HiFi Subjectivist ¦ Audio Forum ¦ NVA User Group

Its the docs favourite topic so i thought i'd offer an example :D

I note the Linn have recently copied Pink Triangle and introduced a DC motor and speed controller for the LP12 . It costs £2800. . still mounted on the top plate, I wonnder how long before it goes on the subchassis?

Now from what Linn say in thier publicity material, it is evident that this motor is from Maxon . I recently contacted Maxon and asked for the best dc motor they sold for turntables explaining it was to be mounted on the subchasis so needed to be vibration free etc etc and quality not price was the priority . They gave me a model number and the price quoted was £109 plus vat . I cannot say for sure the linn motor is the same, but its shares the same description [ precious metals , 13 piece construction , brushless ] Now clearly Linn may specify characterists , but Maxon offer this for all bulk customers and the price drops considerably for bulk order .

So that must be one shit hot state of art dc motor controller to jutify the price

It doesn't justify the price, it only justifies the company and its dealers greed, and the stupidity of the sheep.

At this rate of mark up a pair of NVA TDS power amps would retail at £50k. Though Linn are not the only one Audio Note are just as bad.
AND as for Coconut Audio, well

i am pretty sure that coconut audio is a joke site. the trouble is that irony doesn't travel particularly well over the internet.

spacejay wrote:i am pretty sure that coconut audio is a joke site. the trouble is that irony doesn't travel particularly well over the internet.

I can assure it is serious, just contact them, they will take your money no problem.

I don't see how the price of the Radikal can be justified in terms of the component and material cost.



It doesn't look like there's a lot inside the power supply box.


I don't see how they can justify the price of the Keel either at £2500 for a single CNC machined piece of alloy.


And when it comes to justifying them on the basis of the sound quality, how many Radikal and Keel buyers have compared an LP12 with those items to a Pioneer Exclusive P3a or EMT 950?


There's also the Naim NAP500. Their £15k flaghship amp doesn't even double its power output from 8 to 4 ohms. And not forgetting the £745 Naim Flatcap:


And there was the infamous $6000 Goldmund / Pioneer CD player...


There's a lot of breathtakingly expensive hi-fi components about.

Daniel Quinn wrote:Its the docs favourite topic so i thought i'd offer an example :D

I note the Linn have recently copied Pink Triangle and introduced a DC motor and speed controller for the LP12 . It costs £2800. . still mounted on the top plate, I wonnder how long before it goes on the subchassis?

Now from what Linn say in thier publicity material, it is evident that this motor is from Maxon . I recently contacted Maxon and asked for the best dc motor they sold for turntables explaining it was to be mounted on the subchasis so needed to be vibration free etc etc and quality not price was the priority . They gave me a model number and the price quoted was £109 plus vat . I cannot say for sure the linn motor is the same, but its shares the same description [ precious metals , 13 piece construction , brushless ] Now clearly Linn may specify characterists , but Maxon offer this for all bulk customers and the price drops considerably for bulk order .

So that must be one shit hot state of art dc motor controller to jutify the price

Thats just stupid, as a business we are not cheap, as I believe we offer a lot more than most but we are well within the realms of fair/real pricing. The above is ridiculous, ok we don't know for sure but I'm convinced enough to not question any further

No the price can not be justified.......They are just one of many rip off merchants in the hifi industry.
But wait, what if some mug with more money than brains buys this shit......Then yes the price can be justified.
jammy395

The whole record player market has gone bonkers.
IMO it is down to fashion and the fact that it seems the dearer an item is the better the punters think it must be.
Most recent turntables are styling excercises with pseudo scientific babble for justification.
The prices are truly ludicrous for most of them.
OTOH some things are expensive to make. Power supply and casing items can be horrendous. Someone of my aquaintance wanted to sell an up-market preamp for which he had designed a sexy machined out of solid case. He asked me to get a quote for making the box. The cost price for an assembled empty enclosure was nearly £6000 in the quantities he was wanting. It was designed by somebody who had no idea about machining and was a rubbish production engineer but still...
I am a fan of Goldmund amps, they have always been dear though they have also jumped on the silly price bandwagon and their prices have rocketed. The amps were basically all the same with the size of the power supply, complexity of their mechanical grounding enclosure, and number of output devices increasing as they go up the range. A look at the ones I have (Mimesis 29.4s) would lead me to believe that 90% of the extra price over the base model is power supply and enclosure but they sound -much- better.
BTW I think Goldmund, Townshend and Ayre were all rumbled using a bought in board (Oppo and Pioneer) for their Blu-Ray combo players to avoid paying millions in licensing fees not justified by the production volume. AFAIK they all did high end analogue electronics/power supply/enclosure which explains the extra price, though it is obviously a personal opinion if it is worth it.
When I worked for Garrard in the 1970s the most expensive single component to produce for each product was the printed manual (Except the 401 platter which had the strobe markings gear cut on it..)

Just been reading about the Hart Audio Gold speakers on the AOS thread and thought it would be good to mention it here. £3,000,000

Can the speakers be justified as a hedge against inflation?

Guy

Doing some rough and ready calculations: the bronze version weighs 50kgs per channel. If the drive units weigh 10kgs that leaves 40 kgs for the cabinet. If the gold version uses the same moulds as the bronze version then they will weigh about twice as much due to 18ct gold being about twice the density of bronze. This gives us 80kgs of 18ct gold which we can sell for about £25,000 per kg. Which makes them worth about £2 million. If the gold price were to go up by 50% we'd be onto a winner.

These speakers would be just the thing for any mentally deranged megalomaniacs who happened to have a nuclear device and a Korean butler with a bowler hat.