Loudspeaker value?

Question

At what price would you consider to be the peak value point? In other words, when does just a little more money buy you some significantly better speakers before it gets to the point where you have to spend a lot more money to get just a little bit better speakers?

How about with electronics?

What about cabling?

Is there a value peak for a television as well? What do you think?

Answer 1

For those who have read and answered many questions under home electronics, we know that XenonAudio is very well informed about prices and equipment available. This is an opinion question for the community to see where people see a diminishing return in consumer electronics.

So to answer the question:

I have wondered this myself many times and with many other industries. Multiples of 10 seems to usually work, oddly enough.

For home audio speakers and my opinion/experience
$10 speakers suck but you can find them.
$100 seems to improve over $10, maybe twice as good, but still not great.
$1000 improves over $100, maybe significantly better than 100 but only a little over $800.
$10000 it really takes a huge leap in dollar value to see a small improvement. Now they are better and I can tell the difference but are they twice as good, usually not.

What is this? A log 10 curve, I think it could be plotted.

Personally with speakers I see the greatest drop in return at around $2k to $3k a pair. After this point it takes a huge chunk of change for me to hear a minimal difference. Though if I was in the financial situation to afford more expensive speakers I would pay a greater amount for lesser return because it's that last little step that can make all the difference.

Funny the same rule applies to bicycles, fishing poles, Pool sticks, and maybe even TV’s, the point of vastly diminishing return.


I have a rule of thumb I use when purchasing home audio equipment. Half on speakers and half on everything else. I figure about 10% of equipment budget (5% of total) on Cabling.

So for a $4000 budget:
$2000 on speakers
$200 on cables
$1800 on everything else (amp, preamp, CD,etc...)

What is your impression and where do you see the peak value point? [e-mail]

Answer 2

Difficult question.

Let's look at some of the considerations.

Price for anything where competition is strong (i.e. home electronics) is largely determined by the cost of producing the item. This is largely determined by the cost of labour involved and the cost of the components.

Manufacturers can cut labour cost by manufacturing in places with low labour cost. They can also cut costs by using lower quality components and/or leaving features off.

Since much of what costs extra and you pay extra for may or may not be part of what you woulod consider to be an improvement the consumer can get good performance for less money if they avoid features they don't need.

Of course ggod design plays a large part. Two manufacturers may produce equipment with quite different performance for the same price. Your job as a smart consumer is to determine ... before you buy ... which is the better choice. This usually requires extensive reading of reviews and consumer reports on specific equipment. Many internet sites exist and a simple, effective search technique is to use key words (without the brackets) of the form "{item type or model number} {review}".

Note however that this does not work with new models since they will not have been reviewed yet! If you buy In this case, you are on the "bleeding edge" and WILL waste money. While new features are usually "better" you will save LOTS of money buying slightly older models without sacrificing much (if any) real performance. This is particulalry true in areas of relatively stable technology such as speakers. Here you can often get really good 10 year old speakers for less money than so-so new ones.

I'm not going to offer numbers since there are two many variables. But, the following guidelines have worked for me:
- research before you buy
- never buy new if older models from a name manufacturer and with good consiumer reviews will provide the performance you want.
- If you buy new try to find discontinued, well rated, models (but don't fall for sale items just because they are low priced .. there could be a good reason!)
- wherever possible audition equipment and see if more expensive models are "better" (i.e. can YOU can tell there is a significant improvement over another model?)... then decide if the improvement is worth the extra dollars.
- make your own mind up ... too many take someone else's opinion, or buy on brand name, or pay for quality that makes no practical difference.

In round numbers I would suggest that at least for electronics on a 10 -100 price scale (where 10 is the cheapest available in a class, and 100 is rarified "audiophile" equipment) most people are best looking at the 15-25 point range ... not the cheapest, but far from the most expensive. But remember the second last point above .. if you can tell the difference, and the price differential is acceptable to you, buy the more expensive model.

One final point ... balance. Each piece of the chain (e.g. DVD player, wiring, amplifier, speakers) in a system has performance limits. As with the old line about the "weakest link" there is no point in crippling the system with a markedly inferior component, but neither is there any advantage to using a markedly superior component. The only exception is if you are planning to upgrade overall, in which case each new component should be at least as good as the intended target for the sytem as whole.

OK... long answer ... but I hope it is more helpful than a simple list of numbers.

Good luck.

Answer 3

peak value......all in opinion, right? well here's my 2 cents.

3 grand for floor speakers.
1600 for receiver
cables.......hard to say, there are lots of kinds of cables, each different than the other.
2 grand for television.

Answer 4

The bottom line is you get what you pay for. If you look at buying the whole package in one shot at the cheapest buck, don't expect it to last and give amazing performance. But, if you like what you see and hear, you have made the right chioce.

Answer 5

$2000 for mains
$1000 for surround
$700 for center
$1500 for sub
$1500 for pre-amp/processor
$3000 for 5 channel amp
$4000 for rear-projection tv