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Studio gear vs. Hi-Fi gear Is Hi-Fi a ripoff?

I'm relatively new to hi-fi (bought my first "hi-fi" system one year ago), but I've been an amateur musician for nearly 10 years now (blues guitar mainly). It recently occured to me that pro studio equipment should be at the same level of performance as "hi-fi" equipment. Yet, good studio equipment, while expensive, isn't expensive for the sake of being expensive, as I think many hi-fi items are. For example, Dynaudio makes both studio monitors and hi-fi speakers. Their studio monitors are made under the name Dynaudio Acoustics and they have their own website. They sell a mini-monitor called the BM-6. It has nearly identical specs to the 1.3MKII, except w/o the wood veneer. Yet BM-6's MSRP is less than HALF that of the 1.3. I don't know much about line conditioner's, but I know that decent studio line conditioners can be had for under $200, are made like tanks, and are easily taken apart if you like to tweak. How they compare to hi-fi line conditioner's I have no idea, but I bet they can hold their own. Quality all tube equipment (many of which are completely hand assembled w/ point to point soldering) of all different designs are availble at down to earth prices. Build quality on studio equipment is simply outstanding, far exceeding hi-fi equipment at the lower price levels (<$2000). My question is, is there really a substantial difference between studio equipment and hi-fi equipment? After all, it's studio equipment that captures all the nuances in the CDs/LPs that hi-fi equipment strives to reproduce. Yes, I know the fancier studio's have equipment tabs that run into the many millions, but not if all you want is a pair of quality monitors, amp, and CD player. My theory is, the people buying studio equipment are mainly gear heads with extensive knowledge on what sounds good and why, and they know what to look for, and they know how much it should cost, and are usually on a budget because there is so much more to buy than just monitors, amps, and sources. The typical buyer of home hi-fi equipment is probably not as knowledgable as a studio engineer, is probably much more susceptable to marketing and hype, and is therefore probably much more likely to dump a ton of money on a pair of speakers, amp, source, conditioner, cable, etc., especially since they only need one/few of each thing (vs. the hundreds of components a larger studio would need). I would also venture to say that typical hi-fi customers, especially the more affluent ones, are much more likely to fall for the "extremely expensive = extremely high quality" marketing strategy that any studio engineer w/ experience would never fall for. So, the manufacturer's price their equipment accordingly for the two demographics (studios and audiophiles). For example Dynaudio charging substantially less for their studio monitors than their home hi-fi monitors, and then tucking their studio monitors away under a different name and a different web-site so that us audiophiles don't easily take notice to them. Also telling are the desciptions of the studio monitors vs. the hi-fi monitors. The hi-fi descriptions have tons of "fluff" to them compared to the straight, to-the-point, studio monitor descriptions (Tannoy does something similar, but at least it's on the same webpage). Now all this is pure speculation, and I'm not accusing dynaudio or anyone else of being unethical, on the contrary, they are simply practicing good marketing tactics and charging as much as they think we are willing to pay based on demographic research (i.e. they know we are willing to pay more than the studios are). Hell, for all I know, I may just be rationalizing my inability to buy the hi-fi gear I want. But in my recent quest to upgrade my stuff, I can't help but ask if I can get a lot more bang for my buck by purchasing studio gear, or perhaps a combination of studio gear and hi-fi gear. The more I think about it, the more I really think good studio equipment has the nearly the same quality as good hi-fi equipment but at a substantially cheaper cost. I suppose the only way to find out is to do some testing (after I get my x-mas bonus). Yes, studio equipment can be butt ugly, but they're built to take a beating, literally. Again, being somewhat new to hi-fi, I may be totally misguided, and I'm not trying to make anybody look bad, I'm just sounding my observations off to the fellow members of this board.

Thanks for listening,
Gil
poor_airman
slartibartfast
100 posts
 
Gil-

I guess I am as well a bit confused... studio monitors aren't cheaper because they are studio monitors. Any speaker in question is simply cheaper to manufacture when produced in mass. Take a cheap pair of JBL studio monitors (don't remember the model #s anymore) which I had the great displeasure to monitor with on a project... they were of no greater or lesser cost than their consumer counterpart. They were also of no better quality in sound or construction.

What I was trying to point out is that quality studio gear is equally as expensive as quality home gear to achieve the same level of sound quality. Cheap studio gear is equally priced as cheap home gear and is of the same caliber as well.

Furthermore, you said that the high cost of mixers, mics, and recorders would drive down the prices of other gear. One has no bearing on the other. The price of a $200 Yamaha monitor is not going to effect the price of a $5,000 Neumann microphone. What it might do is weigh where the studio decides to spend their money. You can substitute a $5,000 pair of monitors with a $250 pair and still get decent results in the finished music product. You cannot replace a $5,000 microphone with a $250 Shure and think that you will get even 50% of the quality of the finished product.

If what you are looking to do is justify buying a pair of studio monitors thinking they will be better than a more expensive pair of high end speakers, that equation doesn't work out. My golden rule is that no matter how expensive or how cheap the product, you have to listen to it and decide for yourself whether it sounds good to you. This is a completely subjective hobby and all you can do is trust your own ears and go exploring what is out there. There is a lot of crap in the high-end and there is a lot of great stuff and the same goes for recording gear as well.
rayhall
393 posts
 
My father was an engineer for almost 40 years and he engineered many number one pop hits, as well as many of the jazz greats, and even has a Grammy for a classical recording. I can tell you, having been in the studio a fair number of times, that, except for classical, the session and mixing is not usually about being faithful to the original sound at all. Their job is to sell product and they do so by trying to capture the sound that people are either buying now or that they think that they can entice the public to buy. Generally, their monitoring equipment (speakers) are not neutral at all. They tend to be quite forward sounding. My father preferred to do most of his mixing with headphones because he found studio speakers to be so bad. That is not to say that their isn't tremendous snob markup in the audiophile arena. You don't have to be a genius to see it. Nevertheless, most of us would be very unhappy with the sound of certain professional audio products.
frap
213 posts
 
Rayhall, Since your father produced what was probably the greatest recorded sound of all time, namely "Music For Bang BaaRoom and Harp" (No greater recorded Concert Hall venue sound exists, in my opinion), I would tend to believe anything you might care to say on the subject.......Frank
rayhall
393 posts
 
Thanks, Frank. I don't know much about that record, but he told me about another sound effects record which he did called "Bob and Ray Throw a Stereo Spectacular", in a comedy skit on the record, he put Bob Elliot of the comedy team "Bob and Ray" on a swing in front of several stationary microphones. At one point, you can hear Elliot swinging back and forth across the soundstage. It is certainly not a classic technique for capturing recorded sound. Both "Music for Bang Barroom and Harp" and "Bob and Ray Throw a Stereo Spectacular" were recorded at Webster Hall, considered a great hall for acoustics. He did a lot of recording there in the 50's and 60's.
pbb
1,140 posts
 
Interesting thread I just bumped into. They are two different markets. The one caters to pros who have better things to do than show-off or else gloat over their equipment. The other is aimed at people who often enough have more money than sense or an equal amount of insecurity and consumer credit. Funny thing though, people still believe they can get more out of a recording produced using kilometres of very ordinary cable by using the most expensive ICs and speaker cables known to man on the tailend of the whole thing. Gives one pause, no? Bryston is marketing pro monitors to the home user (PMC I believe). Wonder if they will meet with any approval from buyers who almost always equate $$$$$ = qualty.
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