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What’s really hurting the audio hobby?

Maybe it’s the audio dealer experience? Where else can newbies go to get started in this hobby. Isn't that where most of you got hooked?  Let me describe my latest visit to an audio store nearby. I won’t use the store name here, as that’s not the point.  Where I live there is really only one audio store left. That’s strange because I live in a very wealthy community. The Friday after Independence day, me and a friend went to this local audio store.  First time back there in years. We are both looking to upgrade. They have 3 audio rooms and two home theater rooms. The hi-end audio room (the store’s term) was an impressive room with extensive acoustic treatments. Mostly McIntosh gear. Sitting in the listening chair, you are looking at 600 watt Mac monoblocks running some nice tower speakers. A massive JL Audio Gotham subwoofer unit sat front and center facing the only listening chair. The McIntosh turntable was spun first. Sloooowww. It took my friend less than five seconds to point out the TT was running slow. The salesman had started to play Pink Floyd-Wish You Were Here, and it was noticeably slow. So the salesman flipped the switch to 45 rpm. Yes, that happened. He figured out it was too fast all on his own. Fiddle and poke at the TT for a bit and then the salesman said- "I’ll let them know it’s broke". Then he said he would just stream some music from a server. Bass! All you could hear was bass, and NOT good bass. He turned the subs down a little when asked, but all you could hear was tubby, muddy bass. The big tower speakers were overpowered by the sub.  I really wanted to hear what the main speakers alone sounded like, but could not get the salesman to shut off the subs.  On to the mid-fi room (the store’s term). The salesman tried to play us two different turntables. Neither turntable worked. One would not power up, and one was not hooked up to a system at all. Let me point out we didn’t care what source they used. I did say we both run analog and digital sources. Nothing interesting in the mid-fi room the first time through. Next room (no name) was a wall of bookshelf and small towers run by a wide selection of integrated amps. Not bad sound from some. Again, we were told this is “streaming quality audio”. This was the third time he mentioned we were listening to streaming quality audio. I took a guess at what that meant and asked if we could hear higher quality audio. So he took us back to the mid-fi room. He popped in a CD.I could not tell what CD equipment was being used. I think a Rotel integrated was selected. Everything in the cabinet was black faced behind dark glass. Not sure what CD it was either, but since he only had one, I let it go.

Big change! The Paradigm towers were now making good sounds. A big difference from his “streaming quality” demo. Next we switched to a pair of GE Triton 1s. I seriously might get a pair! They make nice sounds. By far the best thing we heard. There was more that happened that contributed to a poor experience, but I will move on.

Here is my point- What would anyone new to the hobby think of that experience? It took two seasoned audio guys pushing the salesman for over an hour before he played anything worth listening to. Would you buy anything from this place. Would you send a newbie in there? Let me know if I'm off base in thinking these audio stores are killing themselves off by the way they do business. Or is it just my misfortune that I have not been in a good dealer showroom in years?

vinylfan62
sleepwalker65's avatar
sleepwalker65
832 posts
 
I disagree that price hurts this hobby. Great value is not likely to be found when buying brand-new, but there’s always opportunities that come up where someone wants to liquidate a perfectly good item, and often for less than 50 cents on the dollar. When I was a teenager and had little in the way of financial responsibilities, I bought a brand-new system piece by piece, saving from money I’d earn from a part time job. Today I have higher expectations, and a lot of financial responsibilities, so selectively buying high value, high performance vintage gear and restoring it to new or better condition puts a smile on my face. It helps that I’m an avid electronics hobbyist with a complete electronics lab at home. I have a system that compares to many $30,000 new systems, and I’ve only spent $3,000. You can do it too. 
keegiam
730 posts
 
@onhwy61

You're mistaking observations of generational trends for denigration.

The fact that younger generations don't hear music performed by (acoustic) instruments as much as we did decades ago is just that - fact.  How many youth regularly hear a french horn or piano played right in front of them?  It's not their fault - it's just the way things have evolved.

The question presented is: what's hurting the "audio hobby."  If the "audio hobby" includes high fidelity recreation of the sounds of musical instruments in real space, knowledge of those sounds is paramount.  Younger folks don't seem to value that experience as much as previous generations - thus the decline of the "hobby."

Criticism of changing musical content is another matter - that's been going on for over a century and isn't likely to change.
vinylfan62 OP
119 posts
 
In the original post I talked about a bad dealer experience and how that might keep people from learning about better sound. I find so few people who have ever experienced really good hi-fi. Because of that, most scoff at the idea. They don’t think it exists, or place no value in it. Davekacy, you are like me in that music is an emotional experience. The better the sound the deeper my response to it. I joke that music is my therapy (along with some top shelf bourbon). But I’m not really kidding. And let’s face it, more people in this world could use some method to decompress. People everywhere seem angrier these days.
New acquaintances find it strange when I say I watch very little TV and instead listen to music most nights. If I tell them I also spend time crate digging or surfing streaming sites to find new music, like poke77 does, their eyes roll back. But when I get them to come listen to my rig things often change. Not always, but often. I play people music that they are familiar with and their reaction is often a treat. It’s fun when people look at you and say “I’ve heard this song a thousand times but never really heard it”.  Some have been bitten by the audio bug this way. 
My point is that exposure to real quality sound has to happen first. Where are people getting that taste these days.  
vinylfan62 OP
119 posts
 
Keegiam you are spot on. I didn’t realize music programs had been cut so severely in the US, until I read it here and did some research. That’s so unfortunate. If people never get exposed to a wider range of music, played by professional musicians, they have no idea it exists. How are young people exposed to anything other than the popular music of their generation?  I think a lot of that happened in our educational programs of the past. Now that this is no longer available in this country it makes sense there is a decline in interest. I bet this is not the case in other countries. 
bdp24's avatar
bdp24
9,510 posts
 

In the 1960’s, the home of everyone I knew had a console TV/radio/record player. That’s what all we kids played our 7" 45’s and LP’s on. In the summer of ’68, I heard my first component system: a good friend, who had left San Jose in the fall of ’66 for the bohemian beach town of Santa Cruz so as to not have to, like David Crosby, cut his hair (Cupertino High had a dress code, Santa Cruz High did not) had found a transcription turntable (a green felt mat glued onto it’s huge steel platter) at a local radio station in the summer of ’68, and then bought a Scott 299C and Scott 2-way bookshelf loudspeakers to go with it. Best sound I had ever heard!

Hearing that system started me down my own hi-fi path, which was kicked into high gear when in 1972 I discovered a little magazine put out by a guy on the other side of the country, who went by the odd name of J. Gordon Holt. Why put the J there if you’re not going to use it, I wondered? Anyway, by the time I was putting together my first big system (ARC electronics, Magneplanar Tympanis, Thorens/SME/Decca) in ’73, my friend had become more interested in the recording of music than it’s reproduction in glorious hi-fi sound. He never progressed beyond the mid-fi level. But he’s got a pretty nice recording studio in Los Angeles ;-) .

Anyway, my point is that he and I were the only two people in our circle of friends (almost exclusively musicians) who had anything approaching a hi-fi. Hi-fi fiends have ALWAYS been a tiny minority in the music loving community, which is itself a minority of humanity. Is the current situation so different?

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