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RE: If you do not plan

Posted by RGA on February 13, 2017 at 08:38:27:
Don't mistake the brand with the model. Driver makers make a LOT of tweeters - it doesn't mean they are ALL expensive tweeters. You can buy a tweeter from a big name tweeter maker for $15 or $400+ - they both may say Scanspeak but the two are not created equal.

A long time dealer I know noted that you can pretty much take any product from any maker and divide the cost by 10. In other words if the product retails for $1500 it has $150 worth of actual parts in total. Pull apart the Wharfedale and it might have a total of $40. Add in the previously mentioned expenses on top of the importer and dealer cuts and Wharfedale may not be doing all that great - Since back in the day when I owned Wharfedale (when it was actually Wharfedale) they have been bought and sold at least twice/three times.

Also, don't forget that the price a driver may retail for at a Parts Express or direct from Manufacturer isn't the same price a Bigger outfit like Wharfedale pays when they order 500 tweeters. Wharfedale may build in China - another company may not want that image so they pay more to have them made in Europe.

Lastly I try and take these external issues out. Take the two and listen to the two and decide what is better for yourself. I would say a good 3/4 of everything that get rave recommendations by the industry to me is rather poor when I factor in factors that are important to my listening sessions. Although I agree with you in principal that the MORE money you pay the more expectations you should have. But also remember that while a $500 product may get you 80% the anal audiophile hobby is largely about people who are striving for 100%. And it may be a doubling to achieve the next 5% and a quadrupling to get the next 5%.

I just came back from several hours listening to two identically designed pre-amplifiers. The only difference was the parts quality inside the amp - the topology is identical.

I felt there was a rather substantial sonic improvement in the pricier model. But it's not like the lower model was a slouch - it did everything you'd hope and did it better than most but the upgraded model was just simply more "breath of life" into the presentation. But you're going from basically a $9k preamp to a $22k preamp. Sure they can tell me about silver transformers but it's kind of hard to see $22k in parts and they clearly make more money on the $22k preamp. So logic dictates that if you buy the latter they make more margin - then again because of the price they will sell less so they have to cover that somehow. OTOH the sound says it's a lot better and no one holds a gun to your head to buy it.

So is the pricier speaker better than the Wharfedale to you? Then only you can determine if the price is worth that difference - some people are willing to pay 10 times the price for a relatively nominal improvement.