Big Box Brands VS. High End

[Speed-Freak 0]

Greetings Folks,

 

I was in to mobile audio around year 2000. Back then the Big Box Brands like you found at Best Buy were OK but the high end companies had a significant boost in performance. Lower noise floors, met rated power output, better thermal management, and cleaner sound. Today I see that the mainstream companies products pricing has DROPPED dramatically. I wonder if quality has suffered as well. Let me give an example...

 

Sounstream 15 years ago was a high end company that made top shelf products. Today they are owned my the corporate overlords and have mainstream products. This amp caught my attention for price, performance, and looks.

http://soundstream.com/product/tn4-900d/

 

Has the technology gotten so cheap that watts truly are watts and everything sounds basically the same?

[Billy Jack 145]

2 hours ago, Speed-Freak said:

Greetings Folks,

 

I was in to mobile audio around year 2000. Back then the Big Box Brands like you found at Best Buy were OK but the high end companies had a significant boost in performance. Lower noise floors, met rated power output, better thermal management, and cleaner sound. Today I see that the mainstream companies products pricing has DROPPED dramatically. I wonder if quality has suffered as well. Let me give an example...

 

Sounstream 15 years ago was a high end company that made top shelf products. Today they are owned my the corporate overlords and have mainstream products. This amp caught my attention for price, performance, and looks.

http://soundstream.com/product/tn4-900d/

 

Has the technology gotten so cheap that watts truly are watts and everything sounds basically the same?

No watts ain't just watts. Take a 1000 watt dual Walmart amp and switch it out for a audison or arc and see what a huge difference in sound it makes. But power has got cheaper that for sure. I paid almost a thousand in 96 for two Phoenix gold amps M100 and M50 and they barely made 1k and 500 watts. Now you can get 5k watts for the same money. But for some reason the market has moved away from subs that are efficient and don't need much power to get loud to huge monster subs that need 3 alternators worth of juice to realize there true potential. But back to your question a watt is not just a watt there are other factors that make a good amp sound better then a cheap flea market amp. ie damping factor, crossover slopes, and little things like what kind of metals are used in them.  If all amps where the same everybody would just buy hifonics or audiopipe 

[bluedreamz 15]

it's gotten cheaper because of demand and popularity