When I see people buying and selling $50k gear it reminds me this guy who successfully sold dog for $50k by trading it for two cats $25k each.
Amp design logic
I hope you'll excuse my absolute and obvious ignorance...but this is a sincere question.
I don't get why one company is selling a new tube amp for ~$1000, and another is selling one for ~$50,000. What is one paying for? The proprietary circuit design?
Surely if one adds up the cost of the parts, trannies, chassis, etc. it's not worth $50K.
I accept that the more expensive one sounds lots, lots better. But what makes the price so high? Demand?
I think given a circuit diagram from a repair manual, I could eventually build most tube amps from scratch, using the absolute best of each part available. After I learn to solder. For less than $50K, just buying the best cap, resistor, wire, etc. made, for each part, I could slowly build an amp equal to the best in the world. So I don't get it.
What makes an amp worth $50K? It can only be the proprietary tube amp design.
Maybe another factor is the transformers. Each company seems to have their own iron, but that can't be a significant part of $50K?
Thanks, just really wondering about this. And wondering why don't I just make my own? If I buy one part at a time, eventually I can have the best amp there can be.
Jim
I don't get why one company is selling a new tube amp for ~$1000, and another is selling one for ~$50,000. What is one paying for? The proprietary circuit design?
Surely if one adds up the cost of the parts, trannies, chassis, etc. it's not worth $50K.
I accept that the more expensive one sounds lots, lots better. But what makes the price so high? Demand?
I think given a circuit diagram from a repair manual, I could eventually build most tube amps from scratch, using the absolute best of each part available. After I learn to solder. For less than $50K, just buying the best cap, resistor, wire, etc. made, for each part, I could slowly build an amp equal to the best in the world. So I don't get it.
What makes an amp worth $50K? It can only be the proprietary tube amp design.
Maybe another factor is the transformers. Each company seems to have their own iron, but that can't be a significant part of $50K?
Thanks, just really wondering about this. And wondering why don't I just make my own? If I buy one part at a time, eventually I can have the best amp there can be.
Jim
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- 40 posts total
Many factors presumably contribute to that $50K sales price, many of them having been mentioned in the posts above. As someone experienced in electronic design (not for audio), one factor I would particularly emphasize is amortization of design and development costs. Designing a sophisticated high performance electronic product involves many months, perhaps even years, of effort, involving multiple technical disciplines. For starters: Electrical design, including analog, digital, and power supply design, which are essentially different disciplines; mechanical design; thermal design; and in many audio products these days also software or firmware design. Significant payments to subcontractors and suppliers are also involved, not just for parts and materials but also for work by the subcontractors to design and develop custom integrated circuits that may be required, and to perform the non-recurring efforts that are required to prepare for production of major subassemblies such as the chassis, transformers, etc. Specialized test equipment and laboratory facilities will also be needed to support the design and development process. All of those costs, and many others that have been mentioned, will have to be amortized across a total lifetime production quantity that is perhaps measured in dozens. Frankly, considering that and considering the limited market for high end equipment and the vast number of products that are available to choose from in any given category, what surprises me is not the amps that sell for $50K, but the ones that manage to sell for only $4K. Now if you were asking about cables, that would be a different story IMO :-) Regards, -- Al |
What's the difference between a $2.4 million Bugatti Veyron and a $12,000 Chevrolet Aveo? They both get you from point A to point B. I guess it's just a good thing that you are not asking about the REALLY expensive amplifiers. Sheesh.... |
- 40 posts total