Slow death of high-end audio

cnh

Or as they say; the King is dead, long live the King!

cnh

zingo

TECHNOKID wrote: »

The question should be this; will HI-FI die with us baby boomers or will the new generation get into it? As pointed out, HTIB, ipod and all seems to be the hobby of this newer generation, will they actually move up into high quality gear or simply stall with the new toys and bring HI-FI to a halt?

I'm not a baby boomer, nor are many of the audiophiles I know.

TECHNOKID

cnh wrote: »

Some unbelievably High-End products are being manufactured in China these days. And Chinese are very very very good at reverse manufacturing....they're beginning to rival the Japanese. And we all remember what happened to our electronics when the Japanese figured it out! I believe that China is going to become the high end manufacturing hub...if it isn't already that.

Have you seen the high end Lenovos (former IBM Thinkpads now fully made in China?)

cnh

You are probably right about the future of China however, today is far from being the day. Just about anything electronic that I had the opportunity to open that was made in China is pure junk. Probably the perfect country to keep up with this trend of throw away technology! To me, HIGH-END is not solely the end result at the output put the longevity and reliability is a big part of. Afterall, the price tags should justify long lasting and reliability. Yet the Chinese are known for low cost with poor results and unfortunately most so called american companies have opted to fill their chassis bearing their logo with low grade/bottom of the barrell electronic components!

sucks2beme

Yet the future of hi end audio lies in China. In ten years we'll see.
The newest wave of audiophiles is from tht part of the world.

nspindel

This is an excellent point. You've just described my son perfectly! I've tried having him sit down and relax in a great listening chair in front of my two channel rig in a listening room I've set up to the nines with acoustic treatments, etc., to listen to the MFSL Dark Side of the Moon from start to finish. He wants no part of it. Kids have no patience any more because of all the multi-tasking, and you're right - when doing seven things at once, they're not the least bit concerned with sound quality. Same even goes for HT. My son watches movies on a 60" hi-def screen, and it's one extra push of a button to get the 7.1 fired up. He could care less, he's just as happy to have the sound coming out of the tv speakers while he's doing 5 different things simultaneously.

cnh wrote: »

Here's another factor...I think. HEAVY MULTI-TASKING. Let's take the typical youth whose attention span is on the 'decrease'. What is he/she doing...all-at-once--listening to some MP3s off a hard drive, while running some AOL type Messenger continuously on a laptop...and maybe a film on another LCD in the room at the same time their gaming on an XBOX...and intermittently twittering and searching the web for cool youtube vids, etc. If you're so scattered what does it MATTER HOW GOOD OR BAD YOUR SOUND SYSTEM is? And your certainly not worried about high end two channel--your senses are ALREADY being overloaded by visual, textual and aural inputs FROM EVERY direction.

Do you think that ANY of US could stop to actually "hear" a good two channel rig in such a ROOM!

In such a MATRIX your consciousness threatens to become a part of the mulitmedia space that it LIVES in...to disappear into it with no thought, no critical thought..and just one desire....to be STIMULATED in as MANY different ways as POSSIBLE. QUANTITY NOT QUALITY BECOMES THE GOAL!

cnh

apphd

cnh wrote: »

Some unbelievably High-End products are being manufactured in China these days. And Chinese are very very very good at reverse manufacturing....they're beginning to rival the Japanese. And we all remember what happened to our electronics when the Japanese figured it out! I believe that China is going to become the high end manufacturing hub...if it isn't already that.

Have you seen the high end Lenovos (former IBM Thinkpads now fully made in China?)
cnh

Maybe in the future, but they are not there yet.

TECHNOKID wrote: »

You are probably right about the future of China however, today is far from being the day. Just about anything electronic that I had the opportunity to open that was made in China is pure junk. Probably the perfect country to keep up with this trend of throw away technology! To me, HIGH-END is not solely the end result at the output put the longevity and reliability is a big part of. Afterall, the price tags should justify long lasting and reliability. Yet the Chinese are known for low cost with poor results and unfortunately most so called american companies have opted to fill their chassis bearing their logo with low grade/bottom of the barrell electronic components!

Very true. Except for the occasional non authorized substitution of cheaper or black market components these cheap components and lower quality is considered OK by the companies they produce for. You can get quality from China, you just have to pay a little more for it, which many companies aren't willing to do because we as consumers (the vast majority but not all) are not as concerned with it as much as price. The companies that still demand higher prices for this cheaper product I think will suffer in the long run.

sucks2beme wrote: »

Yet the future of hi end audio lies in China. In ten years we'll see.
The newest wave of audiophiles is from tht part of the world.

Could be, as more and more of the population become consumers with the disposable cash for luxury goods. As more and more factories are opened, more and more of these consumers are created (something very new to the vast majority). But having traveled a little in China and seeing (hearing) over and over again, small cheap one piece shelf systems cranked up as high as it will go producing huge amounts of distortion and nothing but load noise, I think it will be some time before many know what evan mid-fi is.

TECHNOKID

As more and more factories are opened, more and more of these consumers are created (something very new to the vast majority). But having traveled a little in China and seeing (hearing) over and over again, small cheap one piece shelf systems cranked up as high as it will go producing huge amounts of distortion and nothing but load noise, I think it will be some time before many know what evan mid-fi is.

I agree with all of the above and even more with with the last part (in bold) as even if wealth is there, you don't suddenly turn around and be an audiophile overninght!

danz1906

TECHNOKID wrote: »

I agree with all of the above and even more with with the last part (in bold) as even if wealth is there, you don't suddenly turn around and be an audiophile overninght!

Agreed, very well said.