Why so expensive??

Expensive = elite limited, an ostentatious display of profligerate spending on something totally unnecessary => it goes back to the basic male drive to demonstrate wealth, accumulate resources and power, and to differentiate versus other males (this may continue long after being happily married, as it is programmed into our very nature). This drive is primarily in order to attract females, however, the drive can become perverted when men build audio systems in basement caves - as it does little to attract females in this case(generous behaviour, attention to children, boats, luxury cars, big houses, social status rank much higher with females in terms of evaluating men). It is the same reason that multi-millionaires want to become billionaires...they must satisfy their drive and can't stop, as it is in their nature.

The next time you think of buying the $15,000 amp, do a blind listening with a $2,000-$3,000 of similar topology and power (Class A, Tube, Triode, SS) and if you can consistently tell which is which, and consistently prefer the $15,000 amp, buy it, it is worth it if you can afford it. You may find this type of evaluation might save you some money more often then you think, unless you simply need to spend more and there is nothing wrong with that if it makes you happy - it does feed the manufacturer's family, children and employees.

Manufacturing equipment costs a LOT OF MONEY. Research and design cost a lot of money. I have been in two high end manufacturer's facilities. Boulder Amplifiers and Dunlavy Speakers when they were in business.

As I remember, Boulder had several CNC machines, these cost megga bucks and you have to have one before you can build any product. So, you finance one, now you have to design a product to build, engineers, designers, CAD workstations... The first design is not always successful, it may not test very well, using the mega bucks test equipment you financed...

Dunlavy's facility had a anechoic chamber! again big bucks, Lots of test equipment. Every componet that was bought from outside vendors was tested before use. Sub assemblies were tested with results logged. Speaker pairs were built using componets that tested similar...

I worked as an engineer for a company that designed and built indutrial robotic manufacuring systems for manufacturers. We had some robotic movement controllers that were the size of an amplifier (and basicly the same thing with a lot of servo loops), that sold for $15,000.00 . A complete system, one built for Johnson Controls ( a HVAC equipment company), cost 3.5 million and took two years to design, build, test, and install.

Just because a product is electronic does not mean it is cheap.

From what I have seen, true high end audio equipment is on the same level of design sophistication as the space program, avionics, medical, really is some of the best product available in the world at any cost.

Jim G.

Shadorne, your argument might work for cars and other luxuries. Unfortunately I have yet to find any woman who does'nt find an interest in Audio, plain weird. Threads like this are interesting, but the arguments are so predictable, you could write them in advance.
1. You are not paying $350000 for the component quality, but for the years the genius designer struggled in a basement with a soldering iron. Sorry, that won't work. Let's be generous and say the 120lb's of steel glass and wire costs $30000 in premium components. lets also be generous and say construction is complex, hand wound transformers for example and that costs $20000. That leaves $300000 and yes I know there are a lot of other costs, but that's the point, those costs are spread over a small number of components. As someone else pointed out, it is grade school economics "Economies of scale", or rather the lack of them. The fixed costs are spread over a handful of units produced, not millions. That is why you are looking at $350000 and it makes for very poor value for money. Besides, who is the real genius, a designer using the very best avaiable components to make the best amp he can, or the guy using inferior parts to make a darn good amp for $5000? I know who I would choose.
2. Putting up the price of a component, may make it more saleable, by making it more reassuringly expensive. Unfortunately, that's probably true and a sad judgement on many of us, who can be schmoozed by a slick salesman, by an invite into the select High end dem room, away from the little people. It probably would work on me too, but I buy 2nd hand, so avoid temptation.
Sadly it's the story of "The Emperors new clothes" an old scam that works every time.
3. Spending $350000 on an amp is immoral, I happen to agree, but it's not illegal. People can spend their money as they wish and their are enough plonkers around to keep the company in business. Spend $10000, 30000 if you must and give the rest to charity, you'll sleep better at night. Plonker by the way is an apt Cockney description, google it if you like, see also dipstick.
Not relevant I know, but the real, hit you between the eyes with a 4 by 2 immoral act, is spending $500 on a meal for 2, when kids are starving for the lack of a few dollars worth of rice, but again, it's a free country.
Finally I have to admit, shaking my head at articles for $1500 interconnects a few years ago, that I buy now. My only defence is I get them second hand.
There I feel better for that rant

Greenelec, that may be true, but there is still great sounding equipment that does not cost a fortune, hand-made stuff, and then there is other stuff that costs 3x-10x and no better, or sometimes marginally better sounding. Both fellas (I assume they are men -Manley and DeHavilland may be exceptions) face the same design costs, tooling and prototyping problems yet one is able to go to market for much less. As far as quality of sound, try the blind test and see if you can consistently pick and prefer the much more expensive stuff. Not to say there isn't expensive stuff that isn't consistently better (my CATJL2 for one IMHO) Again assuming the same basic topology, try the test. In fact, I rememeber how hard it was for folks at the NYC stereo show to discern between a 30 watt EL34 tube amp and a 200 watt 1970s SS Denon amp - that was food for thought.