How important is "brand name"?

Sounds like you just described every industry in the free world. Brand names mean everything and nothing. Some to many times you cannot trust the major audiophiles mags either. The biggest secret in this hobby is coming to the realization that one must spend a lot of money to realize one does not have to spend a lot of money.

There are $30k products and name brands that smell and $200 products that'll make your system sing. And vice versa.

Your surest bet to prevent costly mistakes is to find somebody so well versed in this hobby, somebody who lives, sleeps, and drinks this stuff, and lean heavily on this person's advise for all gear purchases, even down to the electrical plug types and models. But that also means steering clear of the opinions of the masses. Because the majority are usually wrong anyway.

Stehno makes good points. I would just add that I think that "brand names" are VERY important to some audiophiles (you'll note I didn't say music overs), whereas uniqueness is very important to others and they don't worry about the manufacturers going tits up.

My own position is somewhere between the two: I do like the idea that a manufacturer is going to be around to service my gear for the long term, but name brand for the sake of "elite-ism" is not particularly important to me. My amp dealer went out of business, but fortunately re-emerged with another company (McCormack/CJ), and my pre-amp builder (Sonic Frontiers) has been bought and sold (how many times?). I suspect it is very difficult for small audio names to become mainstream, ie Levinson and Krell (and I have 2 Levinson pieces that sound great-- and I appreciate the build quality and name).

But having said all tis, it all has to SOUND GOOD TOGETHER for it to be worthwhile. I'm too damned old to be interested in "trophy equipment". Assess the risk(s) you're willing to take and go with what you like and sounds good to you, IMHO. Good Luck. Craig.

'Blue chip' mfrs are always the best way to go if you like playing with gear. I've nearly always stuck with ARC, Krell, CJ, Magnepan, Quad, Martin logan, Wadia, Linn, Levinson, et al. and hardly ever take a big hit on resale. This 'music lover' would rather preserve his dollars for more software than piss away my cash on 'garage-made gear' that will most likely have poor resale in years to come...