Well I'm in deep trouble here, I think the 802D is the most underrated speaker, and the most undeservedly bagged speaker in the world, and I'm astounded on a daily basis just how good the MXR/KXR combination is.
Final comment I found the 2CE to be amazing, and couldn't believe the price, at a time I was enthralled by my CLS2z's.
So in conclusion most of my favourite brands have been listed as overrated!! big big trouble I must be tone deaf and deluded :) |
I know Vandersteen(1/2/3) owners could care less what I think. The reason I posted was not to bash Vandersteen Audio but to let potential buyers know there are better options at each price point(1150/2400/4500). The 2Ce Signature has the reputation of being a giant killer which IMO is an outdated assessment. I have stated before the Vandersteen 5A(currently carbon) is a great last purchase type speaker, so we know what Vandersteen is capable of. I have not heard the Quatro or Treo speakers so I don't know if there is a "trickle down" effect with these models. Lastly I think Vandersteen needs to update(if they value sound over profit) there entry level offerings to deserve the "giant killer" status. |
Agree totally zd. To be quite frank I've heard different Vandy set-ups range from abysmal (who would ever consider them) to sublime, they can be real chameleons. Set-up and room conditions are critical. They continue to be big sellers for a reason but will not be suitable for everyone but to me come closer than many, IF set-up correctly. I say they ARE NOT overrated because of potential for money spent. |
I do hate to slam the big name manufactures. Please some one else do it and I need a laugh. |
"10-01-14: Dayglow
Vandersteen Audio-1/2/3 models lack speed and resolution but keep selling?"
Vandersteen is a fairly unique company. Most of the time, people aren't setting them up right. The speakers are capable of very high resolution. I put my Vandersteen Model 2's next to my friends B&W 802d's. After going back and forth, we came to the conclusion that my Model 2's have just as much, if not more detail. I also have a pair of Wilson's in my 2'nd system, and the 2's easily outperform them as well. If anyone is interested, download some owners manuals off Vandersteens web site and read through them. They explain in detail, what's different about their speakers and how to get best sound. |
Dayglow , I agree with you totally ! |
Manley jumped their prices a lot all at once a while back.
Are they worth the new prices? They seemed to be bargains for the old. |
Vandersteen Audio-1/2/3 models lack speed and resolution but keep selling? Bryston-Are you buying because of the warranty or do you need an amp for your subwoofer? Esoteric-Can find more natural digital playback for much less. |
It is hard to call low-cost gear overrated, IMO. Nevertheless, there are a couple of names that come to mind here: ASI cables and Grover Huffman cables. Too much hoopla for too little performance.
It is easier to call high-priced gear overrated. A number of items come to mind here: the EMM CDSA SE CD player was a $11,500 total dud. IMO, it simply rode on the wake of the name Ed Meitner. Gabriel Gold cables were a total dud. Some of their prices have since come down to visit us on planet Earth. The AMR DP-777 blew up twice. They had design problems but instead of disclosing this to customers they decided to cover up the fact.
The Berkeley 1 DAC. Never mind what the revered Robert Hartley has to say. I have the feeling he may just be cutting and pasting to save writing time. Like Ted Denney for his Synergistic Research Tesla series cables -- and many other products including the famous Cells. In any case, he needs to start using spell check. He continues to write then in place of than. And he needs to use "increase font size" on his site that continues to use font size 4 -- maybe to prevent folks from reading the fine print. |
Tara Labs used to offer once affordable and reasonably priced products. Then they 'upgraded' and became full of snit. |
07-04-14: Harri009
Every Wilson speaker under the Maxx line. + 1! |
At this point I'd have to say Ayon and Wilson. And by virtue of Audiolabyrinth's understated claims that Taralabs is the mythical Shanri La, the holy grail of cables which will transform $690 speakers into $35,000 reference tranducers, i'll add Taralabs to the list. |
09-22-14: Geoffkait
Strange, nobody has mentioned Sony or Panasonic which I think both make a very wide range of excellent products It's really contradictive to the subject. Overrated is "higher rated" per given performance. Wide range of excellent products that are indeed excellent can't be considered overrated. |
Strange, nobody has mentioned Sony or Panasonic which I think both make a very wide range of excellent products. |
Bose and B&W are probably the two that own more market share than they probably should in an ideal world. |
Just navel gazed the posts and one major point still sticks out that has already been highlighted in this blog: " overrated how and/or compared to ?...... " And ..." Thus overrated ..... because why?"
Intuitively any such posts are going to be absent of any empirical terms of reference that I can think of, and default to heavily biased personal value judgements
OK .. Fair enough.... But instead of just casually listing a manufacturer and its piece , let's use a rifle instead of a shotgun and actually frame the opinion under these general terms that boil down to,
- Here's what I heard / looked at,
- Here's what I considered, and
- Here are my conclusions.
Now we can have a meaningful discussion IMO. |
I used to mod Xovers I have so friend thst has Harbeth 30.1
What a joke the whole Xover parts are pathetic the capacitors are maybe $4 each if you are lucky ,not even an air core inductor
This is why they are very limited on output the inductors snd capacitors
Get over saturated. And the cabinet,.reflection city look how wide it is.
If it were not for the midrange material they would not be anything .the tweeter us not seas best by any means.a $$1,000 to build maybe ,for a speaker charged $6500
Thatis really taking it to the consumer !! |
Magico is a definite. I want to know if the reviewers would like them without the advertising dollars. I have a VPI and not a fan of them, either. |
It could be anything. That's why I don't buy anything anymore without an audition. It's too difficult to put together a system based on reviews or reputation. I bought the X-05 at a great price from a local guy who upgraded to the X-03. It was in mint condition, looked beautiful and I really wanted to love it. Oh well. |
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Chayro, wouldn't it be great to be there when the reviewers
were listening to the X-05 piece and hear what they were
hearing? Maybe they have no ability to discern SQ? Or, is
lack of synergy and system dependency the overriding factor in
the poor performance of an otherwise quality component that
you heard in your system? The sound quality of mid and high in
components from system to system is mystifying to me. |
That would be a good question, except for the fact that only a tiny percentage of the people here have enough experience with the super high-priced stuff to put forth cogent arguments. It's much more fun to just say why you believe the stuff you can't afford isn't as good as claimed. However, now that I think of it, I had an Esoteric X-05 CD/SACD player that I thought was abysmal. Just flat, no depth and absolutely not analog-sounding as the Stereophile review said it was. I've never heard anything higher up in the line, so I can't say the entire brand is overrated, but that box certainly was, IMO. |
"07-15-14: Plasmatech
I would have preferred a more focused question of which manufacturers over-promise and under-deliver, and cite at least two instances of this occuring."
Its an interresting question, but how do you define over-promise and under-deliver? If you're talking about sound quality, for example, its subjective. I don't see how you can define something like that unless you rate things on an individual basis. |
Plasmatech your more focused question would make for an excellent thread! |
I would have preferred a more focused question of which manufacturers over-promise and under-deliver, and cite at least two instances of this occuring. |
What about if the word Reference is something other than the first? Is it still BS, or is it credible? |
Any time I read and advertisement or read about a product that starts with the word" Reference" I know it is bull%$##@ |
I have heard Zu, Wilson, and a bank of speakers from Focal and each of these manufacturers are what I call 0.5 to 0.33 brands. That is, they are mid-level competitive against competitors at 1/2 to 1/3 their cost. So... a 4K Focal speaker tends to compete well against $1500 - $2000 speakers but is way over-priced . These three brands are very overrated. |
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+1Syntax,Burmester, very disappointing sound quality given their
reputation and praise. It was very hifi and not natural at all. |
Runnin: So you're saying that a manufacturer should buy ad space and say "buy my stuff because it's so ordinary."? |
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Dweller, I think that "performance at half the price" is only part of the equation in a value rating system. It's in the nature of our free enterprise system that someone is always trying to deliver a better mousetrap for a lower price. Often, they succeed in the beginning. The history of the high end is a long list of companies that offered good sounding products but ultimately failed because they underestimated expenses and couldn't grow their business past a certain threshold. There are so many "high value" audio products that are shoestring operations run by one guy and little more. You bet that business model can initially undercut the pricing of Audio Research, Conrad-Johnson and other established players. Good luck trying to get replacement parts and service ten years from now though. Maybe that doesn't matter to some consumers but it does to others. |
I'd submit that when a manufacturer rates their gear at a certain level of performance, and the gear does not deliver, then they are over rating it. |
I think overrated is when the component-in-question's performance can be had elsewhere for half the price.
Look-and-feel is another issue. |
Elizabeth is correct, the only thing the average American hates worse than the truth is reality.
US education from K-12 is essentially one long propaganda fest
to ensure this mindset endures for a lifetime.
Also extended to BA level in majority of colleges. |
None of this will ever make sense because this group will never agree on the definition of "overrated" as relates to audio manufacturers, which the OP should have defined as part of his question, in the first place. I found these definitions of "overrated" by the Urban Dictionary to sort of sum up the futility of this thread; A word which recently has been used liberally as a way of discrediting something without having to give a proper justification, most often when someone finds they have a disliking for a popular phenomenom and is resentful of those who embrace it. Often used by anti-trendies. and So due to personal opinion and anyone who hates anything that's well known, no matter how brilliant something is, if it gets a lot of media attention then there's always someone who will think it's overrated. and finally, an example; Person A) "I'm gonna watch my TV..."
Person B) "TV is overrated"
Person A) "I want an Xbox..."
Person B) "Xbox is overrated"
Person A) "Jesus, shutup"
Person B) "Jesus is overrate-"
*punches in face* |
The real question isn't "what equipment is overrated?", but "why is it overrated?". If you can get to the "why" of it, you'll have some info that is of real use. |
Ok, so some of you are saying a certain manufacturer's product is the most "overrated." Folks, the problem with the subject matter here is that in general, most audiophiles and enthusiasts mix and match speakers, amplifiers, preamplifiers, cd players, turntables, cables, DACs etc. from a variety of manufacturers. How can you tell if the poor experience that you formulated your "overrated" judgement on is the poor (overrated)performance of a manufacturer's component(s), or because the product did not match up well with the rest of the products (gear)in your system?
If we were talking about an all Ayre system, or an all Levinson system then judgements are more valid. Or, if someone is pairing B&W speakers with the same system that B&W uses to evaluate the speaker's sound, or the audio system that ZU Audio uses to evaluate the sound of their speakers, then judgements like most "overrated" would take on much more validity. But instead, most of us are using completely different mixing and matching of speakers, amps, preamps, cables etc in our homes than the manufacturer that designed and evaluated their product before putting it on the market.
On a practical level, in most cases, having a system all from one manufacturer with the same cables, or having the same system and cables as the one used by the manufacturer for evaluating their products is usually impossible for various reasons. |
"07-05-14: Twb2
Ayre?? Not my experience! Sound quality, reliability and customer service from Ayre are absolutely superb IMO. All my Ayre gear (and I have a lot) was purchased used, so value is excellent as well. However, I don't like dealing with their dealers."
If you are looking for a good Ayre dealer, try one of these: Audio Connection, Audio Center and Audio Alternative. Audio Connection is my favorite, but the other 2 are also very good. I've done business with all 3 and always had a good experience. |
1. Atma-sphere
Amps that are suitable with 5% of all speaker systems.
2. Merlin speakers
Blah, really boring
3. Synergetic cables
Fat ted is all show and no go
4. Koetsu cartridges
Really?
5. Machina Dynamica
Everything is PT Barnum stupid |
Vpi
Extraordinarily ordinary tables.
Lousy tonearms. |
Paladin: Unfortunately, even a Bugatti today isn't a Bugatti in the sense of the original marque. The pre-war ones, particularly the racing cars, are truly special. (And without trying to sound condescending, because I'm not and actually love old cars, if you look up Shakespeare and Bugatti, you'll find some amazing pictures of the guy who was heir to the Shakespeare fishing reel company fortune who collected a huge number of the early cars and sold them for almost nothing back in the day. There are some fabulous pictures that should be on the web showing the cars being loaded onto a train after the sale, including a Royale).
Syntax: you crack me up.
I'm glad nobody got too torqued here. And the OP did a hit and run, right?
Over and out. |
Ayre? Really?
I have nothing but good things to say as they were helpful and patient in helping me solve a hum problem.
Turns out it was my doing (placed my Oppo 105 over some ICs feeding my Ayre P5xe phono amp).
Ayre is first class all the way (they sound good too). |
To Sounds Real....calling out Elizabeth for cynicism in your post, that ends, "Isn't that what we really want in America? To be told a bunch of lies?" Takes chutzpah.
As to the OP, I'd add any manufacturer that charges more than $100 for a meter of HDMI. |
So, the market 'corrects' this, even if there is 'buy in' initially. +1 Whart the cool thing about this industry, unlike many others, is that it is still in many ways a cottage industry...
think about how many of the products that are still around,
year after year, or pop up fresh and get a following, that are made by little companies, tinkerers, or long time enthusiasts from other industries who have transferred their skills +2 Considering home audio is an industry with new stuff coming to market all the time, created by both artisans and larger manufacturers, that offers a wide range of buying options from dealers to web-based sellers, a wide range of audition options from showrooms to audio shows to home demos, and the ability to achieve stunning sound from even modestly priced home systems, audiophiles sure find a lot to be critical about. |
I suppose I hold the view that the hype and the reality should match for these higher end manufacturers. My example about Emotiva may be an extreme case. They have promised the XMC for over 4 years now. People have been on a waiting list for that long! They are late by at several months for many of their products, and anything with firmware usually has some issues that haven't been dealt with by beta testers.
I can't think of any other manufacturer that REGULARLY treats the consumer this way. At any rate, you seem to accept this delta, to explain/understand it and hold the view that the market deals with it. I'm not sure about that, because there's a sucker born every minute. The uniformed with a credit card, keep the delta in existence. |
Runnin, maybe that's true, but what you just described is perfectly consistent with what I was referring to~ the 'delta' between the hype and the reality. |
Ayre?? Not my experience! Sound quality, reliability and customer service from Ayre are absolutely superb IMO. All my Ayre gear (and I have a lot) was purchased used, so value is excellent as well. However, I don't like dealing with their dealers. |
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