A thought occurred to me this morning as I was reading the shit list last night, that there are whole branches of brands that don’t have a large following here despite other whole branches of brands that are less mainstream having devout followings. Is that just the nature of forums in general or are we a more off the beaten path lot? You could say that we have quite a bit of universally agreed upon gear but it got me thinking.
I don’t have an opportunity to visit a lot of high end shops and so my listening experience is on stuff that I bought, listened to and kept or move on from. The rest of my experience comes from reading, listening to certain reviewers that I know have described certain gear I’ve owned and I cross reference that information.
So here’s the question, general overarching comments on gear sometimes is accurate other times it’s not but it does need to be taken into account when a lot of people report the same thing about a brand or house sound etc. What do you think drives that in a forum collective coalescing around some brands and not other, and in a more extreme situation vehemently against a brand?
A few quick thoughts (and I’ll give it some more time later):
barrier to entry in the sense that if one owns gear from brand X and wants to discuss it but no one here has it then one is likely to search for a different place to spend time at. Over time that leads to people with not only shared interest but shared gear
After spending enough time here you get exposed to the things people like here and there’s a higher chance you’ll want to try some of it - either through buying it from people here or simply curiosity to try the common praised stuff
Since this community is harder to find and most don’t just randomly get here when they start the hobby it’s more likely that you got here after some time in the hobby and exposure to the larger sites and you maybe passed the noise hype and agenda that some on those sites push constantly
Grouping based on dissatisfaction from brands and gear is also common so maybe people end up here because they don’t like something and find that common with others lol
I’m just answering my own question and I know it’s a bit shallow but some gear, if I can’t get past the aesthetics, I won’t consider it. The poorest excuse to completely cut out a brand but it’s real.
“Help Wanted! Small HiFi forum looking to grow and avoid group think. If you have experience with Naim, Benchmark, PS Audio, B&W, and/or other unique audio brands, please apply here. Assholes need not apply.”
And then take 6 months before ultimately rejecting every applicant regardless of their experience and ability to fit in because we were going with an internal hire the entire time but had to post the req for legal purposes?
Oh, sorry. Thought I was applying for more jobs for a moment.
I actually have had experiences with many of those brands.
Naim - I auditioned a Naim Supernait3 at my local store. Overall pretty solid integrated but didn’t pair as well with my dynaudios as the Moon 340x that I compared it with. Naim seems to be fairly neutral, possibly leaning a little lean but with the right pairing, I can see it doing pretty well. The pricing is what gets me though. I think for the same price, you might not get something with the same brand recognition but you’ll get something that can sound better.
Benchmark - I’ve owned the LA4 preamp and the AHB2 at separate times. AHB2 was used to power Susvara, other headphones, and my speakers. It is a dynamic amp but might have issues with harder to drive loads. For nearfield, it’s pretty great. Powering headphones was super easy and it’s quiet enough to use with even sensitive dynamics. There’s not much character to it except being a little dry and a bit boring depending on your chain. Overall a decent pickup if you can get one ~$2k. Quiet, small, low heat, and dynamic is how I would summarize it.
I used the LA4 with my recent setup and it’s a great little preamp. Small, easy to use, and you can adjust the gain per input which is super useful when comparing different sources. A little more dynamic than a passive and you can turn it up without any treble fatigue. Overall I’d say a pretty good value at $2k as well. I’m not sure if I would put the LA4 and AHB2 together but I can see why people enjoy that stack. I’d probably want to warm up the chain just a little though.
PS Audio - I’ve tried their DACs but none of their other stuff. I used to have a Digital Link 3 Cullen modded lvl 3 and it was a great DAC at the time. Better than any of the ESS stuff that was hitting the market around 2010. They were using a burr brown chip and I’d still take a used one ~$500 over a bifrost any day.
I recently had the Directstream MK1 and traded it in for the MK2. I’m really big on vocals and the MK1/MK2 probably has the nicest vocals I’ve heard from any DAC so far. Wide soundstage and good separation and imaging. Overall, I really enjoy it and don’t have the motivation to look for anything else. I know a lot of people didn’t like the initial MK1 but I think the latest firmware/MK2 has changed it enough that it might be worth giving a second look. I don’t find it soft or overly smooth like what I’ve heard/read from others.
B&W - probably the least experience with this brand compared to the other two but I’ve heard some at stores and bought a 706 or one of those back home once but it was defective so I returned it. A bit bright for my tastes so I never really revisited the brand seriously.
We’re still predominantly a headphone forum, and that focuses on specific brands.
Some older Naim amplifiers are legendary, it was my aspiration in 2Ch when I first got into it. And the OG Naim Nait used to be one of the better entry level integrateds, but it’s moved upmarket quite a bit since then.
It’s a brand I haven’t listened to in earnest since I left the UK though, you can put Rotel and several others in that same bucket.
But there are a lot of British/Euro brands that just didn’t get a lot of play in the States in their heyday. The 2Ch market wasn’t particularly global 30 years ago.
People talk about what they’ve heard, and it’s self reinforcing, (see head-fi) what we talk about people try and then they talk about it. I remember when I bought an Amber 3, and no one else had one, now Lampizator is heavily referenced here, I’m not taking credit for that just pointing out that without someone advocating for a brand you’ll never have conversation or interest around it.
As I’ve pointed out previously this works to sometime promote brands perhaps more than they should be Holo for example, without what started as a few vocal proponents on head-fi, it wouldn’t have the following it does.
Benchmark has been mentioned here, but never really gained any traction.
I think there’s a lot of common sense with this statement. I also think that we’re not fanatical about stuff though and even the things we love we’re pretty good about speaking of their cons. It’s when you can’t mention or even insinuate flaws in equipment that things start to unravel. Everything is a mixed bag to some degree.
What @orrman mentioned also makes sense, we’re hasbeens from other forums, lol. And so the conversations and discussions that started when SA sprang up were already colored and up to speed and at a more experienced level from the get go.
I was looking at them first when looking for a streamer, their unity stuff looks and seems to be great. But none of them are just sources, theyre all paired with a dac and amp. Ok so what about rheir more main line? Their entry level their is $3-4k, and once again not many features and it all is integrated with their dac. Next step up is ~$7k. This line also looked a bit aged, which is fine, but that can keep it from being more relevant.
They seem to be focused on more traditional and integrated builds, and they just didn’t have something that fit my bill.
Think it really all just boils down to the nature of forums and groups in general, most all of them have some group of products that are praised and consistently talked about, a wide range that’s either ignored or just not actively brought up often, and a group that’s shit on. Either happens by one or a few active members trying something and either loving it or hating it, either causing more people to pick it up or more people to not consider it. We’ve got stuff on here that’s really well liked here but seldom discussed elsewhere and things that are widely liked here and elsewhere, same goes for the dislike side of things. The general nature of this forum is a bit weird one, not often do you come across a forum that’s (mostly) headphone focused but in the high to ultra high end semi exclusively, so in comparison to other forums most don’t discuss high end dacs and sources and things of the sort in the context of headphones, mostly 2ch which limits the amount of people interested in participating by alot. That’s one example of how things are colored here in terms of perspective. It’s also (largely) a group with core members that has pretty much already gone through or is nearing the end of their audio journey and are less likely to try unknowns or things not will liked because they probably already know their preferences and next steps.
A lot of the early prominent forum members from here came from hfg and already had preset views on things that were semi similar enough, so stuff that was cemented there got carried over here. As much as we’d like to have a wider range of views on things here, we’re inherently limited (partially by design) by the nature of the forum, from the more specific focus on high end headphones, to the semi closed aspect of the site, and it’s more (comparatively) mature user base, we probably aren’t going to get the level of variety and wide band coverage that other larger, less tight knit, public forums.
Just because something isn’t discussed doesn’t mean it’s bad or not worthwhile or something, typically just either means it isn’t on people’s radar or isn’t something that people have experience with to discuss. Would personally like to see some more variety but how to go about that is a whole different discussion getting into the main topic of finding members who would be willing to participate and discuss that sort of thing lol. I think this community is pretty good when it comes to handling things they dislike (sometimes) in that they’ll either respectfully disagree and move on or just not bother the people who are enjoying it and focus on what they like instead. Compared to other places where it quickly becomes either isolated shit slinging matches or wider dog piling real quick at least
If I had to pin it on something why there’s not a wider range of discussion, I’d really mainly guess it’s just down to the smaller and more closely connected user base, as in order to get a wider range of discussion and viewpoints, you have to find the people with those viewpoints who are willing to discuss first lol
Edit: for the brands you named, I think that’s really mostly due to the site not having a lot of speaker discussion, since most of those brands are 2ch centric, but I don’t think that was the point of the discussion anyways lol
Sorry that was just my typing a response with my feet. I meant to say that I see the AHB2 referenced as a solution for the power hungry Susvaras and was wondering if it’s a one trick pony.
I wouldn’t consider the AHB2 a one trick pony considering that many people on the speaker side like it as well. It just happens to be able to power headphones decently as a speaker amp. The price point is what makes it attractive to Susvara users I think and the fact that many people have had success with that combination makes it easier to recommend. I don’t think it’s the best combination with Sus but it helps with the “sleepy” nature of Sus when it is underpowered. My friend went as far as to try Sus with dual AHB2 and found that to be an even better experience. YMMV of course.
I know this forum is mainly HP but I’ve never considered it as such for some reason. I guess at the point I wound up here I was looking to DACs as my primary concern and a description of a DAC applies equally to both 2 CH as HP, more evident even in 2 CH IMO.
I’m nearing the end of my journey but nowhere near the end of my curiosity. I just ordered some Nordost speaker cables and some Anticables with the idea of trying different architechture of cables before I then decide on a speaker cable. Architecture, build, insulation has a lot of impact and it’s something I’ve been wanting to listen to for myself as I don’t have much experience with high end speaker cables.
You also brought up the topic of SET amps. At this point I know that a pair of monoblocks are certainly going to be in my future as I’m now committed to low wattage high efficiency loudspeakers. I’d like to start exploring USB cables. So there’s a lot of hobby left for me.
From my experience, it’s just very hard to find people who have experience with a lot of speaker components. Shopping for preamps is terrible. Same with cables or DACs. Speakers probably have the most coverage but even then, the interesting speakers probably only have one or two real reviews out there. The big names are more easily available locally and their price is inflated because of that.
Also not having dealers, retailers, manufacturers, sponsors, etc, etc on the forum does mean the things we talk about mostly have to be bought by someone with non-infinite funds or on loan. While I view that more in a positive it does mean it usually takes some more cash-venturous folks to push things.