[Richter Di]

What I imagine is now standing between us and shipping notices going out are the following. Some items can take place concurrent with other items. The sequence of events is also not necessarily as outlined.

1)the, by now, standard degree of company disorganization. I had to state that up front.
2)ordering of shipping boxes(assuming that all of the Kickstarter units have been assembled)
3)flashing now Dolby-approved firmware on all of the units
4)adding CanJam, etc., PRIRs to the appropriate subset of units
5)emailing Kickstarter buyers to confirm shipping information
6)final confirmation of receipt of shipping information from Kickstarter buyers
7)arrival of boxes for shipping
8)packing boxes
9)shipping and emailing tracking information

I guess you are right. And to be honest especially the shipping boxes need to be top notch. My hifi dealer send an amplifier tube amp via DHL. It got broken. DHL refused to pay for the repair, as although it was the original packaging - the packing wouldn`t protect a 2 meter fall.

 

[Maestroso]

As if it were so unforeseeable that they would need boxes for shipping ...

My guess is this whole waiting game is related to due Dolby licensing fees. But let's see ...

 

[phoenixdogfan]

As if it were so unforeseeable that they would need boxes for shipping ...

My guess is this whole waiting game is related to due Dolby licensing fees. But let's see ...

And really we're talking about 1000-2000 boxes tops for a 10 lb component. That's a pallet or two of boxes, and at l.t $5 each probably $10k tops .No reason why they should not already have had them and the other packaging materials in stock, and a packaging department up and running--especially if they're planning on making this company a "going concern."

 

[Sanctuary]

And really we're talking about 1000-2000 boxes tops for a 10 lb component. That's a pallet or two of boxes, and at l.t $5 each probably $10k tops .No reason why they should not already have had them and the other packaging materials in stock, and a packaging department up and running--especially if they're planning on making this company a "going concern."

The communication with Smyth Research has been atrocious, but did you realize, or simply forget that from the time the A8 was announced (with it's various setbacks) until its initial launch that it took five years? I mean, a lot of the things they keep saying they are intending to do, or the expected shipping dates have often been a load of bunk, but they actually still have another three years before their behavior could be considered abnormal by their own standards. We know the units are built, we know certification was finished, we know some of the outstanding bugs that they were trying to pin down were squashed, and yes, it does seem rather stupid to have everything ready to go except the boxes that you knew you were going to need, but remember this time they are also shipping two variations, not just one shape for all, so the packing materials likely will need to be more specialized than they previously were and they also likely don't want to spend money on more materials than they actually need in the end.

Also, you previously mentioned the A8 sold for $3K. It sold for just over $3600 when it came with the Stax units, and even after the HDMI version was released, and knocking off a few hundred by getting it without the headphones, it was roughly the same cost. The current price of the A16 is not extreme in comparison, and given inflation isn't unreasonable. It's too much for me to order a second one for now though, and I didn't expect the price to jump so high up from the preorder cost, but I ended up buying a good secondhand A8 for $1,400 as a backup unit. And I'm not sure if you've had the opportunity to actually hear either the A8 or A16 with even an adequate PRIR, but if not, all the hype you hear about it isn't just justified, it's actually understated.

I guess you are right. And to be honest especially the shipping boxes need to be top notch. My hifi dealer send an amplifier tube amp via DHL. It got broken. DHL refused to pay for the repair, as although it was the original packaging - the packing wouldn`t protect a 2 meter fall.

My used A8 came in the original box, and flew four thousand miles. The original had some pretty good protection, especially with the A8 itself. It was basically suspended with gaps all around it to the edge of the cardboard box. I don't know exactly how high it could be dropped from before the impact would be enough to shake a component loose, but I imagine over six feet.

 

[phoenixdogfan]

The communication with Smyth Research has been atrocious, but did you realize, or simply forget that from the time the A8 was announced (with it's various setbacks) until its initial launch that it took five years? I mean, a lot of the things they keep saying they are intending to do, or the expected shipping dates have often been a load of bunk, but they actually still have another three years before their behavior could be considered abnormal by their own standards. We know the units are built, we know certification was finished, we know some of the outstanding bugs that they were trying to pin down were squashed, and yes, it does seem rather stupid to have everything ready to go except the boxes that you knew you were going to need, but remember this time they are also shipping two variations, not just one shape for all, so the packing materials likely will need to be more specialized than they previously were and they also likely don't want to spend money on more materials than they actually need in the end.

Also, you previously mentioned the A8 sold for $3K. It sold for just over $3600 when it came with the Stax units, and even after the HDMI version was released, and knocking off a few hundred by getting it without the headphones, it was roughly the same cost. The current price of the A16 is not extreme in comparison, and given inflation isn't unreasonable. It's too much for me to order a second one for now though, and I didn't expect the price to jump so high up from the preorder cost, but I ended up buying a good secondhand A8 for $1,400 as a backup unit. And I'm not sure if you've had the opportunity to actually hear either the A8 or A16 with even an adequate PRIR, but if not, all the hype you hear about it isn't just justified, it's actually understated.



My used A8 came in the original box, and flew four thousand miles. The original had some pretty good protection, especially with the A8 itself. It was basically suspended with gaps all around it to the edge of the cardboard box. I don't know exactly how high it could be dropped from before the impact would be enough to shake a component loose, but I imagine over six feet.

One of the major, in fact THE MAJOR disappointment on the A16 is the price increase. If you look at it objectively almost everything except the jump to 16 channels (and truthfully I'm not that much more excited about it vs 7.1) is just an incremental improvement (like better headtracking) over the A8. The big thing I was impressed by was the price. It showed me this technology was following the model of most IT type technologies where the successor models have BOTH performance improvements and price reductions. That's why you can get an I7 laptop today for less than $1k when the original IBM PC sold for more than $3k in 1984. But these guys aren't delivering that benefit even though we are seeing those performance improvement/price reductions in everything audio from Edge of the Art speaker systems to DACS to Amps to DSP Room and Speaker correction--very nearly everything except apparently a 15 year old emulation technology made possible by microprocessors (which have obviously had rapidly falling prices since they first started making Realisers.) Really? All I can say is What, man.

 

[Sordel]

One of the major, in fact THE MAJOR disappointment on the A16 is the price increase. If you look at it objectively almost everything except the jump to 16 channels (and truthfully I'm not that much more excited about it vs 7.1) is just an incremental improvement (like better headtracking) over the A8. The big thing I was impressed by was the price. It showed me this technology was following the model of most IT type technologies where the successor models have BOTH performance improvements and price reductions. That's why you can get an I7 laptop today for less than $1k when the original IBM PC sold for more than $3k in 1984. But these guys aren't delivering that benefit even though we are seeing those performance improvement/price reductions in everything audio from Edge of the Art speaker systems to DACS to Amps to DSP Room and Speaker correction--very nearly everything except apparently a 15 year old emulation technology made possible by microprocessors (which have obviously had rapidly falling prices since they first started making Realisers.) Really? All I can say is What, man.

I'm not sure that this is fair. The reason that tech gets cheaper is not just that the parts become cheaper: it's that the uptake (and hence the production runs) is larger and more predictable. The A8, although it was very much liked by its owners, never reached the point of wider manufacturing viability. So Smyth had to launch that A16 at a price that reflected the fact that - if ever - it would not be a scalable product for a considerable period of time. Now certainly there is a price at which you could more or less guarantee a wider uptake but you would need a colossal, videogame-console-type investment to achieve that and Smyth clearly don't have that sort of money. Instead, they are ordering components in comparatively small numbers and paying a premium for that which is, unavoidably, passed on to customers. I think that's reasonable.

 

[phoenixdogfan]

I'm not sure that this is fair. The reason that tech gets cheaper is not just that the parts become cheaper: it's that the uptake (and hence the production runs) is larger and more predictable. The A8, although it was very much liked by its owners, never reached the point of wider manufacturing viability. So Smyth had to launch that A16 at a price that reflected the fact that - if ever - it would not be a scalable product for a considerable period of time. Now certainly there is a price at which you could more or less guarantee a wider uptake but you would need a colossal, videogame-console-type investment to achieve that and Smyth clearly don't have that sort of money. Instead, they are ordering components in comparatively small numbers and paying a premium for that which is, unavoidably, passed on to customers. I think that's reasonable.

So the answer to release yet another product even more expensive priced for the carriage trade/professional recordist market?

Look, there were any number of things that could have been done to bring the price of this thing down, anyone who understands marketing and manufacturing knows that. Ultimately this price is the compounded result of poor product design and marketing decisions and, I think, the Smyths have done themselves no favors here--to say nothing of an unserved market which could be vast if offered the right product marketed in the right way.

 

[phoenixdogfan]

The communication with Smyth Research has been atrocious, but did you realize, or simply forget that from the time the A8 was announced (with it's various setbacks) until its initial launch that it took five years? I mean, a lot of the things they keep saying they are intending to do, or the expected shipping dates have often been a load of bunk, but they actually still have another three years before their behavior could be considered abnormal by their own standards. We know the units are built, we know certification was finished, we know some of the outstanding bugs that they were trying to pin down were squashed, and yes, it does seem rather stupid to have everything ready to go except the boxes that you knew you were going to need, but remember this time they are also shipping two variations, not just one shape for all, so the packing materials likely will need to be more specialized than they previously were and they also likely don't want to spend money on more materials than they actually need in the end.

Also, you previously mentioned the A8 sold for $3K. It sold for just over $3600 when it came with the Stax units, and even after the HDMI version was released, and knocking off a few hundred by getting it without the headphones, it was roughly the same cost. The current price of the A16 is not extreme in comparison, and given inflation isn't unreasonable. It's too much for me to order a second one for now though, and I didn't expect the price to jump so high up from the preorder cost, but I ended up buying a good secondhand A8 for $1,400 as a backup unit. And I'm not sure if you've had the opportunity to actually hear either the A8 or A16 with even an adequate PRIR, but if not, all the hype you hear about it isn't just justified, it's actually understated.



My used A8 came in the original box, and flew four thousand miles. The original had some pretty good protection, especially with the A8 itself. It was basically suspended with gaps all around it to the edge of the cardboard box. I don't know exactly how high it could be dropped from before the impact would be enough to shake a component loose, but I imagine over six feet.

"but remember this time they are also shipping two variations, not just one shape for all, so the packing materials likely will need to be more specialized than they previously were and they also likely don't want to spend money on more materials than they actually need in the end."

You are kidding, right?

 

[Sanctuary]

"but remember this time they are also shipping two variations, not just one shape for all, so the packing materials likely will need to be more specialized than they previously were and they also likely don't want to spend money on more materials than they actually need in the end."

You are kidding, right?

No, and I don't understand why it's so hard for you to wrap your head around it. They might already have boxes, they just don't have enough boxes for all of the units yet and they might have simply been waiting until it was closer to shipping before deciding how much they needed to invest in the packaging. Usually you get a discount when ordering bulk, but there's no point in ordering enough for 10,000 units if only 3,000 are actually needed due to having lower than expected preorders. It's not just a damn cardboard box and nothing else. I don't know why you seem to think that they are a standard, mass production business and that they should be able to handle these kinds of things like every other mass consumer company.

On another note, I wonder if the price increase is related in any way to Heavenly Sound, and if not for needing their resources to even get these out the door if the price wouldn't have been a bit lower since the announced increase was essentially released as the same time the merger happened.

 

[Fox1977]

One of the major, in fact THE MAJOR disappointment on the A16 is the price increase

I'd rather look at the bright side and feel lucky and privileged that i managed to order my A16 at a small fraction of that price...
Smyth Research clearly underestimated the retail price. Maybe they hoped they'd manage to reach a $2,000 retail price, maybe they wanted to reach it, until they realized (no pun intended !) it was way unrealistic (here neither !)...
As great engineers as they are, they are very bad at predictions, since they estimated the release date originally would be in May, 2017 !!
It costs much more now... well, that's sad for those who didn't order it on time, but it remains a niche product, we are talking about a product that will have a first batch of less than 1,000 units for the whole world, so that's not very compatible with economy of scale...
Even if they managed to make it cheaper, even for $2,000, they would sell more of course but i'm not sure that they would still sell enough to make it profitable. They are not philanthropists and still need to make some money out of it.
In the forthcoming years, they may produce a cheaper variant stripped with some features, or license their algorithm and then it can reach mass market... we'll see...

 

[SergioPOE]

There are headphones that cost €6000 that arguably sound the same as €1000 headphones, and yet there are people complaining about the €4000 price for a truly unique product that will revolutionize home theater for many of us, and that most of us purchased for €2000 or even less.

 

[Maestroso]

I mean ... SERIOUSLY ... Brexit is gonna happen in October at the latest!

GUYS HURRY THE screw UP!

 

[travis-bickle]

The price increase was a big let down for me too. Dont get me wrong. This thing is worth the money. But as an a8-user combined with the estimated retail price the saving was not big enough to have to fund it. Especially when considering shipping costs, taxes etc.
That changed of course when they announce the price increase. So lets hope you can get the new tracker as an upgrade for a8-users or the battery exchange isn't as fragile as i picture it.

 

[Fox1977]

Even though i am not chocked by the new price because it's a niche market high-tech device, i would never spend that much for the A16. I backed it up on KS and it cost me all in all 1,150€ when the estimated price was then around 2,000€ (and now it reached 4,290€ !), so i did not hesitate and seize the opportunity, especially since when i found out about the KS campaign, there was only 4 units left at this price...

 

[Dixter]

just wanted to toss this out here.... where exactly did anyone get the idea that the Smyths are awaiting boxes.... and how did that subject get so ingrained here ... crazy....
also wanted to mention that the Realiser (A8/A16) is a professional piece of equipment that might end up being cheap at its price point if it was used for production of music/movies in that industry ...