Has anybody heard the new Audio Research LS 27?

Onhwy61,
The point is that the LS27 is better then the LS26.
I know a top engineer who had a LS26 in his tightly controled,very neutral listening room..He replaced it with the LS27 and theres no question it sounds better.There must have been something ARC was able to improve.

No one,not even ARC forces you to upgrade.
If new better products effect your re-sale value,I don't think ARC should care to much about that.
They are a business that has to fight to make a PROFIT.
Some people don't seem to understand Capitalism.

Agreed. If you don't keep reinventing yourself you will be quickly passed by the competition.

Companies can stay competitive in an open market by satisfying pre-existing customer demands and needs. Alternatively companies can be equally successful by creating customer demand and needs and offering solutions to problems customers didn't even know they had until the "new" product came along. Apparently some people don't understand the function of marketing/advertising.

I find it hard to understand how in an industry where resale value is becoming increasingly more important that a company would seriously undermine or disregard the investment their customers have made in their products.

Efner, this isn't about capitalism it is about ARC's perceived marketing model and how some see it. Your comment about ARC's new offerings effecting resale values and ARC not caring, I'm not too sure they don't care. If the resale value plummets on older products when new ones come out after a period of time folks may come to a conclusion that ARC doesn't offer the best value for the prices they charge. Obviously this doesn't seem to be the case as there always seem to be a demand for their used products for folks unable or unwilling to pay for new.