DarTzeel’s new direction

The oligarch market is probably saturated. This isn’t meant as a joke; with the Russians shut out of the West, there are fewer oligarchs around, so the market itself has fewer buyers today than five years ago. And it can’t be all that big ... maybe a few thousand people or less. Eventually, all of their New York, London, and Zurich mansions have $500,000 systems, and the market shrinks.

Creating a new "value" brand is difficult, since it undercuts the Veblen-good pricing model of the original brand. Choosing the appearance is even more tricky, since you don’t dare mimic the look and feel of the original product. A separate brand is about the only way to go.

Using medium impedance (50 to 300 ohms) for line-level interconnects is a good idea, although not suitable for modern studio practice. And medium impedance for speaker outputs (1 to 2 ohms) is going to depend on the complexity of the speaker crossover ... simpler crossovers will tolerate it, more complex crossovers will not.