Culture of Stereo hifi in India....building up or fading away....

I think all in one box (.....just add speakers) with network,digital,analog may attract more Gen y and keep the stereo tradition going as it's super easy to use.However it's not going to see growth like headphone sales.
 
IMHO, like all good things, sitting down for sometime "only" to listen to music from a stereo, needs some practice and training. Specially in today's life, where other distractions(mobile, youtube, netflix etc.) are plentiful.
As far as the kids are concerned, try making them sit with you sometimes while a listening session is on. With time, they'll surely start appreciating nuances of the reproduced sound and enjoy it.
 
Convenience<=>distractions<=>short attention span<=>need for instant gratification.
Life is totally different today from 30 years back. So many things competing for your attention - Whatsapp, Instagram, news, calls from friends/relatives, ty shows, mobile and PC games...the list is endless. Listening to and "appreciating" high quality stereo reproduction on a good system demands time and attention - both are in very short supply. For everyone, not just kids. and if you dont have the time and attention span to make the effort to listen properly, then one may as well listen on a crappy BT speaker - it's background blah anyway.
Convenience also plays a major role. 30 years back, if you wanted to watch a movie, you had to get dressed, drive to the cinema, buy tickets and sit through it for 3 hours. Today you tell alexa to play the movie. If you wanted to eat a biriyani, either you cooked it at home, or got dressed and went to the restaurant. Today you order it on swiggy and it's there in 30 mins, without you even leaving the couch. So 30 yrs back, watching a movie, eating out, seeing your friend's vacation pics or even talking to friends took much more effort than listening to the stereo. Today it's the opposite.
Given that, only nutcases like us will invest lakhs of rupees in hifi and then take the trouble of actually listening to it. For everyone else, a headphone or a crappy bluetooth speaker work just fine.
 
Yes definitely fading away.
We have access to the internet with its lure of free content.
We have a generation which is lazy and doesn't want the hassle of maintainence.
Mobiles have made access to music easier.
Most people consider this hobby a waste of resources and time.
There are many more reasons but these are the ones I could recall.
 
most of them dont notice/hear any difference between a song being played in so called crappy systems and good systems ......lets rewind and go back in time ....did we not enjoy listening to music on small portable mono/ stereo systems , AM / FM radio , Walkman etc during our school or college days ? the output produced by these systems are not as good as so called Separates or Hifi systems ...same is the case now ....much later on in our life we moved to HIFI .

There is a difference in just listening to songs and being a audiophile something like - eating food and being a Foodie
 
I’d argue it's the other way round.
Music reproduction was a pursuit only of the elite or true hobbyists until fairly recently

Back in the 70s, my dad would purchase LPs for the princely sum of 50/- (1200 INR adjusted for inflation) and would play 'em back on a pair of old JBL speakers - which sound fine to this date

In the 90s,/00s I would save up my pocket money for cassettes (or a CD for that really special album)- Each purchase was treated as a special occasion
And then I would play them back on a walkman/discman with some sony earphones or one of those Aiwa/ Sony All-In-Ones that had gone through a couple of upgrade cycles
I seriously used to save up for equipment and source and was one of the very few in the campus hostels among 1500+ students who had such a setup...

550 INR for cassettes and 1400 INR for CDs inflation adjusted if you are keeping tabs on the numbers ..
The price I'd have paid for the crappy All-in-One AIWAs/ SONYs would add up to a seriously high resolution system today

Fast forward to today - Practically every Student/ Kid fresh out of college listen to a lot more varied selection of music than I could ever dream of..
And as the final nail on the nostalgia coffin, their 100/- streaming service coupled with a 1 K (or a few K) IEM sounds way better than any of the aforementioned systems

As for stereo separates, leaving aside people who have a trust fund in their name, maybe 1 in 500 would be so into this hobby in my Dad's time to spend a decent part of their net worth into it
That number may have become 1 in 200 by my college days

I am sure that the ratio will be far better for when the 18-24 ageds of today get to a point where they have a higher disposable income and a house of their own
 
Imho it is all about affordability and portability of HiFi seperates that makes someone go the BT, headphones way. I hope that there is a huge resurgence of HiFi in the current / future generations.
 
Yes definitely fading away.
We have access to the internet with its lure of free content.
We have a generation which is lazy and doesn't want the hassle of maintainence.
Mobiles have made access to music easier.
Most people consider this hobby a waste of resources and time.
There are many more reasons but these are the ones I could recall.
Nothing is fading away, in fact, on the contrary. The number of hifi brands and choice of equipment available these days is a lot more than what it used to be. This in itself is a testament to the fact that appreciation for hifi is increasing. If there was no reasonable demand, stores like HiFiMart would've shut down ages ago,
unless someone has the statistics to say there is a decrease in demand when compared to 10 years ago!
 
This makes it sound like Digital is not Hifi

Haha, its a good thought actually. Companies are focussing more on ease of use these days. Thought of a turntable brings to menory a big speaker, antique arm chair and golden sun and lot of good music. Thought of a streamer, well it produces only 0 and 1s in my mind. Lots of zeroes and ones cluttered all around and our beloved equipment has to somehow make sense of pulses and create music.
 
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The best way to judge is by asking the new generation about stereo/hi fi. My kids to point. NEVER have they asked me to play music on the system, it has always been mobiles. But when I play it they enjoy it! So asked them why don't they play some music in our system. Their answer is too much hassle!
 
Haha, its a good thought actually. Companies are focussing more on ease of use these days. Thought of a turntable brings to menory a big speaker, antique arm chair and golden sun and lot of good music. Thought of a streamer, well it produces only 0 and 1s in my mind. Lots of zeroes and ones cluttered all around and our beloved equipment has to somehow make sense of pulses and create music.
I fully understand what you mean. This is very similar to analogue vs digital photography. The purists love winding their films on their analogue cameras after every shot. The satisfaction of the 'click' sound is real!
 
The best way to judge is by asking the new generation about stereo/hi fi. My kids to point. NEVER have they asked me to play music on the system, it has always been mobiles. But when I play it they enjoy it! So asked them why don't they play some music in our system. Their answer is too much hassle!
Hahaha.. no patience!
 
I fully understand what you mean. This is very similar to analogue vs digital photography. The purists love winding their films on their analogue cameras after every shot. The satisfaction of the 'click' sound is real!

Its simple. For ease of use and storage, a medium was created by contaminating signals, now everyone is in race to convert the contaminated media back to original signal. It cannot become like original, its as simple as that. Thats what hifidelity means. To reproduce as good as original.
 
Gentlemen,
Stereo music and paraphernalia associated with it has perished. New generation is not interested. No matter how much we would like it to be.
For anyone interested in vintage photography. Roll developing shops have been closed. But Mumbai fort area has one guy who developes film rolls. I think 10/20 Rs. per single picture, Developing extra. which I think is Rs. 200 to 300. Brand new film rolls are available starting from approx. Rs. 1000/-
Regards
 
Its simple. For ease of use and storage, a medium was created by contaminating signals, now everyone is in race to convert the contaminated media back to original signal. It cannot become like original, its as simple as that. Thats what hifidelity means. To reproduce as good as original.
Interesting point.
I did have a collection of more than 500 CDs and audio cassettes, which I eventually gave away. Audio cassettes in tropical climate is disastrous because of humidity and fungus.

I like the ease of 'music on demand' on spotify. In fact I've discovered so many new artists and songs that my listening sessions are ever increasing. This would not have been possible with the CDs.
If the difference in sound quality between 320kbps of Spotify and 1411kbps of CDs was drastic to my ears, I would never have made the jump. In fact, I can't even discern the difference between the audio quality of the two.
 
I have seen that for the new generation to get interested in hifi stereo, if an effort is made by the experienced guys to guide them on the ease of use part, they appreciate it. Keep it simple to begin with, say something like a pair of KEF LSX is a terrific option for younger generation to get into the groove. Don't judge their music preferences, encourage them with options they could look for better sound quality in their budget, with emphasis on "plug & play" or "ease of use". The headphones scene in India has actually come of age.
 
I have seen that for the new generation to get interested in hifi stereo, if an effort is made by the experienced guys to guide them on the ease of use part, they appreciate it. Keep it simple to begin with, say something like a pair of KEF LSX is a terrific option for younger generation to get into the groove. Don't judge their music preferences, encourage them with options they could look for better sound quality in their budget, with emphasis on "plug & play" or "ease of use". The headphones scene in India has actually come of age.

Interest in hifi starts from genuine interest in music. Interest in anything increases leaps and bounds if one takes time to involve in it and explore things especially physically. Digital music makes sure there is no effort whatsoever required to listen to songs, now add to that, the devices where music is played are seldom dedicated. So the result now with youngsters.
 
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