Good point Unclejeff. Got me to thinking ...
As I reread this thread, I wonder if we all have different definitions of brand. There's the mass market brands (like Sony), the mass audiophile brands (like Krell), the specialty audiophile brands (like Montana), the price competition brands (like Stealth, perhaps) and the no-names (like, ... well, uh, if I knew who they were they wouldn't be no names). Plus there's stuff in-between and beyond. The original question was around the potential stigma behind an audiophile buying mass market brands but some of us took it further. I took it to the "nobody ever heard of this brand before" extreme. Many of the answers covered the brands that are smaller and less stable. That might help explain why the answers are a bit all over the place.
At this point, I would agree that the right course of action for me is to just jump in headfirst into the music. Even if the piece lasts just a year, oh what a year! That assumes the off-brand is really better than the rest.
