I’ve been contemplating this lately as a person who hasn’t been in the hobby audio for that long. I’ve witnessed mine and many other’s perception of budget and high end changed. And found myself as someone younger ,less knowledge of the space, with less money think high end was $100 and now x amount of headphones later think that $100 range is very budget and entry level. I’ve also grown an acceptance if price to performance really does rapidly taper out but doesn’t really quench my want for more expensive gear in the future.
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It’s somewhat destroyed at least for me, although surprisingly I don’t see it bleeding over into other aspects of my life. Spending more than like 15-20 bucks on a meal is expensive and something I really have to try and justify, but dropping a few grand on audio gear is something I’ll do without even thinking about it. I think it might boil down to the idea that as you progress and hear what’s above and gain a further level of appreciation and experience/listening skill, it’s much easier to justify and be rewarded for spending the extra cash. Somewhat tying into the idea of “diminishing returns” and how that point generally will continually move up depending on experience and level of commitment to the hobby (personally don’t really think a true diminishing returns point exists, but there is a reasonable stopping point depending on the person).
Also doesn’t help that at least in the headphone and iem space over time new models continually push up in price and performance so the potential performance ceiling is higher, and I think this leads to the feeling that people need to start skipping past the entry level stuff and more jump into the midrange stuff because the top keeps getting farther away and because of that the rest of the brackets are pushed up as well (if that makes sense, 2ch has somewhat already stabilized in this regard)
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A couple years ago I would sort “Price: Ascending” and now I sort “Price: Descending.”
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Been absalutely fucked tbh. I’ve bought well enough that I’ve only list around 1k on gear this last year (including shipping and fees) which has made me start justifying higher and higher end shit tbh…
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As I’ve moved up the ladder, at least regarding source gear, I’ve been thinking of each meaningful jump as costing roughly double what I paid before.
My Bifrost 2 is roughly double the cost of my SMSL DAC, and my used Exogal was roughly double the cost of my Bifrost 2. So for example, if I wanted to move up from my Allnic (bought for $2K used), even if I don’t know what that amp would be (maybe a used Modwright HA300?), I can at least ask myself “am I in a place to spend $4K or more on a new amp?” to see if I should even /think/ about upgrading, since $4K+ is what I assume is needed to really move up the amp ladder again.
And if I’m honest, that answer might be “no” for quite some time, but that’s how I’ve been thinking about prices and whether or not I’m ready to continue moving up.
EDIT: Oh, and since this was touched on earlier in the thread, I will definitely pay money for a delicious meal at a great restaurant, but I also live in Los Angeles, where the supply of amazing places to eat seems to never run out. (Also, I don’t drink alcohol, so the cost of a fancy dinner for me is significantly less than for someone else who talks to the sommelier.)
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God i wish I just went double. I went straight from a micro BL to a P6 Pro and a 13r was only my second desktop amp…
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Interesting question. I think my perception of price ranges has changed less than my perception of value. By which I mean I see more value in more expensive purchases than I did at first. Each time I move up a couple of hundred Euros I have felt like I found enough of a difference that the cost has been worth it which I didn’t expect when I started. My last purchase - Focal Elegia for 750 - is, for me, the upper limit of what I am prepared to spend on any one thing and I feel like it is probably getting near my own point of diminishing returns. I don’t really see this as something universal. Value depends on personal circumstance and that determines the price one finds reasonable I think? For me 750 is the limit because of income. Is there better to be heard? Almost certainly. Do I think the price is worth it? For me I do not, but that doesn’t mean it is not for someone else.
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Nice distinction!
That describes me as well.
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This made me laugh from the guy that can justify $20,000 on a DAC. You really are a unique individual in the hobby @M0N and I’m glad you’ve applied some of that freakishness to the advice you give here to others and to myself!
I know you historically always encourage people to look at the higher dollar alternatives but I’ve found that more often than not, the higher dollar alternative is the way to go for the most satisfaction in the end, especially as your mature in the hobby.
I thought spending more than $1000 on a headphone was something only lunatic would do. Today I can fully justify the purchase of a $2,200 used headphone.
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The Audiophiliac had a video recently on “diminishing returns” and there was a lot of wisdom thrown around by two old Jews from NYC. Thoroughly enjoyed it, worth a watch.
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Having been a bit crazy about gear since my young days in car audio, the prices and justifications happened too long ago to remember lol. But, a Modi MB, 6XX and, Crack w/SB are a $900 system I could live with and be happy. I don’t because I can afford more but I could. And I still use the Modi MB and HD600 regularly.
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Well it’s the only way that’s going to happen in the first place lol, have to cut costs on everything else in order to make it happen
Honestly yeah to an extent, although still depends on the system and the person
Very good way of putting it
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I told myself I’d not spend $2k on a single component and that week I ended up purchasing a Pass Labs HPA-1.
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“500 on LCD-2C makes me want to vomit” was the same week as “guess I’ll get a hugo2go to tide me over, oh wait, I already paid and here is a p6p to buy too”
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It depends for me, but mostly yes.
I do agree about the statement about value and everyone has their own definition of value and for particular items.
For my purpose right now, I would not spend anything above entry-level for my desktop/headphone setup. On the other hand, I happily spent $700 used on a freaking USB cable for my 2ch and would easily do it again. It was valuable to me in that use case.
In addition, that has messed up my definition of value when looking at other items, even though it doesn’t translate the same. That $700 would have been a damn nice monitor or a PS5 or a plane ticket. With that being said, this sadly desensitized me to purchase a 6900xt without hesitating while I would have wrecked my brain about it for a good few days prior to high-end audio.
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Well said!
Maybe the thing that has surprised me the most has been the influence of “small things” at higher price ranges. For me, changing out cables on low-cost headphones (<$500) is mostly esthetics. But as I approach $1k headphones I’m genuinely surprised how obvious the audible changes are with cable swaps. (Probably not 100% correlated to headphone cost, but just my exposure to headhpones that are sensitive to cable are higher price.) My first eye opener was a cable swap on the Campfire Andromeda. The second was a cable swap on Audeze LCD2 and LCD2 Closed - both lost their magic on the 3rd party cables I tried. This took me from being a cable agnostic to a born-again cable believer 
Not surprising, but certainly expensive, has been what it takes to keep all of the gear in a source chain at roughly the same level. It’s easy to have the DAC be the limiting factor, or network streamer, or power supply, or … Again, as I’ve touched the $1k headphone market, everything around the headphones is going up in contribution to sound quality as well as price!
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This question made me sit back and see how much the price range I shop in has changed in the last year or two. I’ve been in this hobby for a while now, joined Head-Fi in 2005, but until last year, my most expensive headphone purchase was a $300 Modhouse Argon (Fostex T50 mod).
Now I’m sitting on $4000+ of ZMF headphones, $1500+ of headphone amps, a $700 Bifrost 2 and an $800 headphone cable that came with my Verite Closed. If my conservative math is correct, that’s $7000+ worth of headphone audio equipment. In early 2019, I had about $600 total. It’s a slippery slope folks.
I’m not saying I regret spending all this money. I enjoy all the gear I currently have. I have also made the discovery that when you only own highly popular and coveted audio gear, it is possible to break even or even make a small profit when selling stuff to gather funds for the next upgrade. I keep my eyes on the classifieds at all the regular spots and only buy when I get an excellent deal.
It’s almost like a long-term loaner program with a high-dollar deposit required. Luckily you can get your deposit back anytime. I could hypothetically have all $7000 back within a week or two if I listed all this stuff for sale. To be honest, I might end up with something like $7500 because I got such good deals on a lot of my stuff.
Using the strategy of buying quality used gear only when found at great prices, you can always have nice stuff and never suffer any of the downsides of depreciation.
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I did recently make a conscious decision to set the limit I have for myself. I can see the attraction and interest in spending more and more. New gear is fun! Interesting, sometimes beautiful and working out how and when to use it enjoyable. I did this by asking myself what I wanted to be the point of this for me to be and deciding it was “enjoyment of music”. By which I mean only that.
I decided to test this idea when I bought an Audio-GD R2R R11. Now I didn’t post this anywhere because I felt weirdly embarrassed by purposefully buying something that is less “glamorous”, less well thought of. It is very coloured sound, it lacks detail compared to my RNHP and it is far from being a clean sound but damn do I love it for certain genres of music combined with the right mood and headphone. For just sitting back to listen to some dirty funk or some hard metal or dance, for really getting into some nice grimy bass lines it is just amazingly fun!
It made me think a lot and made me start to change how I was thinking about value. It moved away from price and more into “does this thing do what I want it to do to music and is that worth the asking price”. If I had more money would I spend more on individual items? Absolutely! Would I have more fun? I highly doubt it! It would be purely for the joy of the equipment itself but not for experiencing musical enjoyment. I couldn’t enjoy music more than I do now, just in different ways.
I decided that I don’t have an interest in the idea of a “correct” or “original” sound. I think music is, like all art, a highly personal, changeable and ultimately indescribable experience. I don’t feel that it is ever the same twice because I am never the same person twice. I’ve changed since I last heard any piece of music so it will never be the same experience. This means that value can be much more divorced from price and becomes about more intangible things like “joy”, emotional engagement, soundscape and mood.
I have no idea if this makes sense to anyone else! It’s still very much an evolving idea for me.
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While I’m not in the deep end of this hobby yet, my perception has always been tightly coupled with my disposable income.
50-200$ is mostly impulse buys after checking some reviews to make sure it’s not a complete failure of a device. Does it work? Does it have what I need? great → checkout
200$ was a big deal some years ago, now it’s not.
Once it goes beyond “pocket change” and into the realm of saving up for a purchase, it gets very complicated for me. If I’m looking to spend 2000$, should I just get something for 3000$ that is better and I will use it for longer?
Questions like “how is it going to be to live with this device” are common, and I become very critical with things like glued pads or waiting 3 months for delivery and just dismiss stuff for things that seem petty, but I take it very seriously as the budget increases.
Audeze is a perfect example for this, I’ve always wanted a pair, even saw them at crazy good prices, but then I remember: I will use these all the time, they’re heavy, the pads are glued, I won’t find any pads locally so I need to order from the US or China, customs&duties, etc…
But then I’m not the person that likes to have 10 things with different styles, I buy a good jacket and wear it until it breaks. And I apply this to hifi also.
It probably helps that I don’t really care about the hardware per se, I care about getting the best value to be able to listen to music enjoyably.
Funny enough, an impulse buy has proven to be my solution for this with IEMs. I am done caring about IEMs, I know there are better out there, but I won’t spend 1000$ or more on them knowing how I treat IEMs and what I expect from them. Good enough is perfect.
If they ever break, I’m back into the rabbit hole and who knows what the budget will be then.
Now I’m looking to upgrade the stereo setup and it’s ranged between just buying the refresh of what I already have, because it falls in the “pocket change” area, or a complete upgrade.
The complete upgrade is crazy money, even for me now thinking about it, but anything less and I won’t be satisfied sound-wise and 1 year later I’m going to be doing it again.
So the perception has changed, but only because my life has also changed to allow for it.
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I just had a realization… a lot of what’s in this thread could also be in the mental health thread. It’s all really one big jumbled topic in the end. The hobby has a way to tango with our mental gymnastics when it comes to rationalization of purchases.
In the end as long as we all find the road most comfortable to us, there’s no wrong or right.
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