Cost of Lessons Learnt

[DigiPete]

How much of your lifetime spend on audio gear has been written off as Lessons Learnt?

 

 

If you need a formulae:

 

A = Total lifetime spend

B = Purchasing price of current main system

(allow for more systems if you have more homes or separate audiophile and HT sys.)

C = Total recouped be selling used equipment

D = Total recouped if all your spare equipment was sold

 

 

Cost of Lessons Learnt (%) :

 

LL = (A-(B+C+D))*100/A

 

Yes, a guesstimate will do!

[wgscott]

I realize that most Europeans who speak English non-natively do so better than the average American, but in this case you have created an ambiguity: do you mean money spent or time spent?

[Jeff In San Diego]

I realize that most Europeans who speak English non-natively do so better than the average American, but in this case you have created an ambiguity: do you mean money spent or time spent?

 

Actually the confusion you are experiencing comes from trying to use your American parser on a different language (English).

 

I suffered the same failure, but quickly realized that since he used the string "learnt" (which is a word in the English language, but not in the American language), he probably was using the phrase "lifetime spend" as it is used in the English language as a properly formed past-tense noun referring to the total money you spent over the course of your lifetime (American translation of his proper English prose).

 

I won't fault him for his English...but I will fault him for making me feel like I'm at work (bunch of darned English speaking Indians there). Bloody good English, but annoying all the same.

 

He also invited me to do some math (or maths in English). Thanks once again for making me feel like I'm at work. I don't do math at work, but I am frequently confronted with people who are inviting me to do math, which is almost as bad.

[wgscott]

[esldude]

Kind of looked at your formula, after voting in the poll.

 

Don't know if this is what you want, but suspect it is.

 

My current main rig, if purchased new, would cost around $20k. I spent about 40% of that. Further, I mostly edged up to it over 25 years. I almost always purchased second hand. Sometimes made a bit, sometimes lost a bit (though that was usually after a few years use), and mostly came out about even. Which means I slowly, but surely increased what I had in my system. A little at a time as I could afford it.

 

My current system would liquidate somewhere very close to what I spent on it. So my total costs to have these various systems would be close to zero.

 

Now I have noted this elsewhere, but my subjective determination is that subjective sound quality is related to a 4th power function. Meaning to double how good a system is subjectively would require 16 times the money. So an odd combination of subjectivity and cold mathematics involved.

 

So to double my current system in terms of listener quality would require a new system of $320k. I have heard a system that is maybe two thirds this, and it seems to fit my curve of cost to quality.

 

I currently am just short of having two full systems of equipment on hand. Plus various other pieces acquired for peanuts and to satisfy my curious nature. Sources have become super affordable and of tremendous quality with CA developing. Everything else of quality is still expensive though offering more than ever before. The two that still cannot be done cheap are amps and speakers. If you choose a speaker that doesn't cause problems for a class D amp, you even can just narrow this down to speakers. There is not yet quite magic for speakers. Though digital room correction is getting close.

 

As a for instance I have used a room correction unit to play a two-way box speaker on one channel and a panel electrostat on the other. The listener would notice almost nothing remiss in this combination. Only at the very margins and at the very limits of what you can hear is there really a difference.

 

I think digital sources from computers are a done deal. Don't over-complicate it otherwise. I even think good class D amps are very close to state of the art. I would say to 2000 hz they loose nothing. Only above do they give up a bit to the finest available. Room correction can make basically decent speakers much closer to perfect than ever before. Things are good in ways never before possible. If we can keep audiophool tendencies at bay, we are living in a golden age of musical reproduction.

[esldude]

 

 

Damn you! Einstein was never that hefty.

 

He was much leaner, and so were his equations. They had to be as he felt he was deficient at the math. Plus he was a well known walker. Walkers rule!

 

I do sometimes wonder how I would have turned out if I had accepted that Princeton scholarship. I don't think I would have been another Einstein, but I doubt I would have left physics for engineering. Damn-it!

[wgscott]

I interviewed there for a faculty position. Very wacky place.

[wgscott]

0%. Until the Rel dies again.

[Encore]

I probably shouldn't get into a debate with Peter about math, but what is the resulting unit? What unit should we use for A? Is that what you're referring to, wg?

 

In any case, I don't really want to know :-D I don't mind having spent (speaking of which--shouldn't it be written with a t?) quite a bit of money on upgrades; part of the pleasure of this hobby is when an upgrade lets you discover new layers in wellknown music. But I readily admit that the cost has probably been higher than I like to think about ...

[DigiPete]

I realize that most Europeans who speak English non-natively do so better than the average American, but in this case you have created an ambiguity: do you mean money spent or time spent?

 

I do thank you for taking the time to really think about my question!

I am only asking about money, as I assume the time you spent was pure pleassure.

 

Both continental Europeans and Americans are non-native English speakers.

You are disadvantaged by the risk of confusing English with your native language, we are not.

I think you might be less confused, if you stopped using the term English about American English.

[ringenesherre]

Having bought most things used, I am very close to 0% - or even negative? I am surprised how well 10+ year old audio stuff sells if it is the right brands :-)

 

Cheers,

Peter

[Paul R]

I tend to not buy much used gear, but by your formula, about 11% of the total cost of everything I have spent would be written off.

 

About 6% would be in music that I just absolutely didn't like, or was simply horrible. For example, a Julie London disk from Half Price Books at $6 that was utterly unlistenable. Sounded like a dub from a cassette tape, and probably was. That's a write off to me, since I had to buy the same music from a reputable dealer to get a decent copy of it. (Well, by your formula, that would be a 30% write-off if that purchase were considered in isolation, since the replacement disk was more expensive.)

 

Overall, I think 11% isn't all that bad, especially considering the fun I had with it.

[wgscott]

For the record, I read it to my wife, a 100% Queen's English-speaking Brithole. I even did so with a Freddie Mercury accent.

[wgscott]

Do the Bose bookshelf speakers I bought for $300 at Sears in early 1997 count? I have them in the garage, hooked up to something that cost $100 at Costco and plays CDs and docks an iPod. That was my computer audio system (via cheap aux in analogue cable) until 2010…

[mav52]

Darn shame there is not a 10% box.

 

Now if this poll was for cars oh my

[DigiPete]

How much of your lifetime spend on audio gear has been written off as Lessons Learnt?

 

I put down down 40%, and I think that is very low and shows how carefully I have been investing in audio gear these past 30 years.

Then one put 60% and one 100%. The remaining 80% of the voters put 0 or 20%.

 

I hear all these people with piles and piles of old boxes and cables, are they just voices in my head?

We are your pals, not your wife, you can tell us the truth, it's not 20% - is it?

Are the tree of us (above 20%) the only ones not lying to ourselves, or do I have a totally warped perception of the average audiophile?

[Audio_ELF]

I put down down 40%, and I think that is very low and shows how carefully I have been investing in audio gear these past 30 years.

Then one put 60% and one 100%. The remaining 80% of the voters put 0 or 20%.

I was thinking similar DigiPete - that maybe less than 50% of the total spend I've made on HiFi is equipment still in general use.

 

Perhaps your formula is wrong...

 

I would (for example) say that equipment that isn't in regularly use is "lost" expense.

Equally if you're using several thousand worth of equipment just so you have some background music in your garage/workshop, that's similarly expense that is lost...

 

My own journey (We'll forget the Fisherprice record player I was started with)

Basic "midi" music centre in my teens, playing records and cassettes then moving to a CD player in the early/mid 90s. From there was moving around so had a Panasonic "lugable"

Late 90s, first real space of my own, bought a Sherwood AV amp and speakers (£400 spend I would estimate). That was traded at a 50% loss for a better Sony (another £400), then again loosing 50% as I moved on to a Marantz later. Speakers disposed off at 100% loss purchasing ex-dem B&W 600 series.

Next step up was for Rotel processor and poweramp. First the RSP1066, (£850) then later traded for a RSP1068 - estimated recoup £300 from the RSP1066 to put towards RSP1068.

From there added Musical Fidelity A1008, and then replaced the Rotel combo with a Yamaha (big mistake). Again when selling on lost around 50%

 

Anyway there you have it ... I would say 50% loss on purchases...

[DigiPete]

I was thinking similar DigiPete - that maybe less than 50% of the total spend I've made on HiFi is equipment still in general use.

 

Perhaps your formula is wrong...

 

Well, I included the:

 

D = Total recouped if all your spare equipment was sold

So it comes down to the definition of "spare equipment".

I personally included everything I do not use on a weekly basis.

[JohnMH]

I clicked the 0% selection. Perhaps I am fooling myself. I have a lot of old gear around, most of which is still usable even if not currently hooked up. I've gotten musical enjoyment out of virtually all of it. None of my stuff is very expensive. My most expensive components are an Oppo BDP 95 player at $1000 and pair of Bowers & Wilkins 801 Matrix Series II speakers acquired used for $1700 (+ the cost of a trip to SW Colorado to pick them up). My original large Advent speakers are still in use as is my kit-built Hafler DH 200 amp. Looking at Ebay it appears a lot of my stuff could be sold for as much or more than I paid.

[Jsmith]

I put 20% but I am closer to 10%. I think this is due to three reasons:

- I am still on some of my original pieces; speakers, rack, sub......

- I have resold all of my used stuff, except for a pair of Chord interconnects.

- I started cheap and got more expensive, so the current system price actually makes up most of the expense