[mrkangpae]

rofl virometal.

 

[Tyll Hertsens]

I've been given permission to post high res pix of the new Micro DAC and Micro Amp this weekend. It will be in the Coda/Overture thread. And I will be able to talk about those two products a bit there.

 

[bln]

Quote:

Originally Posted by CD44hi I know your post is well intentioned. Yet I beg to strongly differ. To run a company with staff that get a salary, insurance etc... then on top of that include the costs of mainstream advertisement, R&D work (which unlike DIY work does not hit the market...in other words prototypes are not sold or open to the public as DIY amps would be here...) profit needs to match all those needs and provide for the whole operation. One cannot compare DIY work with company business. At $300 a piece, I think they are reasonable priced.... Just my 2 cents...

That's a fair point, but he never said the prices were unreasonable. He said they were uncompetitive. That doesn't take into account how the price is arrived at, just how it sounds in comparison to similarly priced products.

 

[rab10]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bln That's a fair point, but he never said the prices were unreasonable. He said they were uncompetitive. That doesn't take into account how the price is arrived at, just how it sounds in comparison to similarly priced products.

Excellent Point! I also side with MD1032. I think the OVERTURE
at significantly < $300 would have been a great value for itself individualistically.

I would like to see what Headroom has to offer as a singular DAC component
unit, not as a combo.

my $0.02 Thanks!

 

[brianknewbie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by erikzen I think the new Mini DAC and Amp you refer to are indeed similar to the Coda/Overture. However, reading between the lines of some of Tyll's recent posts, I think the new products might actually be better. I think the limited edition stack was a sort of test marketing exersize. It also gave them a chance to improve upon the design. I was lucky enough to get my hands on an Overture. Believe me, this thing is going to be well worth $300.

In the sponsored thread, I specifically asked Tyll about this and he said the new amp/DAC would outperform the Coda/Overture and be similarly priced

 

[devwild]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bln That's a fair point, but he never said the prices were unreasonable. He said they were uncompetitive. That doesn't take into account how the price is arrived at, just how it sounds in comparison to similarly priced products.

Quote:

Originally Posted by rab10 Excellent Point! I also side with MD1032. I think the OVERTURE at significantly < $300 would have been a great value for itself individualistically.

I'm curious, what products are out there that compete with the Overture/Micro DAC at a lower price point? I can understand criticising the amp price, because there will always be outstanding resold diy components out there (sans the support of a long established company). But when it comes to DACs, I have yet to see anything that would compete at under $300 for a high quality, usb and spdif, portable DAC. Xin may have something in another 6 months, but he's only in the concept stage at the moment as far as I can tell, so who knows...

I'm not being a jerk, I'm genuinely curious... I'm in the market for such a component and I like to know all my options. I even asked about it once upon a blue moon on this board and the answers were all well above $300.

Also, the Micro DAC is available independently; the Overture/Coda was a one-time deal, stop assuming that it dictates the future products.

 

[spike33]

$300 for overture/micro dac is VERY reasonable... actually quite a bargain if it's as good as people say.

 

[erikzen]

Quote:

Originally Posted by devwild I'm curious, what products are out there that compete with the Overture/Micro DAC at a lower price point?

As far as I know, there is nothing out there that competes with the soon to be released Micro DAC. There were some DIY-type products from AOS but those are no longer for sale. Now if we could only get more portable sources with optical out that are worthy of the Micro DAC!

 

[brianknewbie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by erikzen Now if we could only get more portable sources with optical out that are worthy of the Micro DAC!

EXACTLY. I don't want to buy an antiquated IRiver 1xx just to get optical out but it seems like nothing else out there has optical out

 

[uncle b]

Quote:

Originally Posted by brianknewbie EXACTLY. I don't want to buy an antiquated IRiver 1xx just to get optical out but it seems like nothing else out there has optical out

Easy on the "antiquated" part. I'm running both an SR-71 and a SuperMacro v 3.0 through my "antiquated" iRiver iHP-120, and I don't feel the need at all, at least right now, to get a new DAP...For once in my digital music/head-fi.org life, I'm feelin' pretty damn content.

 

[brianknewbie]

No offense intended

.... my point is that there are a lot of DAPs that have come out since then which are probably smaller?

I would prefer to have a newer one AND optical out, and not have to choose one or the other -- that was my main point, not trying to bash the Iriver

 

[uncle b]

Quote:

Originally Posted by brianknewbie No offense intended .... my point is that there are a lot of DAPs that have come out since then which are probably smaller? I would prefer to have a newer one AND optical out, and not have to choose one or the other -- that was my main point, not trying to bash the Iriver

I know, I didn't mean to sound snipe-y (you know what I mean). We are all amongst friends here.

 

[CD44hi]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bln That's a fair point, but he never said the prices were unreasonable. He said they were uncompetitive. That doesn't take into account how the price is arrived at, just how it sounds in comparison to similarly priced products.

You are using reverse logics (towards a syllogistic conclusion...) on my post. I never wrote (or implied) that MD1032 was deeming the products unreasonably priced. My statement was "I think this products are reasonably priced." And I arrived to that statement after writing the facts I thought will support my conclusion. I just simply disagreed with his post. I was not trying to judge anyone's ideas. Quite different.

I think there is a fundamental difference in approach to both trends. Thinking on competiviness with different markets in mind. Remember, head-fi is part of the market, but for headroom, I would estimate that it is a very, very small part of their total sales. Thus in terms of being competitive, one has to ask the question, with whom or what products? Instead of asking whether one has to be competitive with the value that a small part of the market thinks is a competitive price... I would approximate that companies would do some marketing research in order to arrive to a final price. Usually such work has several iterations in which variable have to be adjusted. For instance, what is the competition's domain or/and what is the buying power of the target market.

We have other portable amps that are around that price or a bit higher, don't we? Also, what other portable DACs with ac/dc capabilities are there that we could use for a fair comparison?

Again, in my opinion, it boils down to assure a profit margin that allows to run a company, future development R&D. Competition is a great driving force, I aggree. But one would be mislead if one was to compare "DIY pricing" to "Consumer Market pricing" economics. For this particular product, the DAC, I think that $300 is a fair price for all the features that have been hinted it is capable of doing.

CD.

 

[bln]

He said "the products aren't competitively priced," and you said, "I strongly differ." What does that imply?

Anyway, "comparing 'DIY pricing' to 'Consumer Market pricing'" is exactly what the people who read these boards do. They may not make up a large percentage of Headroom's sales, but the larger this community grows, the more companies like Headroom will have to compete with small one-person operations.

 

[CD44hi]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bln He said "the products aren't competitively priced," and you said, "I strongly differ." What does that imply?

This implies that I disagree, plain and simple. Your post made it sound as I was judging MD1032. I am not. I have other concept about marketing that differs, that is all.


Quote:

Originally Posted by bln Anyway, "comparing 'DIY pricing' to 'Consumer Market pricing'" is exactly what the people who read these boards do. They may not make up a large percentage of Headroom's sales, but the larger this community grows, the more companies like Headroom will have to compete with small one-person operations.

I guess I must not be communicating myself very clearly. I understand your point, I understand MD1032's point. I just disagree. Plain and simple. Marketing involves much more than monitoring boards and adjusting to what people think your price should be.