Press Release-HeadRoom "official" announcement of the Audiophile Desktop

[kodreaming]

If you are charging such premium price, I would highly recommend you get some good marketing ppl do the marketing for you.

The picture in the press release is like from last century.

[jude]

Originally Posted by kodreaming

If you are charging such premium price, I would highly recommend you get some good marketing ppl do the marketing for you.

The picture in the press release is like from last century.

I'm the one who added that photo to their post.

[elbuzzard]

Originally Posted by MASantos

I don't know of your audio or electronics experience but coming here with just a few posts and starting to talk trash about a company's products doesn't look good...

:

i dont know his experience either but i have to agree with him. that stuff if way overpriced. if you can hear the difference between those stands and a stack of old encyclopedias then your ears are golden. you should rip them off and barter yourself the best equipment you can buy. i am a customer of headroom and i think they are a good company. that said, are those harbreaths 10X better than my PSB alpha B1's? doubt it. is that class D amp better than a sonic impact T amp? probably... but not 50X better.
are those stands better than a stack of encyclopedias? only in the prestige department. am i cheap? yes. my music collection is worth more than all the audio equipment i own.

[tyrion]

I don't think people by the Harbeths for 10x the price of your Alpha because they believe they are 10x better. People pay the bigger bucks because it gets them closer to what they think is the best sound for them on some incremental basis but and that doesn't mean a direct connection between dollar paid and percent of improvement in sound quality.

No question the stands are expensive. Are they worth the money, that's an individual choice and many times depends on whether you are in a position to afford them. I would rather not have my speakers on a pile of encyclopedia. I had them on worse for a while but it was always with the idea of getting something better when I could.

[warpdriver]

We've been through this debate before about the stands. I was actually ready to buy those stands, because they are EXACTLY what I needed and looked for a long LONG time, but then I found out the price.

Re: Chesebert

Sure the Harbeths sound their best when situated on something like a sand-filled Target HR28 but the Headroom stands allow good placement for a desktop system with a small footprint. Where I listen to my computer music, there is no place for freestanding speakers anywhere, so the Headroom stands would be the next best thing if I was set on setting up a good desktop system.


I don't disagree that these are premium priced products, and Headroom makes no claims that it isn't.

Tyll in the other thread very adamantly suggested that a good budget compromise for the speaker stands would be these:



These would produce a similar sonic benefit but would cost barely more than a case of premium beer.

[elbuzzard]

Britanicas sound awesome! very intricate and detailed.

[wuwhere]

Originally Posted by MASantos

Vacuum tubes? where do you see a vacuum tube in the audiophile desktop?

So you're saying that is better to pay 1000 for a crap pcb and parts with great looks than for high quality pcb and parts with a great enclosure? I don't get your point.

This has been discussed 100000000000000 times before here, Headroom products don't have such a great Price/performance ratio as say DIY. Headroom is a business. I personally don't buy their products because I prefer to DIY, but if I didn't they would be on the top of my choices. And using 0.1 resistors, and good opamps and parts overall IS good for audio.

I don't know of your audio or electronics experience but coming here with just a few posts and starting to talk trash about a company's products doesn't look good...

oh, and what does the accuracy of a resistor have to do with it's level of resistance(whatever that is...)...

I don't know what your level of audio/electronics experiences are as well. I've been in audio for 20 years. And I've even bought equipment from HeadRoom. But those prices are just outrageous. And if I offended anyone here by my very direct comment, my apologies, that was not my intent. But I still stand by my comment that for a piece of audio equipment to get notice, it must be priced high.

[nnotis]

Has anyone had a chance to play around with any of these new amps? I wonder how well they'd perform with other near field monitors, as well as the K1000s?

[Tyll Hertsens]

1) I'm not happy with the price either, but at the $499 they are the lowest margin item we build. There's a lot of fairly expensive materials in there.

B) By the time you cable up a system with decent cables, you'll have more in cable then the stands. I'd say that's reasonable appropriate.

iii) If the concept takes off and we can build stands in larger quantities we'll be able to eek down the price.

IV) Too much? Don't buy it. Get wall cubes ... or a stack of books. At this point the product (the whole system) is really targeted at folks with serious cash. Over time, it'll be more affordable.

[Planar_head]

Did anyone try these with some Totems?

[thedauntlessone]

LTTP but I would also like to know why the stands cost 500 dollar. No matter how high quality I don't see it costing 200+ dollars to make each stand.

For comparison, paintball markers use aircraft grade aluminum to make the body complete with annodization, solenoid and electronics wiring and a mid range marker cost about 400-600 dollars.

The reason why I use paintball marker as a comparison is because the body uses high quality metal that needs to be cut to exact specification. Another reason is because while paintball is quite popular nowadays, markers aren't exactly mass produced on a large scale. Moreover, big manufacturers produce them in the US of A... not Asia.

As a consumer, that stand is worth maybe 50-100 dollars at most. Just an honest opinion.

[grawk]

The headroom stands are made in america, and tyll's said that the stands are his lowest margin product. These are very heavy duty steel, and very nicely done. Other manufacturers I've talked to have said they don't think they could get the stands made to be able to sell them for what headroom does. If you ever get a chance to talk to Mr. Hertsens about the desktop system, you'll see this is a labor of love for him.

[uraflit]

i heard the setup at the international meet las year... it was quite an amazing experience! it was what sealed my decision on sticking with desktop and computer audio.

expensive? u wont see me buying it... but if i had the cash i sure would.

[BIG POPPA]

Man , I'm looking at the stands just to put AudioEngine A5's on them. Cool Stuff!

[grawk]

The monoblocks and the stands are both high on my "must get" list.