next to my "inferior" Tag. He of course points out it's about the craftsmanship, not just accuracy. Sounds like tube versus SS arguments to me!

My point? Your opinion about the excesses of others depends upon your interests. I love watches, but one Tag will do for me. I will however drop several grand on a piece of equipment without a second thought if it will help me enjoy my music more.

To each his own!

I agree with you Grimace and disagree with Viridian and Danlib1. It's easy to justify the exorbitant amount spent on audio gear by using other excessive hobbies as examples. Those hobbies have the potential for absurdity as easily as this one. Besides, high end audio is not really a hobby anyway. "Hobby" needs to be dropped. The money I've spent and what many are spending on this gear is absurd; especially when the sound we achieve does not meet the expense. For those where money is no object it's fine. But those of us who live in a "money is no object" scenario are in a minority. For me, my investment in high end gear has gone far beyond what I could have conceived of 5 years ago.

I was at a library book sale this weekend and picked up about 45 classical LP's at $0.50 each. I've been cleaning and playing them and really having fun. Hours and hours of fun.

Comparing that to the 4 Mullard 6922's I bought for $576 from Vintage Tube Services... which is going to give me more pleasure for the buck? You're right. It is a silly hobby.

My wife tells me she'd rather have me spend on these things than on fast women or bookies. I guess it's all relative. Maybe ALL hobbies are silly at some level!

On the plus side, our musical passions seem less self destructive than many others. One of my best friends is into vintage car racing. He routinely blows $3-5,000 for a weekend of racing, sometimes more. But the gratification he gets makes the mere monetary value insignificant. On the other hand, he can afford it.

The fact is, it is NOT about the money, ever.

Foster_9: If I felt as you do, I would stop spending money. For many others however, the hobby yields a great deal of joy at any level of expenditure.

I think this hobby has a pretty good bang for the buck factor provided one doesn't do anything stupid, like buying the $10,000 pre amp that just showed up on the cover of Sterophile at full retail. If you buy used and let the other guy take the depreciation hit you can sell it for close to the same price years later. So the net investment isn't too bad, although it's not very liquid these day.