Are more expensive speakers better?

Garfish my friend. No or yes, I forget exactly how you put it. I was being (or attempting it seems!) to be ironic or sarcastic. Fear not, I thought the Vandersteen 5s were probably the best speakers I heard. My only complaint, up here in Canada, with the Loony sinking daily, they retail for $18,000$. I don't know what they actually would sell for, I don't think the dealer carrying them has ever sold a pair. Maybe I can get the demos down the road for half! No, the point I was trying to make was based on a nasty exchange I got into with someone on AA, an apartment dweller who is in the market for Utopias, who did not like my tone or the tone it seems of Vandy 5s. I think some audiophiles come from a socio-economic strata that cannot be seen by the naked eye from where I stand. Briefly put: no you don't have to spend anywhere near 50 k for all the sound you will ever need; speakers that I consider beyond my means, but that sell for a fraction of the price of the Wilsons and Utopias etc.(such as the names I quoted) offer outstanding sound and a lot of speakers even at half or a third of the ones I mentionned, should not leave any half sane person truly wanting. There is a large selection but, at least in my world, money is always a concern. We all can't be Enron execs with wheelbarrowfulls of allegedly for now ill-gotten gain. From a very middleclass lawyer in a soon to be Third World economy. PBB

Me again. Just read Sean's post. That is precisely what my intention was. I think that if you can't design, build and market a top speaker for less than $15.000 USD, you should get yourself into another business. Luxury yachts maybe? Listen to the damn equipment and stop looking at the label and price tag is what I mean. Geez, "I'm just a soul who's intentions are good, Lord, please, don't let me be misunderstood", with sincere apologies to The Animals, have a pleasant and musical weekend, one and all.

Dear Ddhpark,

I will build for you the ultimate speaker system. It will consist of six 7-foot tall towers. Two will contain 8 (each)12" Scanspeak carbon-fiber woofers. Two will contain 6 (each) Lowther "full range" drivers brilliantly solving the no-lows-no-highs problem of Lowthers by using them only for the midrange. Two will contain 16 (each) Revelator tweeters. Three inch thick MDF will be used for the cabinets, internal wiring and binding posts will be pure, oxygen-free osmium. Weight, delivered, will be 16,000 pounds. I will include a set of 24 6" tall spent Uranium spikes at no additional cost.

Amplification will be provided in a separate 6'x6'x3' module and will consist of 32 SETs wired in parallel.

My cost to build these,include hand-rubbed Rosewood veneers throughout will be $10,000.

My cost to purchase the SETs from Malaysia and rebadge them with my own marque will be $2500.

The cost to you will be 1.7 million dollars.

I will then write a lachrymose letter to TAS complaining about the death of the High End and appealing to (all genuflect) The HP for financial assistance.

Garfish: I love how you defend the Vandy Fives, even if you have some trouble spotting irony. I've had my Fives for three years and I'm more attached to them every day. As you have stated, carefully following the set-up instructions is critical. Beyond that, the Fives are so good that they seem to respond favorably to an endless stream of tweaks and upgrades elsewhere in the system

I believe that the Fives could very well be my last speaker. Richard has some exciting modular updates and upgrades coming up and I firmly believe that the Fives, properly set up and backed up by first class equipment and cables, may be about as good as it gets.

I once heard Richard talking about more expensive speakers and his take was that once you reach a certain price point, in order to make more expensive speakers you have to start adding multiple drives and doing other tricks that often are counter-productive.

Email me your phone number if you want to discuss what I have done to try and get the most out of my Fives. My system is truly magical and all of my efforts at achieving that magic have centered around getting the most out of the Fives.

Hi Pbb; and thanks for the well stated clarification of your original post. As noted above, I've calmed down, and with the help of some other A'gon members, I understand what your original post actually meant. So, my apologies for my own excess sensitivity (and crass remarks), which a couple of days ago was well over 100 dB (1 watt @ 1 meter)-- sort of like horn speakers. My nominal sensitivity is usually only about 87-88, like Vandersteens;>). Cheers. Craig.