Floor Loudspeaker Reviews

Do you work for Magico? ....... or, are you gonna buy Magico M2? :-) .......

NHT C4 are worth a review by Stereophile :-) ......

Glad to see NHT is still around, and apparently still held by the same folks - and they still do acoustic suspension speakers! Thanks for putting a smile on my face.

I've also still got a pair of BA T1030 towers that I bought in ca. 1990 but they overpower my current living situation (need room to breathe). I think it was TJN who said in his review in Audio Magazine (RIP Audio), "90% of the performance of the B&W 801 Matrix II at 20% of the price."

Set up in an appropriate room (big) the T1030 has the best bass I've ever heard from a speaker - including my old studio rig (2x Genelec 1031A + 1x Velodyne 12" servo sub - still have the Genelecs but need to send them in for a full refurb).

Some of that 'low frequency transparency' JA1 describes, could be due to speaker isolation from floor vibrations and reflections ......... Isolation devices like Townshend and IsoAcoustics, could help achieve that :-) .........

Information for general interest ........ Townshend audio has a video posted on their website demonstrating the effects of floor vibrations and other types of vibrations :-) ........

You're not wrong, and yet it's not something I spend a lot of time thinking or worrying about. It's true that some companies that make expensive stuff don't like it when we point out that even the diminishing returns are shrinking, as they are in some areas. But from a consumer perspective, I don't think it matters much. If a Stereophile reader is in the market for a $50,000 pair of loudspeakers, they're unlikely to buy a $5000 pair, no matter how well they perform. (I'm sure there are exceptions; indeed, I'm aware of what I'll call the wealthy entry level, where buyers can afford a lot but scope out how much they need to pay to get sound they can be satisfied with. They may pay $5K instead of $50K.) Even more, those shopping at $5k are unlikely to end up paying $50K, although that too may occasionally happen (same thing but in reverse).

Diminishing returns are a very real thing--but diminishing doesn't mean non-existent. We tend to be satisfied with a certain level (of quality, not price, although the two are related)--we don't even notice flaws, but then we hear something even better! We all have a price range we're comfortable with, whether it's dictated by income or a sense of proportion (what portion of my wealth is it appropriate to have tied up in audio equipment?) and a sense of value. A small subset of us consider anything above our level--whatever it is to that individual--to be unethical somehow and consider the magazines complicit for continuing to review it. But Stereophile is not their magazine only. My personal preference is for equipment that is aspirational but approachable for people with relatively ordinary incomes if they prioritize good sound--let's say the $8-12K components. But I don't let that dictate Stereophile's scope, because I know we have readers who expect to pay less and other readers who expect to pay more. So I try to cover a wide price range, from the Schiits and the Magnepan XLS through ultra stuff that, for most of our readers, is of interest mainly for gawking (and often, complaining, and that's OK, too).

Jim Austin, Editor
Stereophile

Small Batch, Limited Distribution, Exclusivity with high profit margins for Sales Network.

I know this scheme, we Automotives have been doing Limited Editions for Decades.

I'm not going to continue on any of this.

Thank you for writing back.

Tony in Michigan

John, that’s a nice article and I don’t recall having read it before. I’ve thought quite a bit about this in the past and really can’t unpack it all here. Much can be said about the economics and consumer behavior around luxury items and businesses that are highly relavent to this conversation. Your article touched in something that rarely, if ever, is discussed: these companies don’t typically have high revenues or profits. Notwithstanding some of the changes that have comes from Asian business flows lately many of the companies appear to price at inefficient points on a Laffer-like curve. I woudn’t ever expect a company in the space to try and make up in volume, and I say this without proof, but it certainly seems that things aren’t priced at the highest point on the curve. If this is true it would suggest a couple of things. First, maximizing profit is not the primary objective. Second, there’s something distinctly non-monetary in the psychology of the marketplace.

As JA2 points out, someone with a budget of $50k isn’t going to buy something for $5k when they have more to burn. I’ve seen this work out well on the manufacturing side. A fellow I know was selling a piece of audio equipment for $85k. He was losing sales to people that wanted to spend more. So he arbitrarily increased his price to $125k and his southeast Asian orders 10x’d and he’s busy for a decade. For makers that aren’t that lucky it seems they want to maintain price points that are far from optimal, but that may be sustainable. I see this in high end instrument building when a maker gets a well known name playing their instrument. They double their prices and extend their waiting lists rather than trying to produce more instruments to meet the demand. In some cases they produce fewer instruments at higher price points to give them something money can’t buy.

... the overall price range of audio equipment suggested that the vast majority of manufacturers were operating using the markup-driven pricing model while only a few outliers may have been using contribution-driven pricing.

Now, the situation appears to be just the opposite, with the market dominated by those using contribution-driven pricing and the markup-driven makers few and far between.

When was the last time Stereophile reviewed an integrated amp (or CD player) from a manufacturer such as Yamaha, Denon or Onkyo - whose prices give the impression of still being mainly markup-driven?

Equalizers, tone control devices and similar adjustments built into the speakers, could be useful for the internet billionaires ........ A lot of those ultra-rich individuals are young people, who may not have much hearing loss ....... They can easily afford ultra hi-end stuff ....... all kinds of ultra hi-end stuff :-) .......

Best wishes to you and yours too!

Cheers

... compare value may well depend upon whether you consider yourself to be more of an audiophile, forever on the prowl for the next "better" sounding component, or more of a music aficionado, who just wants a good sounding system through which to listen to their favorite recordings and which doesn't require a second mortgage to afford.

Look at the review of the Wharfdale Linton speakers. JA1 says that they offer "excellent measured performance". HR says that they "merge a refined, elegantly detailed, full-range sound with a magnetic personality that made me want to play records—made me want to listen longer, and to understand more of what I was listening to." A pair of Lintons, with stands, cost about $1500. Are they a good value? Are these Magico speakers, at 50 times the price, a good value? Will you enjoy your music that much more by owning them?