tokyo john wrote:

Audio Note has released a turntable called the Ginga which costs 60 thousand US dollars in Japan. (if you google Audio Note Ginga images you will find it very easily). My first reaction was pure cynicism, as Audio Note does traditionally price its products aimed at Russian oligarchs, but given how prices of tonearms have gone up so much (prices of Dynavector, SME arms have doubled over the past 10 years), it is possible that it costs a lot of money to bring out a turntable like this today (ok, if not 60k, maybe 25k?). Limited quantities, precision machining, and the small number of machining companies who will take on the job etc. all make it lot more expensive than 20 years ago to do the same thing. People who own Micros in good condition shoud rethink what price they should ask for when they sell!? Digressing a bit, I have no idea if the Ginga is as good as a top class Micro, but in the latest Stereo Sound (Japanese hi-end audio magazine), one of the reviewers (and all Japanese audio reviewers are pretty familiar with Micros) said he approached the turntable with great skeptism but was actually impressed by the sound (given the price, he ought to!). Audio Note hardly advertises, so I think there is much less favoritism at play compared to say a product from Sony. Other thing to note is that the founder of Audio Note, Kondo, has passed away and the company is now being run by people who used to work for him. I have heard how the current folks at Koetsu (son of the founder no less), has a more business-like approach to things and many Japanese swear by the "first generation Koetsus". Coming back to the original theme, much manufacturing has moved out to China, so until the Chinese get serious about audio, and are able to do very high quality machining, prices of tomearms and turntables have no place to go but up. Since gold has already gone up so much in price, buying a couple of Gingas may be a good way to hedge against inflation :-)

The problem with High-End price makers is not that they can’t put the price tag on Sound but that they do not truly know what Sound is. I am very much not kidding. Industry does not sell Sound but talks about Sound, the promise of gratification that has absolutely nothing to do with Sound. In this environment price might be anything and become very much irrelevant. Ironically I learned something from my real-estate buy-side broker. He has a notion that each house has a value for me, not the price that is being asked for the house. I think it a very right attitude. Yesterday I was asking for a new cable:

http://www.GoodSoundClub.com/TreeItem.aspx?PostID=12611 

I said that I would not pay for this more then $150. It is not because that I can’t not afford more but it is because that in context of my playback and the results that I get from my analog I do have a feel that the value of this cable shall not be more than $150.  If somebody makes cables that coast $10.000 then good for them and they need to learn how to make the very same cable to coast $150, not to mention that we all know that all expensive cables cost a few dollars to produce and all super-cable prices is just an industry pump up.

So, how much a very good TT shell cost in a playback of a person who would like to get good analog sound? That is very interesting question. As we enter into association of price for the features and price for useable result. Did you pay attention that it NEVER was done by industry? Wonder why?

About the new Condo Ginga TT – I do not know a lot about it. From their web site is said that it is oil-bearing and has sort SME tonearm, I do not know anything else. I personally would challenge the fact that $60K TT has an accommodation just for one tonearm. However, it is not $60K TT. From this $60K of the retail price 10%-15% is the “street” accommodation, 50%-60% is dealers mark up, 10%-15% is distributor mark up, 10%-20% is industry accommodations. What is left? $5K-$7K cash that Condo would get? Thai is pretty much how much a good  TT shall coast to begin with. Would you agree that sound of tonearm, sound of cartridge and sound of phonostage is as important as the sound of TT? If one pays $2K for cartridge then why he shell pay more for TT if the sound of cartridge is MORE important than the sound of TT?

As I said – a very little common sense and the whole illusionary BS that the industry built around itself despairs like a mirage… 

Wow, price inflation in TTs were a lot worse than I thought! (more than 400% in nominal prices in the example of Goldmund).

You are right, the prices in audio seem a riddle wrapped in a mystery within an enigma. As a manufacturer, it is almost a disgrace: Supposedly Roy Gandy of Rega said that it would cost more to make the original Linn Ittok tonearm (maybe 1000 dollars in 1980, than the Linn Ekos arm which probably cost more than 4000 just a few years ago?). In cars afterall, prices have been quite flat and content has gone up and up (cars are safer, can go faster etc). But then autos is a more competitive industry and can mean life and death in some situations.

As an investor, my job is to figure out prices, and I have to confess, part of my fascination with audio since I was in 8th grade, was apart from the sound, my fascination with the high prices. I loved to think about the kind of micro-tolerance machining and engineering that must have gone into an SME magnesium tonearm or Goldmund Reference TT (I was a lot less cynical as a child).

I tell you that investing in companies is so simple in comparison! You just have to make an educated guess about how much cash will be generated by the business over its lifetime based on its 20 year track record. Then its all about understanding human behaviour and mental discipline. But I digress.

I have also thought hard about prices for tailor made suits (6000 dollars, or 30 times more expensive than a budget suit), swiss watches which cost tens of thousands (also 30 times a timex), and European luxury cars (Tata Nano is 3k, increase the price 50% to comply with Euro safety standards, and 30 times more for an S class Mercedes). No doubt for all of these a big component of price is purely the lack of economies of scale and productivity, never mind better finish and better materials. The productivity side is basically the lack of division of labor (could be people or industrial organization), high labor costs (European or Japanese vs China or Vietnam) etc. Compared to these things, prices in audio are maybe not so out of whack; all of these low volume products need a very high price to entice entrepreneurs to provide them. Risk of failure is higher too. Then depending of the honesty of the product itself, the providers will be crooks or honest businessmen. This is maybe a generous view?

In terms of prices that people are willing to pay.....even though I was fascinated by magnesium tonearms and Micro Seiki bearings, I could never imagine paying more than 10k for a full audio system. But my exposure to suits, watches and cars have made me become more forgiving. I have also become wealthier and less price sensitive. More than that though, I have worked in many big and famous banks and also worked for myself, so I know what kind of people work in big companies and how only mediocre ideas make it up through the organization (stuff like CDOs and subprime mortgage backed securities). I can therefore say that a small team of motivated and talented individuals, who are happy to go with new ideas (which are more risky), can put out products and services that despite their high costs (much of which is due to the fact that they are a low volume business) will be more satisfying IF the buyer is not price sensitive. Unfortunately there are so many phonies, crooks and charlatans in audio (same as banks) which give even the honest entrepreneur/innovator a bad name.

John, a few corrections for start

First of all the gullible and moronic are not interchangeable words and I never use one instead of other. Second Audio Note Ginga does not look like traditional Micro. It has oil suspension and God knows what else. I do not know what Ginga has and what principles it uses. One of the greatest despoilment is that audio media cretins mane public to think about design concepts when they approach turntable but not about the sonic characteristics. Did you ever hears/read any TT designer who was taking/thinking about TT in terms of Sound? I never heard it. They will talk about vibrations, momentums, space technologies, laser trimming and % of distortions but I still did not see TT people who think it terms of Sound. I personally witnessed a demonstration when a team of VERY expensive TT (the most expensive and the most glorified in today market) presented this TT. After a few bars I asked to stop demo as the hugely sophisticated TT clearly ran at slower speed. The designer team was very surprised that I was saying such foolishness. I was very surprised that they did not recognize it. Then they spent a hale night to fix the damn TT…

Many of today High-end products are just a worthless show off what might be sold instead of furnishing of what sound needs. I am not in position to criticize TTs. It is very difficult to do and I would never undertake to review Turntables. Sometime it takes years to get proper sound from a TT or a cartridge and I can only to be sorry about the industry idiots who have a few TT, arms and needles during each month. Anyone who understand anything in analog would know how much superficial and phony the feedback of such idiots might be. The problem however is that the sound of TT does not sell the TT. The sale will come from an asshole US distributor of Kondo would sit on phone and will call to his buttered up clientele. It is possible that that the new Ginga is an OK TT, the problem is that no one will know it because it will be sold to ignorant people and by via dirty methods.  The very same Kondo US distributor when he picked up a distribution of Lowther driver with a back loaded horn 10 years ago was lobbing Audio Asylum Owner to delete from AA archives any negative posts about single speaker drivers (and they did it!!!) The very same whore-distributor will tomorrow "decide" if the Ginga TT sounds good.  I hope Ginga is heavy TT and I hope that distributor-asshole will break his back lifting it up…