Quote:
Originally Posted by Scott Wallace 
Here's my thing, and I'm really bummed about it, and really pissed off about it. Everybody wants the best thing in the world.....cheap. So manufacturers listen and make cheap stuff but with name brand chipsets or whatever and make people think it's better than previous built like a tank stuff. An earlier post alluded to one of the new Sony's. The new Elite BDP-23 is way smaller than the 05 to say nothing of the 09 and it has a wimpy power cord connector, which is a bummer to those of us who like the boost in performance that a good IEC power cord can provide. Point being, things are gravitating towards being more cheaply built, so manufacturers point to chips and name brand whatevers and if it tests well, well then it must be better......but no. Does anyone really think that a $499 player that can do DVD-Audio, SACD, DVD-Video, Blu-Ray, & CD and uses a name brand processing chip like the Anchor Bay is really optimized for all of those formats? No, clearly not. The Elite was SUBJECTIVELY better, and it was not subtle. This from a customer who WANTED the Oppo to be better since it was soooooo much faster, and Elite's are slower than erosion. Point being, there is no substitute for good, but bad for marketing copy build qualities like a good overbuilt quiet power supply, good circuit layout, superior build quality and internal layout, proper implementation of all tasks, regardless of whether it's a name brand chip that sells when mentioned in reviews. These things show up on screen and to our ears, even if there is not a measurable quality to them. Not everything is about 'Secrets of HT&HF' benchmark scores (not that those don't have SOME value). And it's this same Oppo/Vizio culture that has killed Pioneer Elite plasmas. There was a study done and amongst those who made over $100,000 a year, the average they spent on a new TV was $1,500. No wonder Elite can't make money off plasma when even the well-heeled refuse to pony up for genuine quality. And now once Elite leaves, there really is not a fantastic second option, and so now there are no high performance TV's within reasonable reach of the average consumer (some colleagues who attended Runco training said that there new "Opal" line of plasmas were the best TV image they had ever seen, but priced more than double the Elite's which are being firesold and still aren't selling as fast as such a good product should).
So you asked for it, you got it - cheap stuff that measures well and performs ok, but is completely uninspiring in actual use. Ain't those internets amazing!?!
Here's my thing, and I'm really bummed about it, and really pissed off about it. Everybody wants the best thing in the world.....cheap. So manufacturers listen and make cheap stuff but with name brand chipsets or whatever and make people think it's better than previous built like a tank stuff. An earlier post alluded to one of the new Sony's. The new Elite BDP-23 is way smaller than the 05 to say nothing of the 09 and it has a wimpy power cord connector, which is a bummer to those of us who like the boost in performance that a good IEC power cord can provide. Point being, things are gravitating towards being more cheaply built, so manufacturers point to chips and name brand whatevers and if it tests well, well then it must be better......but no. Does anyone really think that a $499 player that can do DVD-Audio, SACD, DVD-Video, Blu-Ray, & CD and uses a name brand processing chip like the Anchor Bay is really optimized for all of those formats? No, clearly not. The Elite was SUBJECTIVELY better, and it was not subtle. This from a customer who WANTED the Oppo to be better since it was soooooo much faster, and Elite's are slower than erosion. Point being, there is no substitute for good, but bad for marketing copy build qualities like a good overbuilt quiet power supply, good circuit layout, superior build quality and internal layout, proper implementation of all tasks, regardless of whether it's a name brand chip that sells when mentioned in reviews. These things show up on screen and to our ears, even if there is not a measurable quality to them. Not everything is about 'Secrets of HT&HF' benchmark scores (not that those don't have SOME value). And it's this same Oppo/Vizio culture that has killed Pioneer Elite plasmas. There was a study done and amongst those who made over $100,000 a year, the average they spent on a new TV was $1,500. No wonder Elite can't make money off plasma when even the well-heeled refuse to pony up for genuine quality. And now once Elite leaves, there really is not a fantastic second option, and so now there are no high performance TV's within reasonable reach of the average consumer (some colleagues who attended Runco training said that there new "Opal" line of plasmas were the best TV image they had ever seen, but priced more than double the Elite's which are being firesold and still aren't selling as fast as such a good product should).
So you asked for it, you got it - cheap stuff that measures well and performs ok, but is completely uninspiring in actual use. Ain't those internets amazing!?!
thinking that you can get a Ferrari for the price of a Yugo are driving good companies out of business and driving manufacturers to build things more cheaply and creating the same kind of disparity between the super high end and the low end as exists in the economy with 1% of the people owning 50% of the country. The middle class in both electronics and economy is going away. That's why I'm so serious!
