Who do you trust?

It's not a question of trust or the sense of honesty. It's a BIG BUSINESS.
I never bought anything base on their review, only base on manufactory specification.
You are the only one that you have to convince and trust. If it sounds better to you then that's all that matters.

I take it all with several grains of salt, more even as the price tags go up.

Me, das who!

I heard recently that to get a review published in one of the top mags costs upwards of $10k

For that price they had better say nice things :-)

So how can you trust that?

Ask here first - you'll get opinions fro users :-)

Regards

"I trust also catalogues from major pro-audio dealers such as zzounds, sweetwater, musiciansfriend and fullcompas." He DOESN'T trust reviewers that offer their experienced opinions, based on the fact that magazines have advertisers. BUT- he DOES trust the PURVEYORS of equipment, that ONLY print the HYPE that the manufacturers publish. INTERESTING!