Absolutely true. Matsushita were amazing, their sheer scale of investment dollars was apparently limitless. Much bigger than Sony and way more diversified. The stuff they poured money into was just crazy. They built entire resorts here (in Queensland, Gold Coast Australia) with arguably some of the finest golf courses in our country, in the late 1980s.
For me however, their HiFi was so incredibly efficient and mass produced that it had no bespoke, over the top, personal attraction. I can't think of a single Technics product I really coveted. Sure, their continued committment to turntables in the face of digital was incredible. Their turntable legacy will never be surpassed IMO. Nobody produced a better line of quality TTs than Matsushita. (now Panasonic)
My favourite Japanese turntables are Technics, followed by Sony. The one that will outlive me of course is the venerable SL-1200mk2. As a very wise engineer and audio salesman once told my father in the 1960s "It's the moving parts, Doctor." All the clever automatic, motorized stuff dies (I should know, I'm so over fixing auto mechanism issues). My father's Empire 398a is still his favourite TT- totally manual, not even a cueing mech.
I just spent a weekend fixing a gorgeous Denon from the early 1980s that had spun up so fast it shook his desk and threatened to destroy itself. The wonders of early AC motor control...
Oyster is a way of making the case waterproof.Rolex. I don't know what an Oyster or oyster steel is is but it sure has a time-honored cache.
You confuse early adopters with luxury buyers. You are equating someone who buys a Rolls Royce, to someone who bought the first Tesla.
They are sealed, waterproofed with rubber gaskets. I believe all of the Rolex watches are sealed like an oyster except for the Cellini dress series. Possibly we should have waterproof audio components.Rolex. I don't know what an Oyster or oyster steel is is but it sure has a time-honored cache.
My POV is you open up a major can of worms if you wish to exclaim Chinese DAC brands as the "center of healthy competitive innovation."
At this point in digital audio the design of a quality audio DAC is neither a feat of great engineering or innovation. The burgeoning success of the Chinese DAC industry is mainly the result of utilizing chips and engineering that were pioneered or developed by other companies. Their advantage is they can produce in mass, and with quality, at price points that can virtually undercut any free-world produced (or based) product, and receive state sponsored benefits in doing so.
I would not associate the word "healthy" with that. Yes, most certainly, it is a direct, immediate and major boon to the free world consumer, as I indicated in my initial comments. But the indirect consequences can certainly be debated, which I will briefly undertake.
Now that these Chinese DAC companies have secured a major share of the low cost free-world marketplace, and eliminated or avoided the middle man in doing so, their next strategy is to focus on producing higher cost DACs in order to fully capitalize on the $500 to $1,200 market segment. One also cannot neglect the fact the Chinese DAC/Hi-Fi companies also enjoy an ever-expanding consumer class and base within in their nation of 1.3 billion people, all hungry for such consumer goods. Thus their capabilities of scale are unequaled in manufacturing history.
If you are a free-world independent company how do you survive against that? Mainly in three ways: 1) you move your manufacturing to China or another cheap labor market to contain costs; 2) you focus more, if not exclusively, on high-end, expensive products aimed at a smaller but affluent target audience; 3) through M&A you aggregate with one-time rivals as a way to achieve more scale; or 4) you work a combination of 1-4. In the long run you still stand a good chance of loosing.
I happen to see that as the antithesis of healthy competitive innovation.
Early adopter vs. luxury buyer is a most valid point, but I think the early digital/DAC buyers were adopters who also had cash. I think that is often the case in consumer products. In the case of Tesla, most initial buyers were in the upper end of the income brackets, and that is still mostly true today. I bought my first CD player, one of the early cheaper Technics models, for around $300 in the early1980s. The silent background and dynamic range were simply stunning. I was in graduate school and had no money to speak of, but the listening was glorious over my old EPI 100s and HK amplifier. I could not afford to be an early adopter, as CD players were initially quite expensive, but when the price hit mass market levels, I was all over it.
http://aries-cerat.comThe audio equivalent would be buying multi-kilobuck amps that sound worse (both sighted and blind) than cheap stereo receivers, but doing so because they look cool.
What's amazing about high-priced mechanical watches is that they are all far worse at the their one actual function, measuring time, than any $20 quartz watch from the drug store. Reviews of them (at sites like hodinkee, wornandwound, ablogtowatch, etc etc) don't even bother to check their time-keeping performance. It's all about looks, and only looks.
The audio equivalent would be buying multi-kilobuck amps that sound worse (both sighted and blind) than cheap stereo receivers, but doing so because they look cool.
Would love to know the pricing on these things - to my eye they don't look cool at all. But i imagine they're crazy expensive.
... pass the ASR Purity Test.
Gotta serve the classic "Electric Kool-Aid"!We should throw a big party and ask "Can you pass the ASR purity test?" We could invite a band to play...
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Actually they really do measure the accuracy of elite movements but the whole chronometer thing is meaningless. But you are right that Casios and Timex models outperform mechanical watches, even good ones. This is especially so with chronographs. But the craftsmanship is amazing and we see such handmade products very rarely now.What's amazing about high-priced mechanical watches is that they are all far worse at the their one actual function, measuring time, than any $20 quartz watch from the drug store. Reviews of them (at sites like hodinkee, wornandwound, ablogtowatch, etc etc) don't even bother to check their time-keeping performance. It's all about looks, and only looks.
The audio equivalent would be buying multi-kilobuck amps that sound worse (both sighted and blind) than cheap stereo receivers, but doing so because they look cool.
John, what was the pre-and-power they did, mid to late 70s, olive green, that looked a bit military? I remember really wanting one of those.
If you look at traditional Chinese crafts like calligraphy and pottery they are amazing. I worked for a Chinese company for a couple of years and learned much about the way they do business. They have a completely different way of looking at things than we do. Their perspective and many different customs leads to racially different business ethics. It is really something to do business with them on a daily basis. If I had to sum it all up I would say that winning, being successful, and amassing wealth are prized above everything. They have an immense work ethic and dedication. I don't think most Westerners understand that the Chinese are capable of making superbly crafted products when called upon to do so. It is wrong to think they make only cheap shoddy products, and they take considerable pride in their better efforts. They also have great appreciation of high quality products from the West. If the West can't measure up to them we will all be buying Chinese audio equipment soon enough. Incidentally, here in the West we appropriated many Chinese innovations in pottery, namely in 17th century Germany. Now is is just roles reversed.It seems a little hippocritical to continuously bash china for supposedly stealing the bread from the mouths of corporate America when it was them themselves that raced to move all their production to Asia, the Philippines, Vietnam etc. Because it enabled them to escape paying a living wage and skirt environmental constraints at home.... And, often willing to share production methods as part of the deals they made.
Is china a bad actor? Sometimes. Are they worse than any of the western business that willingly created the situations they now find themselves in?
1890s: "made in Germany" is seen as cheap stuff, possibly copied from English manufacturersIf the West can't measure up to them we will all be buying Chinese audio equipment soon enough. Incidentally, here in the West we appropriated many Chinese innovations in pottery, namely in 17th century Germany. Now is is just roles reversed.