H
HiFiFan
Guest
Afternoon All
As a relative newbie to the world of AV, coming from the land of 2 channel and with many years experience of it behind me, I'm finding the woods a bit confusing re AV, and am seeking some answers to many nagging thoughts, both general and specific.
To start off, and hopefully promote some meaningful, and worthwhile discussion/debate, (but hopefully not a flame-fest) I'd like to be the devils advocate and offer the contention/proposition that in general, High-End AV Processors are not worth the asking price re what they bring to the OVERALL movie enjoyment/satisfaction rating, compared to lesser 'mainstream' components.
As multi-channel surround sound continues it's march into territory once dominated by Hi-End 2 channel markets/manufacturers, those manufacturers seem to have scrambled to bring products to market, to enable them to share a piece of a burgeoning and lucrative AV pie. And who could blame them, after all, business is business.
But with few exceptions, most do not appear to design their own software re surround sound processing, rather they just buy in OEM boards/chips from off the shelf makers, and marry it to their own circuits re the analogue outputs, power supply and implementation etc, dress it up in a tasty box, and sell it on at thrice and four times the cost, of 'lowlier' designs from 'mainstream' manufactures, using the same OEM decoding boards and chip-sets etc.
Not that many years back, the Japanese HiFi manufacturers were accused of taking other peoples designs, copying and marketing them at undercutting prices.
Nowadays, the Japanese HiFi manufacturers seem to be the ones that are truly innovating and at the cutting edge of technology; the smaller specialist manufacturer copies, tweaks and makes small improvements, and sells it on at a much higher cost, buoyed by the marketing machine of prestige, status, brand image, assumed extra benefit/quality through cost (it costs more, therefore it must be better) and well, smoke and mirrors at times IMHO.
This approach seems to work very well in countries like the UK, which still appears IMHO to have a very entrenched class structure socially, but seemingly less well in societies that appear to have a much more pragmatic outlook re consumer goods in general, such as the US for example.
In particular, having heard one or two high-end processors, I found their sound strengths to be typically that which apply and are important to 2 channel, i.e. resolution, dynamics, clarity etc, BUT and importantly for the movie watching experience, nothing extra re soundfield size, steering, localization etc, and most especially, in the context of viewing a movie, with a large screen, VERY LITTLE improvement at most to the overall (sound AND picture) involvement and satisfaction of a movie watching experience.
So, ladies & gentleman, are Hi-End processors worth it? Just WHAT do they bring to the OVERALL movie watching experience that makes them 'better', if at all, over their mainstream competitors? Anything? - or is it just smoke, mirrors, and a good dose of old fashioned snake oil?
Let the debate begin.
Cheers
John....
As a relative newbie to the world of AV, coming from the land of 2 channel and with many years experience of it behind me, I'm finding the woods a bit confusing re AV, and am seeking some answers to many nagging thoughts, both general and specific.
To start off, and hopefully promote some meaningful, and worthwhile discussion/debate, (but hopefully not a flame-fest) I'd like to be the devils advocate and offer the contention/proposition that in general, High-End AV Processors are not worth the asking price re what they bring to the OVERALL movie enjoyment/satisfaction rating, compared to lesser 'mainstream' components.
As multi-channel surround sound continues it's march into territory once dominated by Hi-End 2 channel markets/manufacturers, those manufacturers seem to have scrambled to bring products to market, to enable them to share a piece of a burgeoning and lucrative AV pie. And who could blame them, after all, business is business.
But with few exceptions, most do not appear to design their own software re surround sound processing, rather they just buy in OEM boards/chips from off the shelf makers, and marry it to their own circuits re the analogue outputs, power supply and implementation etc, dress it up in a tasty box, and sell it on at thrice and four times the cost, of 'lowlier' designs from 'mainstream' manufactures, using the same OEM decoding boards and chip-sets etc.
Not that many years back, the Japanese HiFi manufacturers were accused of taking other peoples designs, copying and marketing them at undercutting prices.
Nowadays, the Japanese HiFi manufacturers seem to be the ones that are truly innovating and at the cutting edge of technology; the smaller specialist manufacturer copies, tweaks and makes small improvements, and sells it on at a much higher cost, buoyed by the marketing machine of prestige, status, brand image, assumed extra benefit/quality through cost (it costs more, therefore it must be better) and well, smoke and mirrors at times IMHO.
This approach seems to work very well in countries like the UK, which still appears IMHO to have a very entrenched class structure socially, but seemingly less well in societies that appear to have a much more pragmatic outlook re consumer goods in general, such as the US for example.
In particular, having heard one or two high-end processors, I found their sound strengths to be typically that which apply and are important to 2 channel, i.e. resolution, dynamics, clarity etc, BUT and importantly for the movie watching experience, nothing extra re soundfield size, steering, localization etc, and most especially, in the context of viewing a movie, with a large screen, VERY LITTLE improvement at most to the overall (sound AND picture) involvement and satisfaction of a movie watching experience.
So, ladies & gentleman, are Hi-End processors worth it? Just WHAT do they bring to the OVERALL movie watching experience that makes them 'better', if at all, over their mainstream competitors? Anything? - or is it just smoke, mirrors, and a good dose of old fashioned snake oil?
Let the debate begin.
Cheers
John....