What exactly you get more from High end vs Entry level

[sunilj]

I Auditioned quite High end (Read Costly) setup recently, the FM mostly listens to Jazz & I had to Listen to the available Jazz tracks. Expectedly, it failed to impress me in any manner (I Hardly listen to Jazz), It was too sweet sounding a system without the required sparkle. But, I knew I was pretty wrong to conclude, so I spoke to people who listened to the setup earlier, who always felt the setup was rather good and very balanced. The problem was my current system was rather BRIGHT ( I don't like to call it harsh, Because its like commenting on your wife's bad choices; Failing to realize that , 'You' are one of her bad choices). Probably my Habituation with a bright system over last 2 years altered my sense of music perception. Who knows the music we have been listening all these years was not meant to sound like the way we like it (or the way we Color it to suit our preferences). After the regular commercial audio brands, The higher we go in the setups (price wise) there are more subjective decisions to make, the components will be carefully optimized and paired to suit a specific Genre in mind and specific types of listeners. I know that is kind of weird but specialization costs more. So without an objective data it is mostly a subjective opinion.

This series of Phrases is mostly Apt for our discussions:
"Our Music System is a Prisoner of Our Room & Our Ears"
"Our Ears are Prisoner of Our Mind"
"Our Mind is a Prisoner of Our Experience in Listening (Over the years)"
& Finally
"Our Experience in Listening is a Prisoner of Our Music System (Owned or Listened Repeatedly)"
"Our Music System..."

So, Whenever possible I don't miss an opportunity to listen to different of systems at different places and Now I rate less prejudiced, younger audiophiles opinions slightly higher. I was bit puzzled when @sound_cycle came to listen to my setup with his son, but now I realize; it is the right thing to do. Also I keep changing the Speaker systems often in a periodic manner.

Whenever I read Online reviews of audio products, I mostly look for objective data, because Without Objective Data, it is just like One prisoner sharing his opinions about a New device that entered his Cell and How much it appeals to his/her Listening Experience. By the Way ,Hifi Portals are a platforms for Prisoners to exchange experiences online.

Well articulated.

Same track, same setup, same room, different person is an entirely separate perception. It just cannot be the same.

I also find the mobile phone demo's passed around so silly in making comparisons.

 

[Ravindra Desai]

I Auditioned quite High end (Read Costly) setup recently, the FM mostly listens to Jazz & I had to Listen to the available Jazz tracks. Expectedly, it failed to impress me in any manner (I Hardly listen to Jazz), It was too sweet sounding a system without the required sparkle. But, I knew I was pretty wrong to conclude, so I spoke to people who listened to the setup earlier, who always felt the setup was rather good and very balanced. The problem was my current system was rather BRIGHT ( I don't like to call it harsh, Because its like commenting on your wife's bad choices; Failing to realize that , 'You' are one of her bad choices). Probably my Habituation with a bright system over last 2 years altered my sense of music perception. Who knows the music we have been listening all these years was not meant to sound like the way we like it (or the way we Color it to suit our preferences). After the regular commercial audio brands, The higher we go in the setups (price wise) there are more subjective decisions to make, the components will be carefully optimized and paired to suit a specific Genre in mind and specific types of listeners. I know that is kind of weird but specialization costs more. So without an objective data it is mostly a subjective opinion.

This series of Phrases is mostly Apt for our discussions:
"Our Music System is a Prisoner of Our Room & Our Ears"
"Our Ears are Prisoner of Our Mind"
"Our Mind is a Prisoner of Our Experience in Listening (Over the years)"
& Finally
"Our Experience in Listening is a Prisoner of Our Music System (Owned or Listened Repeatedly)"
"Our Music System..."

So, Whenever possible I don't miss an opportunity to listen to different of systems at different places and Now I rate less prejudiced, younger audiophiles opinions slightly higher. I was bit puzzled when @sound_cycle came to listen to my setup with his son, but now I realize; it is the right thing to do. Also I keep changing the Speaker systems often in a periodic manner.

Whenever I read Online reviews of audio products, I mostly look for objective data, because Without Objective Data, it is just like One prisoner sharing his opinions about a New device that entered his Cell and How much it appeals to his/her Listening Experience. By the Way ,Hifi Portals are a platforms for Prisoners to exchange experiences online.

The point I was trying to make was a bit different.
However, w.r.t. your reply, here is what I have to add:

Even if we are prisoners of the prisoner concept that you mentioned above, our brain should tell that something is different, then it should be able to tell us if the difference is good or bad. If the new system that we are listening to is different (good) on the same side of the tone, consistently, only then should we think of pointing finger at our own system.

But in general, I agree to what you have said.

Regards,

Ravindra.

 

[sandyjhyderabad]

The difference is not just in component quality the difference is in the signature.
to have a signature one need to have taste in sound and know how to steer the signatures not everyone is gifted this way.
You are buying the sound signature.
If you take a painting Davinci uses the same oil paint and gully painter can also use the paint and make paintings. So now you understand why Davinci`s or Picasso`s paints are sold at such higher price. The same difference is applicable for audio. If you cant hear the difference get the entire chain top notch and see what difference you can hear. Its obviously not in percentages its in signature of sound that you get and thats what you are paying for.

 

[heliumflight]

I agree with you that with each signature, a brand is assciaated and with that a certain premium. Thus we have so many choices in audio unlike cars, alcohal, actor etc. Just think about it

 

[Naveenbnc]

Each to his own as I mentioned tuff...I've realised that a track makes me sing, dance and enjoy music. Not the system. I still enjoy my favourite tracks on my Harman kardon soundsticks which I have at my parents place. And I enjoy them to the same extent when my devialet + PMC floor standers play that same track at home. The 100 times increase in cost of my main 2 channel system over my parents system doesn't add anything to the enjoyment for me.

But of course there are other things we look for, imaging, clarity, sound stage etc...I have never found them contributing to musical enjoyment, except make me a critical listener and make me worry about my cables

excellent view point !!! I can relate myself to this very much

 

[ubitoo]

While many people claim better details with Hi-End systems, an often overlooked
aspect is critical listening. One is more likely to concentrate on the sound when
top-dollar is paid for it and thereby "picking up" more details than before.

If one does experience some "detail" on very high end system, they are very likely
to find similar detail on a more reasonable system. And it was always there! Just
that they were not sought out that critically.

---

PS: Again this is not a blanket observation but a scenario more frequent than many
in the hi-end space would want to believe.

 

[sandyjhyderabad]

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.

 

[ubitoo]

This is a very interesting subject when it comes to audio enthusiasts. Me too have gone through lots of periodicals, books, internet, searching for answers. Different people give different answers, some of which may raise our eyebrows. Finally I found out that this is purely subjective.
According to my findings, more than 70 percent of the audio enthusiast are happy with either entry level or mid segment audio kits. The reason may be the price factor of course. What is said in the beginning of this discussion is absolutely true. When we buy high end audio paying 10 or 20 times the price of entry level/mid level equipment, we expect an increase at least 20 to 30% in the sound quality which normally don't happen. In other words, for a little bit increase in the clarity, smoothness, definition or whatever, we pay a very very unfair price. But that is the situation. If we want high end, we have to pay. But there are problems. If you buy a high end speaker, to get it to perform well, you will definitely need a high end amplifier, a high end source, as a matter of fact, the cables too requires to be of higher level. This is going raise your budget to an unimaginable level. but do you get the results according to what you paid....it is one point you have to ponder.
Speaker amplifier is a very critical factor in audio. Recently, a friend of mine took a Kef Coda 7 and an Arcam Alpha 3 to a person house, who boasted of having high end equipment. I too accompanied him. This guy was having amazing equipment viz. Accuphase amplifier, Quad electrostatic speakers and an Ayon cd player, I don't remember the models of these. The sound of this set up was good, quite good I must say. But things just changed when we connected the Coda 7 to the small Arcam. Ofcourse I won't say a magic happened and the latter pair outperformed the Accuphase/Quad combination. But, there was only a very marginal difference, you won't believe. I just closed my eyes and listened to the Arcam and Kef, just erased the thought I was listening to Arcam, I felt like listening to a system priced around one lakh. Such was the matching between the two. You should have seen the Accuphase owner's face. It turned pale yellow. Here was a system my friend hardly paid 20k in the used market competing with a 5 lakh set up. So, high end audio need not necessarily perform to your liking if the pairing is not correct, and if you can get good pairing among low priced units, why bother about high end.

The anecdote you share preth30, is not very surprising. Especially, when the line of
thinking is higher price implies higher quality. The recording setup itself, these days,
is often cheaper than even a decent mid-range system.

At the end of the day a speaker is not going to output what is not in the recording in
the first place.

 

[ubitoo]

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.

Thanks for the post @sandyjhyderabad!

I am genuinely keen to hear about specific experience you may have
had if you managed to audition some of these hi-end systems. For example,
any specific song or instrument that felt different vis-a-vis, say, some other
system you've had experience with.

 

[arj]

Saying that highend is different because of different components is almost saying that a good cook makes a better food because of better ingredients !

Equating High end to price is also as much saying a 5Star hotel will have better food than a smaller boutique hotel.

High end sound ( not necessarily price) comes from several things viz
1. better components is basic but also better design.
2. Better designed Power supply and power supply kept different for different sections..has a cost impact.
3. Each good brand has several strengths in design due to R&D which they bring out
4. Vibration control/casing etc
5.Better voicing with a wider variety of connected equipment etc etc..

All of these can make a big difference until individual points of diminishing returns. Also diminishing returns are heavily depended on other equipment in a chain..eg the difference between a 3K amplifier and 5K amplifier may seem like nominal for one speaker but throw up a huge difference in tonal quality/separation/dynamics etc on another

To me the best equipment brings out lots of details, the dynamics for the lowest and highest peaks, the continuity of music, all the harmonics in instruments and voices seem true albeit to some vague reference in my mind !

 

[hifitoaster]

The anecdote you share preth30, is not very surprising. Especially, when the line of
thinking is higher price implies higher quality. The recording setup itself, these days,
is often cheaper than even a decent mid-range system.

At the end of the day a speaker is not going to output what is not in the recording in
the first place.

The assumption that we are only aiming for what is recorded on hi end is lame. Then all we need would be just studio monitors like a Geithain. Most hi end is more about more deep, wide, fast and so on than what the engineer heard. Studio gears are mostly used to avoid too much faults with a respectable amount of transparency they provide. On the other hand hi end is more of annexperinece larger than life which may not be exactly 1-1 as the monitored stuff.

It may not reveal what is not there in the recording, but what the engineer did not hear while he recorded sometime.

 

[amitk777]

I went from a sweet sounding budget setup of around 50K to around 1.5L.
Yes, I still like those songs which I liked earlier (Bollywood, Pop) . But post this system, I began to appreciate Jazz and Western classical as well.
Live recordings took on much more life and sound better than soundtracks and studio recordings.
I believe cheaper systems cannot do justice to certain genres. Specially Indian and Western classical.
Now a days I love to listen to music with actual instruments rather than electronica, because the system is closer to the actual sound and dynamics.

 

[smedhavi]

Each person responds differently to music (and also hears differently). Some people are impacted more by the sound quality, where as others care more about the content. I have observed that women mostly care a lot more about the content and much lesser about the delivery quality, both for audio as well video. This aspect decides where the point of balance lies for each one of us on the curve of diminishing returns. One should stop exactly where they stop caring about the improvements.

The problem starts when we go by what is supposed to be better, rather than what gives us more pleasure. What is considered higher end in the social circles, or by entities trying to sell us stuff, should never over power common sense or overrule personal satisfaction. I am not including the business, professional and commercial factors here. For a pure listener, the primary purpose of listening to music is pleasure, relaxation or bliss. I would always keep that clear to my-self. Life is too short to waste time on something that sounds bad to us, just because someone else thinks that supposed to be better.

Just my 2 cents

Regards,
Sharad Medhavi

 

[mandeep]

GUYS, DON'T FORGET:-

Acoustics (or the Type of room) play very important role in overall perceived sound quality.

No matter how high end is your equipment it will not sound the way you want, untill you provide a better acoustic environment.

DIY treatment is as good as professional treatment if you know your basics.

To me, Ignoring acoustics - - - - >> means one is not serious about one's passion.

 

[ubitoo]

GUYS, DON'T FORGET:-

Acoustics (or the Type of room) play very important role in overall perceived sound quality.

No matter how high end is your equipment it will not sound the way you want, untill you provide a better acoustic environment.

DIY treatment is as good as professional treatment if you know your basics.

To me, Ignoring acoustics - - - - >> means one is not serious about one's passion.

100 times this! Environment and equipment positioning is often the cheapest and best upgrade,
as far as impact is concerned, available to many who already have a decent stereo setup. But it is
often ignored.

 

[ubitoo]

The assumption that we are only aiming for what is recorded on hi end is lame. Then all we need would be just studio monitors like a Geithain. Most hi end is more about more deep, wide, fast and so on than what the engineer heard.

If the depth and width are not in the recording, then the setup is artificially adding them.
Some people may like them but often such "extensions" lead to muddling one way or the
other.

 

[humblebee]

The prices are worth it for many many reasons.
Diminishing returns starts from $25,000 according to my and my friends' opinions.

 

[Anurag]

I play the instrument, played with band, record and make music. I'm into hifi for about a decade, mostly entry level and mid level.. Among the higest level stuffs that i have heard, i like Dynaudio and Mcintosh systems..

But i can tell you hifi adds flavor, a simple good pro audio monitor can tell you what the artist intended to do..a hifi can give you all the details that you wouldn't even notice if you were in there doing the recording.. but to be true it is just not possible to reproduce the actual thing.. It's just like when you have gone to the most scenic of mountain valleys and you have captured the best pic with your best dslr, and then you see the output and feel it's not quite the same feeling like what i had seen there, and then you test your editing skills on photo editor, and try to make the pic as real as possible..
I think that's what the designers do, they tend to make their system sound the way they perceive music.. in a way that comes as flavored to somebody else or it doesn't even work well with other genre of music..

Im a kind of person who listens to music 24x7..i like to discover unknown underground bands, search for new artists and try to see what the musicians are trying to do and how good are the musicians. This kind of thing just can't be done with hifi..

Another way to put it, even kingfisher can give as much kick as another beer, even though technically the other beer be superior..

coming back to hifi.. It's not a straight line from entry level to high end, even within the same brand one may like a lower end model than the higher end or an older discontinued model than the newer version, cause a 100 % true reproduction of sound is just not happening at any level.. various designs and components chosen lower distortion in the signal at various level but never 100%, and results in the kind of sound signature..

And to be true it's difficult to quantify what makes us engage in music, it's not about just soundstage dept or width, or details or refinment..So it's not as easy as you choose a higher cost system and you are done for the future.. else hifi hobby can be a rabbit hole, a one way road that never ends..

 

[flat_listener]

This title would have been more apt:
What sonic improvements did you hear from high end Audio over entry level?

Oh god...
And who is defining entry level and high end audio??

My advice as someone jumping in: Don't be unhappy with what you have because someone else claims theirs is better, because that someone wants you to buy what they make. Remember, the economy, and especially the audiophile economy, runs on dissatisfaction.
For me, I don't want or need another hobby that keeps me in a constant state of dissatisfaction and envy especially when that dissatisfaction is based on largely subjective observations and personal preference.

Having said all that, I am happy with how my system sounds, I find it intoxicating, I enjoy listening more and find myself finding more time in order to do it.

Case closed... Over and out!

 

[prateekatasniya]

GUYS, DON'T FORGET:-

Acoustics (or the Type of room) play very important role in overall perceived sound quality.

No matter how high end is your equipment it will not sound the way you want, untill you provide a better acoustic environment.

DIY treatment is as good as professional treatment if you know your basics.

To me, Ignoring acoustics - - - - >> means one is not serious about one's passion.

Very well said..
But how to do diy correctly ?
Acoustics seems to be the most difficult part.. Every room needs different treatment.
Good consultants charge a bomb.