Quote:
| About the extension, yes, I made one, much better than this one, for the half of the price, so why we have to pay 30.00 for a regular cable and two mediocre jacks and plugs.....When Canare starquad sounds better and Neutrik jacks and plugs are better, and in half and hour you have a better extension for less..... |
all cool , and yes most of us here can build a project that if not a straight out clear winner can compete with a lot of what is offered comercially-why DIY is cool
But we pick each others brains,let the 'group' try various methods of getting to a destination and if something is not quite up to expectations it is nothing.We start again and bounce the results off the others going along for the ride
But this process is something that ONLY DIY is capable of when your livelyhodd,whether you pay the bills or lay people off is concerned
R$D is an on going process but while you "tinker" a bread and butter product must be keeping the doors open
I am not saying Grado is hurting , just that priorities differ when a hobby is compared to what pays (or not in some cases) the bills
Some exeptional products have gone away not because they were poorly executed but simply because for one reason or another that product failed to find a large enough market share to allow the person with the original design to keep the doors open
the family has to eat and bills need to be paid or bad things happen
The way a thing looks DOES impact on how it sounds
It is a mental trick that i can not fully explain and it is real
The good looking product will win every time and companies KNOW this !
They would be foolish not to and foolish not to take advantage of that weakness
No matter how good something sounds it will not sell if it is butt ugly !
But take that same product and wrap it in some serious chassis work ,throw on some tiffany jacks and a stepped attenuator and then bang the price up by a multiple of three and the hi end magazines will go wild !
as will most audiophiles
Now gut it and place a mediocre design inside the same wrapper and what happens ?
People will FIND A REASON to like it !
No way something that looks so good and uses such high quality parts can be bad sounding !
Just not possible.
so the product WILL sell and there will be some who will swear that this is the best sounding piece of gear they have heard to date and it will all be bullsh*t !
Happens all the time man
beleive me when i tell ya
So what to do ?
LISTEN !
Really listen and not just for ten minutes but for a time that allows you to KNOW a product
It always craks me up when someone purchases a new (fill in the blank) and immediately proceeds to modify it.
then they will tell everyone willing to listen how the device in question was 'transformed' into something that sounds sooo good that they had tears in thier eyes
HOW THE HELL WOULD THEY KNOW !!!!!!!!!!!!
by not living with the product and gewtting to know its personality how could someone say it "sonds" better ?
Because someone else "said" it does with these particular upgrades ?
Bullsh*t again
not all changes are a step forward
there are well trained engineers that get piad a whole lot of loot to design these products and get them to market . and the product MUST be reliuable !
if you want to go out of business fast then all you need do is market a product with a high return rate
see you later,don't let the door hit you in the........
You,me,all of us can choose to spend as much as we please to make an amp but what if you had to sell it as a means to survive ?
Hoew much is your time worth hourly ?
Do you have a shop or are you doing this on the kitchen table ?
And say you do the best you can with the best parts and design available
The end product will cost a small fortune !
Unless you are also going to do direct marketing , pack it yourself,do your own shipping and try to avoid paying state and federal taxes .
Even THEN the product cost will have to be high or you will need to keep the day job
why ?
Well first you will not sell enough high end gear to survive
How many $1K headphone amps do you think you could sell in a year ?
A bunch maybe but enough to be your entire salary for that year ?
Building for personal use has no real consequences other than "OK.I built it and and does not work.Now what?"
We can change out a part for something daily and it means nothing
A manufacturer does that and he is stuck with a crapload of useless parts taking up space and a bill for the newly ordered parts !
You can not have an efficient assembly process if every day you change the design
the workers would probably string you up or flat out quit !
So bottom line
I see no reason for anyone that wants to copy a product for personal use (and only that) not to do so . I myself have done it many times , including copying things directly from a patent.
But where i DO have issues is with those that never have commited themselves to producing a commercial product of any kind and with it the risk it involves-both financial and personal-in an honest attempt to create a product of some value to the end user simply because the jacks don't cost enough loot or the volume control is not this months flavor
or even worse-I just don't like the way it looks
The old don't judge a book by its cover is a wise saying (for example i look kinda meek
) as is "buyer beware"
you can dress a pig in a nice dress but in the end it is still a pig
Rick
EDIT : deal with the spelling and keying errors (or don't,your choice
).It is too damn late and i am in no mood to fix them at this time
Rick out
