[net.audio] a possibly silly question

ark@alice.UucP (Andrew Koenig) (09/26/85)

I see in Audio magazine's annual equipment guide that the most expensive
phono cartridge on the market is the Kiseki Lapis Lazuli.  It costs
$3500, and a replacement stylus is $2100.

Now, if you figure a stylus lasts at most 600 hours before it must
be replaced, you discover that it costs $3.50 per hour to play
records!  Wouldn't that affect your enjoyment of the music?

dep@allegra.UUCP (Dewayne Perry) (09/26/85)

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add to the cost of tht cartridge, a turntable for $6k and Wilson
Audio speakers at approx $45k and the amps and preamp for $?10k.
With an expected useful lifetime of say 5 years - 61k/5
is then an additional $12.2k for that 600 hundred hours - say
2 hours a day -  thts approx $26 per hour.  If you are willing
to spend that much, you can sit in the front row every night
at Carnegie Hall (or you favorite place) for less than that
and have the real thing, not a cheap -:) imitation.

Dewayne

rfg@hound.UUCP (R.GRANTGES) (09/27/85)

[]
Well, Carnegie Hall, perhaps, and other cheap fare, but people who
spend that much on audio (are there really any) would want to hear
Springsteen (sp?), the thankful (grateful?) dead, and other such
top drawer stuff and $26 an hour might save them money.

:-)


-- 

"It's the thought, if any, that counts!"  Dick Grantges  hound!rfg

greg@olivee.UUCP (Greg Paley) (09/30/85)

> I see in Audio magazine's annual equipment guide that the most expensive
> phono cartridge on the market is the Kiseki Lapis Lazuli.  It costs
> $3500, and a replacement stylus is $2100.
> 
> Now, if you figure a stylus lasts at most 600 hours before it must
> be replaced, you discover that it costs $3.50 per hour to play
> records!  Wouldn't that affect your enjoyment of the music?

Probably not, if your financial situation is such that you can spend
$3500 on a cartridge in the first place.  In fact, I have a feeling that
a large percentage of those people who can afford such things have them
for the sake of having them rather than to listen to them.  In this case,
their enjoyment won't be affected at all, and it will take a long time
before they need to replace the stylus.

	- Greg Paley

rcd@opus.UUCP (Dick Dunn) (10/01/85)

> Well, Carnegie Hall, perhaps, and other cheap fare, but people who
> spend that much on audio (are there really any) would want to hear
> Springsteen (sp?), the thankful (grateful?) dead, and other such
> top drawer stuff and $26 an hour might save them money.

Hmph.  The Dead in prime time (New Years, a loooong show) have barely hit
$25.  A decent opera ticket in Denver is >= $50.  $15 is closer.

If you're gonna figure cost, figure transportation too (amortizing the cost
of the car just as you amortize the cost of a cartridge).  You should also
figure in insurance and/or theft probability for the ultra-hi-end audio
system--and for the car parked in the nasty high crime district in the
center of the city that you have to go to for substantial live music.
-- 
Dick Dunn	{hao,ucbvax,allegra}!nbires!rcd		(303)444-5710 x3086
   ...If you plant ice, you're gonna harvest wind.