What makes up an

In the spirit of this question I much enjoyed TAS September issue, in which HP interviews Lyric HiFi's 85 year old owner Mike Kay on the evolution of hi-end retailing since the golden age of the 60s. Kay is a grand curmudgeon who deplores what customers have become. He is dissolutioned by the trend toward buyers of statement systems who plunk down $50K-$200K a pop and care not a whit about music or how a system performs. He mourns the general disengagement of retailers and manufacturers from live music and traditional venues like Carnegie Hall. He is of course elegaic on the subject of industry pioneers like Mark Levinson and Saul Marantz and Harvey Samson. He grudgingly admits that the erosion of HT may have run its course & that a minor renaissance of interest in 2CH audio represents hope for the future.

He makes me think about my own emerging interest in the hobby as an adolescent, and how difficult it is today to find a system that satisfies like the Altec 604 & Sansui receiver of youth. I wish I still had that set-up for reference.

it's a good thing that i have a thick skin, so i can absorb all of the brick bats thrown at me and come back.

let me make my position perfectly clear as applies to this and other threads.

i am a an iconoclast because i disagree with what i see as dogmatism disguised as knowledge. there is very little knowledge in audio in the strict definition of the word.
there are a lot of opinions that masquerade as knowledge.

it is my hypothesis that many feel insecure if they don't buy into the conventional wisdom espoused by audio professionals. i don't . thus, i frequently disagree with many of the premises asserted here and in other threads.

i will continue to object when i see hype and opinion masquerading as knowledge and/or dogmatic thinking.

i think the above statements pretty much explain my "behavior" on this and other threads.

Thanks MrT, you position has become perfectly clear.

Hi Dgarretson,
Thanks, that was interesting, I didn't know MK was still alive. I used to know Lyric in the old days. Mike Kay, as I recall, was an impressive personality, outspoken, tough and shrewed in business but always helpful if he felt that you were sincere...and he was a true music lover.

Hi Newbee,
Your analysis was again right on the dot. You live and learn.

Dr Floyd Toole during his NRC days found three things were important to listeners (they performed rigorous tests). Wide Dispersion, flat frequency response and low distortion. I'd propose that this is a basic requirement but there is a lot of cheap stuff that does this well at low volumes. (For example...even Audioengine A5's sound pretty good!)

So perhaps "high-end" is mostly distinguished by the fact that a "high end" system will do these three things well at realistic live music SPL levels. Just two cents...

I always thought of it as hi-resolution. Problem is when hi resolution gets in the way of the music. Then is it still hi-end?
Also a matter of opinion and comparisons. What were hi-end speakers in the 60's would be mid-fi at best today.