whats the difference between $200 - $1,000 receivers compared to $10,000 - $20,000 amp or receiver?

It's sort of the same thing as what's the difference between man made and natural diamonds.

In the case of amplifiers, if working to specs and matched for output (no volume difference), once the curtain goes down, users can't tell the difference between amplifiers beyond that of random chance.

So what's the difference between a one carat diamond that's man made vs similar size and quality found in a kimberlite pipe, about five thousand dollars. To me, it's all about bragging rights.

My understanding, if the noise floor is >100dB and THD is <0.1, the amplifier is considered neutral.


Once the curtain goes down, accuracy of picking which is the more expensive amplifier, falls to that of random chance; ~17%

Me? If one can only pick their uber cool amplifier, fifty percent of the time and their gear is suppose to make such a world of difference, then somebody is kidding themselves. If expensive amplifiers make such a "HUGE" difference, then accuracy of choice should be North of 90%. We can tell the sound of our son's car coming down the street, pretty much a hundred percent of the time when we're in the backyard racking leaves and considering the price of some of these amplifiers, for the price, I'd expect this same type of sonic accuracy. What I don't expect is; can you play it again, I'm not sure. At the price of some of these amplifiers, either you can accurately hear a difference, or you can't. There's no doubt about the sonic characteristics of our son's car and that's what I expect in an amplifier test.

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Edited by BeeMan458 - 10/18/12 at 4:27pm

I have only heard some expensive amps one of them was a 2 thousand dollar primare amp and a expensive macintosh amp both sounded okay to me but for the money the less expensive Denon Marantz Nad and Rotel amps sounded just as good to me. I guess that it depends on if you need the more expensive amp to power hard to drive speakers like magnepan sorry for the spelling I am typing this on a phone.

First off, I would like to think that a $10,000 amp should sound way better than a $200 amp. Some of the cost is related to build quality and the component used in the amp. Now most $200 amp will not sound as good as amps above the entry level. But, bragging rights and consumer appeal add a significant part of the price tag to a product. A good amp will last 25-30 years whereas, most other audio gear will be junk, outdated and a pain to use. Even though many believe all amps sound the same, how come we are all impressed somewhat when we hear a high end system?

Its no different when see and hear a Callaway Corvette - or a Ferrari V12 - Porsche Twin Turbo etc. It SHOULD sound great! But they all can be nearly matched or even bested by a relatively cheap Shelby Mustang. Want great sound? Get great speakers - they don't cost tens of thousands either. IMO the laws of diminishing returns kicks in at around $2000 for a pair of main speakers. As I said IMO. Others have differing opinions - thats fine and I wouldn't argue with them. To each their own.

I've got a cheap Emotiva USP-1 preamp and a 15 year old Acurus A200x2 channel (300wpc into 4ohms) amp pushing a pair of Emotiva ERT tower speakers and it sounds pretty damned good IMO! And it didn't cost an arm and a leg. I spin my CD's up on a 2 year old Oppo BDP-80 bluray player. Room treatments include acoustic tile on the ceiling.

The main difference is how big the hole in your wallet is. Other than that, unless you have a home theatre that rivals a multiplex in size, there's unlikely to be any discernable difference.

You all make good points Derrick 25 years is a long time to last for a amp for some people who like the music louder might like the bigger power supply in a more expensive amp as long as the amp sounds good I don't worry about how many watts that it is like I used to. I know that I won't ever crank a huge power amp up all the way or a Yamaha receiver all the way up.

No doubt many things in audio are myths and snake-oil and unjustified when subject to vigorous analysis but do the specs and limited double-blind tests (DBTs) tell the whole story? Look over in the Ayre Blu-ray player ($10K) thread: Charles Hansen when challenged by MichaelJHuman said something about uncharted territory.

High-end companies are much smaller than mass market brands, thus bigger costs, to state the obvious.

Cosmetic appearance of the exterior, can you put a price on that?

If you expect huge difference or >90% accuracy in DBTs, few medicines will ever be approved by the FDA. Read some medical trial papers and you'll see for thousands of patients tested in many places combined, often a positive outcome is determined only on pure statistical grounds (p<0.05, meaning less than 1/20 due to chance).

Not everything in the world has to be fully justified for cost effectiveness or best bang for the buck. Do you buy a car just powerful or spacious enough to get you from A to B, or eat food with just enough calories to keep you going or live in a house with just enough floor space for the number of occupants or wear the minimum of clothes just enough to keep you warm? Some people like to buy far more than they need, or high-end or luxury items whatever. People have different values.

There is an ongoing 30 page thread about audio companies and conspiracies, join it if you like.

My experience with a Yamaha DSP-A1 (>$3,000 "receiver") taught me that its easy to clip especially with 4 ohm loudspeakers. So far I have yet to drive my Emotiva amps into clipping. Almost all receivers have trouble driving 4 ohm speakers at realistic levels. I am convinced that the difference between separate amps that cost <$2,000 and a $5,000 amp is much less than that of the difference in sub $1,000 receivers.

Not so fast. All twenty-five year old gear will be obsoleted out for similar reasons such as lacking current technology, WiFi, Ethernet, Toslink and HDMI connections.


Price. Once the curtain goes down, the price advantage goes away. Let's face it, for the most part, we're all guilty; money equals sexy and high maintenance is sexier than budget choices.

All electronics have a point of diminishing returns. With amplifiers, the point is relatively much lower than other things. I would say the optimum bang for buck occurs between $500 and $1,000. In that price range you can get enough power and quality that spending more will get you little to no improvement.

Agreeing with you, I turn to "unproven/no patents", natural herbal supplements that lack the proven side-affects of patent drugs because of what you suggest in your above. But on the other hand, we're talking life and death as opposed to 50/50 choice in which Amp is mine. A subject I have spent time learning about, in the case of patent drugs, these drugs are developed over many years and then moved into human based clinical trials, based on FDA reviewed requirements. The outcome, being compared to placebo based control groups. As an example, without the drug, there's a ten percent chance you'll live or a ninety percent chance you're toast within a year. With a particular patent drug, your chances are improved to thirty percent and your chances of becoming toast have been reduced twenty percent. That's statistically significant. Which do you want, a one in ten chance of survival as you're always welcome to tell the medical practitioner to keep their prescription. Or you can hand the doctor a pen and say you like a one in three chance of survival better then the alternative.

Now on the other hand, when it comes to amplifiers, guessing is not proof of a product being better and if for the price, like flipping a penny, if the best one can do is 50/50 for an amplifier that's suppose to have a clear and noticeable difference, I'm not convinced admission to the party is worth the price; hence the ninety percent requirement. If it's a stated clear and noticeable difference, then it's a clear and noticeable difference one should be expecting, so ninety percent is not an unreasonable expectation. In the case of patent drugs, all that's being said is your chances of improvement have been improved and we all hang our faith on the hook known as the FDA and hope this is not a product that's been diluted by a crooked pharmacist or manufactured in a contaminated product manufacturing lab.

The point, comparing life saving patent drugs the FDA regulates the development of to that of the unregulated results of double-blind amplifier tests, is not a valid comparison; hence why you won't see published, peer reviewed documentation supporting claims of the superiority of one amplifier over that of another.


Pretty much, in your above, you've just described my life. And I agree, people are welcome to spend/buy anything they want and good for them. As an example, if John Travolta wants to park a jetliner in his front yard and it's code compliant, more power to him.



The line is crossed when someone makes claims that are not true and double-blind tests consistently show that once the curtain goes down, so does the accuracy of choice. The point, I haven't a wit of trouble with someone who wants to spend a $100k on their enviable system. What I have trouble with is someone saying their amplifier creates clear and concise sound quality improvements, to the point that they'd have no trouble picking their amplifier out of a mix of less expensive amplifiers when in fact, once the curtain goes down, immediately, so does the accuracy of their claim.

Note that amplifier manufactures don't publish information claiming their amplifiers are superior to others and note how their wording is clearly guarded commentary so as to prevent lawsuits surrounding false claims. Here's a link to Classe Audio, note how not a word of the superiority of their product over anybody else. Not picking on Classe when I post, all they say is, buy Classe, we have engineers fluent in analogue and digital design, we use quality parts and we're about performance. None of which is any different than what can be said about a hundred other amplifier manufactures.


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Edited by BeeMan458 - 10/19/12 at 8:16am

Fact is given similar specs, all amps sound the same. There are tests that confirm this, like how people could tell the difference between a $200
Yamaha avr and a $10,000 amp.
This will get you started:
http://www.hometheaterfocus.com/receivers/amplifier-sound-quality.aspx