What defines mid-fi versus high-end?


I’m in my mid fifties and I recall 30 years back mid-fi to me fell into the NAD, Adcom, B&K…. For high-end I considered Mac, some of the Counterpoint offerings, Cary…. so forth.  I had another post going where I mentioned I acquired an Onkyo  home theater receiver that retailed new for $1,100.   Yet another agoner responded that it does not rate as mid-fi.   We all have our opinions of course.   So right or wrong here.
How do you define the parameters of high-end versus mid-if?  By money range, by brand…?

 

pdspecl

Not surprisingly mid fi sounds mid. Whereas hi fi sounds high.   See how that works?

Sales terms like 'mid-fi' and 'high-end' can only refer to price and profit margins and the boutique paraphernalia that comes with it.

These terms were created by those who sell and promote equipment.


For the rest of us, it's mainly performance that counts and that has only a tenuous relationship to the above.

I first heard the term “mid-fi” in the late 70s into the mid 80s whilst haunting several Houston area audio destinations that tended toward Magneplanar/Mark Levinson/Linn/Nakamichi/Acoustat/B&W/KlipschHeritage…later Apogee/Vandersteen/Stax, et al. “Mid Fi” at that time, was used to describe products from the Pioneer/Kenwood/Sony/Sansui/Technics et al strata and there were a couple of brands that sort of inhabited a grey area between mid and hi hi, notably Denon/Marantz/Sony ES series/NAD. Just an observation peculiar to those times.

Lo-Fi is that a Fi too? Kind of like small, medium and large. One size does not fit all.

I like Lo-Fi when I'm walking the fence line or just doing nothing. It's to much work to try anything better. :-) One ear listening.