In the middle of a pandemic, Stereophile reviews ~ $30K equipment

Wow, they are expensive.. No doubt..

I read, I didn't drink, not even a sniff..

I actually like the look of the little Freyas +, more. Its not an integrated but for that type of money....And Class Ds to boot. I don't care what it sounds like..or they spent on it, It's a class D. with a humpty dumpty DAC.  I'm liking mine way to much with that price tag.

Cost of living must be crazy in that little production town..
50 euro, beers, and 100 euro, sauerkraut, and 1000.00 euro, sausages.
All I can figure.. Narrow road access, only passable in spring...LOL

Regards

I find it interesting that some of the people decrying these wanton cash outlays are the very ones that have spent multiple thousands of dollars on senseless gimmicks, snake oil and audiophile jewelry, and who will defend their purchases with the very same word salad.

Keep in mind that reviews like this are written 99.9% for people who can only dream of owning the gear and maybe 0.1% for people who are actually likely to buy it (just like Doug DeMuro reviewing multi-million-dollar supercars on YouTube).  As such this is actually a good time for them because people are stuck at home and probably enjoy aspirational content more than ever.

Surprised by the responses to this OP... agreed $30k is a lot of money - for any audio gear... but cost is always relative. For a while though I thought I was one of the very few in the audiogon 'family' that ' did not ' have budgets for five and six figure pieces of gear... maybe someday.. but not today.

Word salads aside - I am glad to see that some industries are getting back to 'normalcy' during said 'crisis'... sort of getting tired of the whole lock down mentality and the paranoia of the media and public at large.

I guess if I had $30k to blow on gear - I would be in an underground swanky bunker - with nothing but great sound to fill my time and space.

@douglas_schroeder wrote: " Perhaps, as happened to me, a review of a pricey component started well before Covid-19 scare, and wound to conclusion now. Sometimes it takes months for a product to come to the reviewer! "

That (or something similar) was my first thought as well.

And give that the amount of money I have spent on audio equipment would be scandalous by the standards of much if not most of humanity, imo it would be hypocritical of me to throw verbal stones at someone who spends significantly more than I do.

Duke