What exactly you get more from High end vs Entry level

[Hari Iyer]

guys believe me or not Highend Is worth every penny. Forget DIY. True Highend is something else. I have been to Highend Munich Germany I have seen numerous multi million dollar systems. There are many which has that unique signature and after everything its worth every single penny spent on the systems. If you just talk about Kef, Focal, B&W or any other brands then you are not talking highend. Highend is different world altogether.

Raidho, Kaiser, Wilson, Tidal on speakers
Total DAC, MSB, DCS on DACs
Bi.

I choose to disagree with your view on DIY. BTW, how many DIY products have you listened till date other than the list of branded products that you have mentioned to conclude. From your post, you seem to have listened to many branded products. Can you also be kind enough to mention some DIY setups too.
It's a know fact that best sounding set ups are often made than bought. In my setup 50% of the components are DIY and I have gone ahead and modified my purchased item with positive results for the sound signatures I am looking for.

Before writing a blanket conclusion as " Forget. DIY" I will suggest you to listen some DIY setups too.

 

[square_wave]

guys believe me or not Highend Is worth every penny. Forget DIY. True Highend is something else. I have been to Highend Munich Germany I have seen numerous multi million dollar systems. There are many which has that unique signature and after everything its worth every single penny spent on the systems. If you just talk about Kef, Focal, B&W or any other brands then you are not talking highend. Highend is different world altogether.

Raidho, Kaiser, Wilson, Tidal on speakers
Total DAC, MSB, DCS on DACs
Bibacord, Trasparent audio, Gekko for highend cables
PS audio, ISOtek for power conditioner
Lars, Gryphon, Passlabs( still many dont call this highend when you really enter into ultra highend zone), Vitus, for amplifiers
still points on vibration isolators
and alot and lot more brands on highend couldnt be mentioned here.

If you are still in B&W / kef / Dali zone then you need to get up on the ladder to see what are the systems so called highend and more importantly the one who sets that up for you the person is very important than anything else.

DIY has a place in high end. But then, it depends upon who is doing it. Years of experience, a finely tuned passion, tools and engineering at their disposal are all pre-requisites for great DIY. Usually such DIY ( they are usually called boutique small manufacturers ), will be accepted in the high end audio circles and will be sought after. And they will not be very cheap either. But they will be cheaper than a " big brand " equivalent due to the business model..

"High end - no compromise design" is the criteria for high end audio. You can reach there via many routes.

 

[flute]

Hi end gear are clean and the music has no colouration whearas a low cost adds colour.
Secoundly while playing music it can be fealt where an amp lacks.It is all about the signal path, power supply and the power bank rails,
circuit topology and components.

 

[liverpool_for_life]

Hi end gear are clean and the music has no colouration whearas a low cost adds colour.

The cost of your speakers, IMO, has little to do with how true to the source the sound it produces is. They have much more to do with the philosophy of the speaker designer. "Hi-end" does not necessarily equate to hi-fidelity.

 

[prateekatasniya]

Hi end gear are clean and the music has no colouration whearas a low cost adds colour.
Secoundly while playing music it can be fealt where an amp lacks.It is all about the signal path, power supply and the power bank rails,
circuit topology and components.

That's not true.. High end gear are colored for a particular sound signature. Not doubt some will be neutral.

It depends on the choice of a person of what type of sound he likes.

 

[dheerajin]

if you are interested about the dissection of the high end electronics, then go through this thread
https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forums/topic/38174-inside-high-end-equipment/

 

[flute]

I dont agree to the point that speakers are not of much importance.I think the most important part in the chain is speakers.

 

[prateekatasniya]

I dont agree to the point that speakers are not of much importance.I think the most important part in the chain is speakers.

Amp and speakers both are equally important.. Either of them being bad will sound bad.. But I feel overall the amp is more important.

 

[Kannan]

Everything is important starting from the quality of power feeding the chain.
Ultimately what we hear are the speakers, so that is the most critical, and should ideally be the starting point for someone starting out for a complete setup.

 

[Dhurai]

Guys, don't forget the source

 

[sound_cycle]

You change the genre even very slightly, the system performance goes phuss. Literally crap for the price tag.....
This happened with not one but most systems.

So, is this a 'baggage' that these 'expensive' systems carry?
If its expensive, it should play everything nicely, no?

All recordings are equal ! why should some compressed, poorly recorded, mastered for car radio stuff sound good anywhere. Is using well recorded stuff some deep conspiracy ? (since the tracks are not mentioned, I speculate)

And genres can be change slightly, how do you do that ? and what goes phuss ?

Nice points

ciao
gr

 

[frend2001]

The identification of change is acquired trait.

A person listening to an al cheapo amplifier wouldn't believe that anything could sound better then this.

Introduce him to a better system and he'd able to understand the change as compared to what he's been listening to.

Now the thing is if he hasn't listened to some good setup, he'd continue to believe that his al-cheapo poorly made amplifier is all he needs.

For comparing things we need reference points. So it becomes subjective to the reference point. You have to have some listening experience to distinguish the difference. It develops as we keep listening to music and to the sound.

In case of what more you get from highend stuff well,

It may not be a significant change or addendum in case of already good setups as after a certain point the changes after upgrade become minor although still discernible. But ensuring thorough approaches in design and layout certainly has a positive effect on the outcome.

 

[sound_cycle]

Any more benefit for spending more?
Do always result into too high grade SQ same time?

Spending more than what/which/where ? And SQ with reference to what ?

ciao
gr

 

[haisaikat]

I think (with not many listening experience to high end stuff is definitely
1. More details with accuracy and separation because of better circuits, filters and ground level better components that have lesser variation with continuity of specs and output, better connectors, power supply, etc
2. Unique signature of sound
3. More finicky with everything has to be set right or else mistakes and problems will be equally amplified and detailed than non high end. Suppose your source or placement or ICs is not well, it may end up stinging your ears like anything thereby spoiling the session.
4. Not limited to just speaker and amplifier but extended to DACs preamps and speaker wires and interconnect and power supply plus power cables too. Each bringing in either guaranteed neutrality (supposedly) or its own component of coloration or impact on the signature.
5. Distortion may not be the ultimate goal since tubes bring more of that but tend to be considered high end because of the warmth in midsvthey add now whether that is coloration or more accurate reproduction of source is debatable but this re-establishes point 2 again
6. Some setup is good only for specific genres only so test with your likeable stuffs mostly unless your gear makes you switch genres which also happen at times so you end up listening to what makes your gear sound best and not what you liked best previously, not that it's wrong but there can be cheaper ways to discover music
7. I have witnessed many moderns DACs end up being bright in their zeal to make sound output more detailed, some days back I compared schit Modi modern dac with Sony esd-337 (30 years old CDP inbut dac) and latter was way better balanced.

Having said all of the above, as someone has rightly said before , if you are enjoying the music even from a cassette walkman of 80s continue doing so, the freedom of keeping things simple and enjoying is quite greater without requiring to worry about world hunger and world peace.

 

[flat_listener]

I think (with not many listening experience to high end stuff is definitely

mostly unless your gear makes you switch genres which also happen at times so you end up listening to what makes your gear sound best and not what you liked best previously, not that it's wrong but there can be cheaper ways to discover music

Can someone decipher the writing on this post for me please?

 

[marsilians]

This thread is off the rails with some BS on high end audio opinion. It gives me a chuckle when people claim to have seen multi million or hundreds of thousands dollars systems in shows and don’t understand the materials going to make most of such equipment is fairly cheap such as capacitors, wiring, enclosures, crossovers etc.

Big money is not necessarily great sound in this hobby. Oh BTW, Scansonic is also designed by Mike Borrensen, who builds Raidho for a third of the price. So is it high end or not?

DIY can beat many high end systems in performance and cost, with the right skill!

 

[prateekatasniya]

This thread is off the rails with some BS on high end audio opinion. It gives me a chuckle when people claim to have seen multi million or hundreds of thousands dollars systems in shows and don’t understand the materials going to make most of such equipment is fairly cheap such as capacitors, wiring, enclosures, crossovers etc.

Big money is not necessarily great sound in this hobby. Oh BTW, Scansonic is also designed by Mike Borrensen, who builds Raidho for a third of the price. So is it high end or not?

DIY can beat many high end systems in performance and cost, with the right skill!

I would love to hear a diy of this capability..
Have you heard one?

 

[Kannan]

This thread is off the rails with some BS on high end audio opinion

The topic in itself is very ambiguous and misleading and hence bound to bring varied opinions.

It can be defined both in terms of pricing and fidelity and it is very much possible to achieve the latter without the realms of high end in terms of money

 

[marsilians]

I would love to hear a diy of this capability..
Have you heard one?

An 18" sub built with Stonehenge kit, 1000 watt plate amp and for looks, top quality plywood mocha veneer. When you ran test tones, it start to rumble at around 9 Hz! Now tell me a movie or music piece which goes so low and you are still able to match with a sub bought off a manufacturer.

BTW, Dynaudio started as a supplier of speaker drivers for the DIY community till they felt the quality was so good that they started to take on turnkey manufacturing of speakers. So when you appreciate the legendary Dynaudio sound signature, you know the history of where it came from!

 

[Mi_10]

An 18" sub built with Stonehenge kit, 1000 watt plate amp and for looks, top quality plywood mocha veneer. When you ran test tones, it start to rumble at around 9 Hz! Now tell me a movie or music piece which goes so low and you are still able to match with a sub bought off a manufacturer.

So ?!! This tells nothing about the quality ! This is very reminiscent of seeing those amplifiers which boast of 150 rms per channel and go to sleep at the smell of serious load! reproducing one set of frequency where 0.001% music resides is absolute non starter for me!

The OP's intent was more of Entry level vs High end comparison, Now if you want to bring DIY and do a cost compare, then IMHO, we are deviating from the point.

BTW, Dynaudio started as a supplier of speaker drivers for the DIY community till they felt the quality was so good that they started to take on turnkey manufacturing of speakers. So when you appreciate the legendary Dynaudio sound signature, you know the history of where it came from!

Yes, so does Scanspeak, Seas, Dayton and a lot of them are still have good range of products for the DIY crowd. The DIY crowd stands for 'Passion'! It stands for 'Innovation'! It stands for an emotion called 'Satisfaction' which most humans undergo when they actively do something to create an outcome!
Do not confuse or convolute this emotion by objectively comparing with a Business firm ! And When you talk about sound quality, there are handful of known parameters but a thousand other intangible, aspects around it including each one's perception of quality and their own hearing ability / disability !
No Offence, but i don't think this is a subject that can be objectively quantified and debated upon!!