High End Amp Price Collapse musings

With all these great new solid state amplifiers, those old crusty tube amps should be going for a dime a dozen any day now....

"Some of you miss the point. The point is simple. As Class D advances it will eat into the high end class A market. We have seen this already happening to a small degree. Some people on this thread indicate they already switched.
Once Class D is close enough in quality even some of the deep pocket Krell, Pass etc guys will switch.
Once that happens they will sell thier existing gear which will gradually bring the value of that existing gear down giving not so deep pockets the chance to own true high end as it exists today."

I think what you forgot to factor into this is if Class-D reaches or surpasses Class-A or A/B, then the prices for Class-D will also reach or surpass Class-A or A/B.  

Some people may sell, but I don't expect to see pennies on the dollar.  If so, I'll be the first one there to grab a pair of XA-160's!

"Future generations will look at amps that are not class d or digital as dinosaur fossils . There will be no mass market makers of class A or ab or anyone to service them . I don't think I will be around when this happens but class A , AB inevitably will disappear ."

You mean those generations that prefer music from their iPhone in the form of compressed mp3's, or God forbid streaming from their "Alexa" eavesdropping device?  LOL

Eventually we will probably stream digital directly into our neural implant, but somewhere there will still be vacuum tubes glowing as life forms listen to the latest hit from the andromeda galaxies latest super-group, Faith +1.  

I also agree that Class-D is not the end all be all for subs.  They're used in subs because they are cheap and can put out lots of power.  I've owned a couple of subs with Class-D subs and one with a traditional A/B external amplifier (RBH).  To my ear it was much more natural sounding when used with music.

Class-D is nothing new.  It's been around since the 50's if not longer... about the same time the transistor came about.

Why has it taken so long for it to become the "next great thing"??

I've owned a couple of high end Class-D amps, NuForce References as well as Bel Canto and they weren't bad.  They were quite good, but there was always something missing.  Will they get better, of course, but so will transistor designs and tube designs.

I guess I just like big, heavy amps.  :)