The Audiophile Ratio

Was chatting with the SO about upgrading my loudspeakers, maybe Aerial 20s, I dunno. Well her comment, you seem to spend way more money on equipment then source material. You seem to listen to the equipment instead of the source material. You'll go out drop a $100-$200 on CDs but are looking at $20K plus speakers. Why don't you drop $5000 on source material & $15 on speakers??? Hmm good point. I measured mine, the value of source material to hardware. I'm too embarsssed to admit it. And CERTAINLY didn't tell the SO of the equipment value. With all the specs and nbrs tossed around, how we are constantly changing out equipment, what are we really doing? Relatively speaking I tend to listen to very few cd's with new equipment, the same ones over and over to see differences between the gear. Out of my cd collection, I really only grab a few.

And actually I'm really getting into the serve idea, just to set it on shuffle, expose myself to the whole damm collection. Much like my ipod.

I'm proposing a new measurement for the high end "The Audiophile Ratio".

The value of source material to hardware.

Isnt the point of the gear to listen to the music?

Well there's another guy around here I know. Met him at the Porsche dealership btw. He has a mega-bucks system, as good as it gets. Actually everything he has is mega-bucks, he's rich, really rich, filthy rich. The way he goes thru equipment, he could be a high end dealer's only customer. Anyways, I swear he just listens to the equipment, where most say, listen to this CD or that CD, he's like listen to this amp, this player. I don't think he has more then 100 CD/LP, and just the ones he uses to show off the equipment. And plays the same dammed ones over and over. I told the SO, if I swiped a bunch of those CD or LPs would he even replace them??? So I bring my own to listen too. Kinda audiophile slumming.
But he's also a serious art collector. Although the roomed is acoustically designed for the specific purpose of listening, my real kick is sitting in a room with several million dollars in artwork hanging on the walls, so when he dims the room just right to set the mood for listening, I can't pay attention at all to the music, too absorbed with the art work, the music is the background, kinda like a Bose soundwave playing in the kitchen.

So who is the audiophile? Is it the one with the best gear? The most software? Or is there a balance in there someplace?

Nah budget's the same either way, just the mix is different. But I get her point, I just love listening to music, but I spend way more on equipment then source material. I really should spend more on the software.

But I did try to extrapolate her reasoning to womans handbags, I had a vision of her throwing a LP at me like OddJob throwing his derby at James Bond.

Actually based on the current set up, if he paid full retail, about $250-$300K would be right. I know the loudspeakers are close to $190K, but really don't know the exact prices of everything else. Interesting the the relatively small space of the equipment is worth more than my house, cars & everything inside. Ironically his SO told my SO, that one those fancy magazines did a photo shoot of his house, but asked him (actually her) if the could move the loudspeakers out of view. In the over scheme of the room the stick out like a sore thumb. Told my SO to tell his SO, they are right, really should get rid of them. He should ask my husband if he wants them. One can olny hope.

It least those would be harder to throw at you.

Ya gotta love that it sounds as just crappy on a high end system as a cheap boombox. No do-overs in the music world unless you count remasters, which is a small amount of the vast library of music available.

I'm also surprised Porsche Design does not make a purse. Does Ferrari have a purse? They do make the matching luggage.

Ok, if your house burns completely downs tomorrow, 100% loss or someone comes in & steals equipment, source material etc, what would you tell your insurance company?

That's the value/price.

The last time I was at the local Ferrari dealer (stopped in to say hello to my old Porsche salesmen who went on to Ferrari), there was some old geezer in there with a really hot young woman (who I don't think was his daughter), picking up his new ride & matching luggage. Well he seemed way more interested in the luggage, how it all matched, nestled together etc then the car itself, kinda just figured from the interaction between him & salesman as the young hot thing kinda stood around looking dumb. I'm thinking, she's thinking boy thats a lot of money for luggage (the car comes free) & wondering what kind of purse would he buy me.

Plus I gotta say, looking at the size of Ferrari boutique, they got Porsche beat on that for. My salesmen buddy told, you would be really surprised on how much we sell (and how much we make off it), what variety too.

Maybe Ferrari is like Harley? Harley makes more off of licensing then the actual motorcycles.

There's a guy in my subdivision, at night when walking by his house with the dogs, I can what I think is his greatroom or some kinda room light up, he has this HUGE Ferrari sign/flag something on his wall. But he does own 2 Ferrari's, the red models (I can't tell anymore the models just that they are red) I thought I was bad cause I have a Porsche Parking sign in my garage??

What is value for you? What you buy something at? Or what you can sell it at?

Actually for me now, material things don't really mean a lot, they are just things.

I went thru Hurricane Andrew back in the day, lost everything I had. Morning after all i had was t-shirt, swim suit, flip flops, watch, wallet & glasses
everything gone. Only things left was what was stored in ex's garage. Which ironically was some hifi gear, lp's tapes & motorcycle