What's your vote for where the Law of Diminishing returns starts for tower speakers?

[Noske]

The law of diminishing marginal returns has nothing to do with subjective preferences.

What is being considered is the production side - a measurable metric (name it) that is the concern of the design engineer who is wishing to optimise their tower speaker, given constraints.

(Digression on constraints - sometimes Amir mentions good for its "class", or, could do better - and I think that is what he means. There are many different classes (curves, as seen in at least one diagram), not just one class or curve. With all due respect, the poll question is deceiving - it is looking at absolutes, not marginals. I would not have been surprised if each category received 20% each - they are sort of different classes, with overlap ).

The engineer could instal a component making it 20% more expensive but the tower speaker measures only a couple % better. Diminishing marginal returns. The inflection point has well passed.

Perhaps the manufacturer may offer it as a premium version of the basic model.

Preferences - some people will prefer the premium version, others don't care. Doesn't matter. Preferences have nothing to do with marginal returns in production.

 

[Heinrich]

The law of diminishing marginal returns has nothing to do with subjective preferences.

What is being considered is the production side - a measurable metric (name it) ...

Ja, "name it". There is no metric that would be relevant for an individual consumer.Or, please name it.

If my recollection doesn't trick me, that would be anyway "decision making on a multiscalar parameter set", around that lines. Still in research, in economics, hence no science and of course either fruitless or ..., you name it ;-)

 

[ahofer]

Somewhere after the Revel f226be...

 

[Blumlein 88]

Ja, "name it". There is no metric that would be relevant for an individual consumer.Or, please name it.

If my recollection doesn't trick me, that would be anyway "decision making on a multiscalar parameter set", around that lines. Still in research, in economics, hence no science and of course either fruitless or ..., you name it ;-)

You are just trying to muddy the waters. The original poster obviously had in mind the sound performance. Yes, one may have other factors for an actual purchase and no speaker is made totally without consideration of appearance. But the idea of the poll is where does the curve flatten dramatically so that spending more money results in very small increments of sound quality.

 

[a4eaudio]

...
Preferences - some people will prefer the premium version, others don't care. Doesn't matter. Preferences have nothing to do with marginal returns in production.

You just changed the topic of the thread. The term "diminishing marginal returns in production" has not appeared until your post above.

From a technical/engineering point of view the production function is in terms or real inputs and outputs. Wood, MDF, paper, copper, plastic, labor hours, rent, electricity, etc. Preferences have nothing to do with this, so you are correct with respect to your newly introduced term.

But I'm pretty sure, based on the poll that is in dollars, that the OP is asking about the diminishing returns to some undefined measure of speaker quality per dollar spent. And that is based on the subjective preferences, for whatever that measure is.

EDIT: Additionally, the video on page 2 is related to production and real inputs. The production side of things is the supply curve, which is the marginal cost curve. But the equilibrium price we pay for a speaker (and that the producer receives) depends on the intersection of supply and demand. And the demand curve is based on subjective preferences.

 

[Heinrich]

You are just trying to muddy the waters. The original poster obviously had in mind the sound performance. ... very small increments of sound quality.

... speaker quality per dollar spent. And that is based on the subjective preferences, for whatever that measure is.

We cannot measure sound quality like we count dollars. As I said, best we have is Olive's score, but that is an ordinal scale, while dollars burn on a ratio scale (look that up, if feasible). Not the least the Olive scale is derived from averaged (!) individual takes on subjective preference. All that doesn't make sense in this context. So in what units to measure 'returns'?

Then I explained to some degree my subjectively motivated decision making. It is not your's, fine. Or do you object that I personally do not expect any returns from paying more than 2k for a pair? Not any. And I stated, that going lower may be possible on black fridays or so, but regularly I better stick with my 100% satisfaction. Conversely, no diminishing returns, for me, before 2k, then no returns anymore. I'm 'on the point', no need for a scale, mine is a go/no go. That is the truth. Ujhh, seem's I'm married ...

 

[traind]

I posit that diminishing returns start at the price point of the cheapest available tower speaker, well below $1000. Especially if you allow EQ.

Even the cheapest tower speaker is going to provide a huge listening improvement compared to no speaker. The incremental gain from the next most expensive speaker is going to be tiny in comparison

I agree in principle. There are complexities in how you can view this that many have offered as well but you have hit upon the heart of the issue.

I think the thread is subtly operating with different definitions of what a diminishing return is. Some people seem to refer to a threshold where you are getting no added value in sound quality vs. others who are thinking the threshold only has to be you are getting less sound quality increase per dollar spent. Can we all agree that if you double the cost of a speaker and do indeed get much better sound quality that it still may be a significant diminishing return despite the better quality?

For me it is helpful to think of a situation where we can be a bit more objective. Let's imagine we can purchase a machine that lifts a 300 pound weight for $1000. If all other variables, like reliability, speed, height, equipment size, energy consumption etc are equal (and they rarely are irl) then it is a diminishing return if I pay $2000 for a machine that can lift less than 600 pounds. Doubling the investment but getting less than double the performance. Does that make sense? Is that essentially correct?

If the weight I need to lift is often more than 300 pounds then this diminishing return does not matter much because the cheaper machine does not meet my needs; unless perhaps I can break the lifted material into smaller chunks. If I can't do that then my diminishing return may not actually start until I spend $2000 and get the specs I need. But your diminishing return may start at $1000 because your needs threshold is lower.

So how do we apply this dynamic to speakers? Do the measures ASR uses lend themselves in any way to quantifying performance value? Or is the final analysis always going to be subjective? And what of a tower speaker, what is the expectation of that vs a bookshelf? Base response? Volume?

Almost everyone has a smartphone, the diminishing returns idea for playing music may actually starts there for most consumers.

 

[a4eaudio]

We cannot measure sound quality like we count dollars. As I said, best we have is Olive's score, but that is an ordinal scale, while dollars burn on a ratio scale (look that up, if feasible).

For the OPs poll question, he clearly means sound quality - which was left undefined.
To apply the concept of diminishing marginal returns, you must have a quantitative measure.
Not sure that Olive's score is the best we have. Is it really better than the average number of stars from Amazon ratings? But I would argue that there is not a very good quantitative measure, and the thread and poll are mostly for subjective fun. And this is just an audio forum, so that is okay.

But if you focus on clearly quantifiable attributes - max SPL, low frequency extension (F6), THD, etc. then the marginal improvement is easily measurable and you could plot these on a graph. It would show technically diminishing returns starting at some very low level - I'd guess $100 or less for finished commercial speakers. At some point you are probably just paying for more exotic cabinetry and the marginal returns would become zero ($20-30K?). I wouldn't be surprised that at some point ($50K) you actually have negative returns, as the speaker becomes much more of a furniture/art piece and actually performs objectively worse.

Then I explained to some degree my subjectively motivated decision making. It is not your's, fine. Or do you object that I personally do not expect any returns from paying more than 2k for a pair? ...Conversely, no diminishing returns, for me, before 2k, then no returns anymore. I'....

The returns are an objective, quantifiable thing...Preference Score, SPL, THD, etc. They are not up to you and you have no influence on them. The subjective preference for that quality attribute, and willingness to pay, is up to you. Aggregate everyone up and you get the market demand curve and the equilibrium price. Every single consumer then has the go/no-go decision to buy or not. Everyone whose preference for the quality attribute is less than the market price don't buy the speaker and those whose preference is for that much quality or more, buy a speaker.

 

[a4eaudio]

...

I think the thread is subtly operating with different definitions of what a diminishing return is. Some people seem to refer to a threshold where you are getting no added value in sound quality vs. others who are thinking the threshold only has to be you are getting less sound quality increase per dollar spent.

That is the problem with the thread as posted. The law of diminishing marginal returns is an actual thing with a definition, but I think it was intended to be a more casual, fun excercise.

Can we all agree that if you double the cost of a speaker and do indeed get much better sound quality that it still may be a significant diminishing return despite the better quality?
...

No, because that is not the definition. If you double the cost of the speaker and get more than double the sound quality (whatever "double the sound quality means") then you have increasing returns, and if you get less than double the sound quality you have decreasing returns. "Much better" isn't a number.

 

[a4eaudio]

That is the problem with the thread as posted. The law of diminishing marginal returns is an actual thing with a definition, but I think it was intended to be a more casual, fun exercise.

I'm fairly confident that no one is all that interested in a technically correct thread about diminishing marginal returns.

I'd suggest the thread question and poll is really "What price range are you personally unwilling to exceed in order to get incrementally better performance for tower speakers".

 

[JiiPee]

While "the law of diminishing returns" has a specific meaning in classical economics theory, it is also colloquially used in describing a common phenomenon where the customer gets progressively less and less added value per dollar as the price of the product increases.

Even though the name of the forum contains the word "Science", let's not be anal about the terminology.

 

[traind]

That is the problem with the thread as posted. The law of diminishing marginal returns is an actual thing with a definition, but I think it was intended to be a more casual, fun excercise.



No, because that is not the definition. If you double the cost of the speaker and get more than double the sound quality (whatever "double the sound quality means") then you have increasing returns, and if you get less than double the sound quality you have decreasing returns. "Much better" isn't a number.

I guess I failed to connect with that second comment. Within the context of my post--- much better was intended as a reference to how people often discuss sound quality; a "better speaker", worth more money to many audiophiles but one that is probably not actually double in sound quality.

 

[DanielT]

The big challenge or problem with HiFi is mostly that an increased price is in no way a guarantee of increased performance. There are countless examples of that. I'll give you one example.
#1:
What's the deal with Audio Note speakers ?
They have so many models and they're not exactly cheap (can cost over $100K)

Audio Note speakers

What's the deal with Audio Note speakers ? They have so many models and they're not exactly cheap (can cost over $100K) And it seems they're "legendary " speakers on other audiophile forums. What's so special about them ?

audiosciencereview.com

The Audio Note speaker is based on the Snell Type E/III design principle (two-way, 8 inch woofer, wide baffle). You can see the similarity between them:

Backwards directed , rear-firing tweeter, Snell Type E / III?

Anyone have experience with such speakers? What are the advantages and disadvantages? Grateful for response. Snell Type E / III, just to show an example of what I mean:

audiosciencereview.com

Snell Type E/III measures better than Audio Note . A pair of Snell Type E/III in really good condition, fully functional, costs around $500. Give or take a hundred dollars.
(a little bit more if we talk about mint condition)

Additionally, if we add in the classic Dynaco A25 speaker, Waxx says this in #784 in the Audio Note thread:

The difficult part is the cabinet, where Dynaco and Snell used resistive loaded or aperiodic vented cabinets to get low bass. Something both Audio Note and Devore don't do, probally because they don't understand how that works...

 

[MattHooper]

This is a fairly mushy question.

I don’t know specifically where I would place the law of diminishing returns kicking in.

But I’m quite sure it kicks in well below what I paid for many of my most cherished loudspeakers. (just like it would kick in well below what I paid for my turntable.)

So in terms of value, as somebody pointed out earlier, there’s going to be some subjectivity in terms of what one person may value more than another. Once the law of diminishing returns kick in one person may not think the smaller increments of change matter that much much to them.
To others, it will matter more.

I fully recognize that there are much cheaper loudspeakers that compete well (and even out compete) in all sorts of performance metrics with my current sets of floor standing speakers.

But the increments in “ improvement” that I personally care about are very important to me, and so it was worth paying for.

Whenever I listen to or try various cheaper loudspeakers, it reminds me of why I spent the extra for mine.

 

[Sokel]

The big challenge or problem with HiFi is mostly that an increased price is in no way a guarantee of increased performance. There are countless examples of that. I'll give you one example.
#1:
What's the deal with Audio Note speakers ?
They have so many models and they're not exactly cheap (can cost over $100K)
View attachment 438023

Audio Note speakers

What's the deal with Audio Note speakers ? They have so many models and they're not exactly cheap (can cost over $100K) And it seems they're "legendary " speakers on other audiophile forums. What's so special about them ?

audiosciencereview.com

The Audio Note speaker is based on the Snell Type E/III design principle (two-way, 8 inch woofer, wide baffle). You can see the similarity between them:

View attachment 438026

Backwards directed , rear-firing tweeter, Snell Type E / III?

Anyone have experience with such speakers? What are the advantages and disadvantages? Grateful for response. Snell Type E / III, just to show an example of what I mean:

audiosciencereview.com

Snell Type E/III measures better than Audio Note . A pair of Snell Type E/III in really good condition, fully functional, costs around $500. Give or take a hundred dollars.
(a little bit more if we talk about mint condition)

Additionally, if we add in the classic Dynaco A25 speaker, Waxx says this in #784 in the Audio Note thread:

The difficult part is the cabinet, where Dynaco and Snell used resistive loaded or aperiodic vented cabinets to get low bass. Something both Audio Note and Devore don't do, probally because they don't understand how that works...

We have to get to a consensus though (not very optimistic about it but still) about what a tower speaker is.
Cause surely something with a 1" tweeter and and 5" midbass is not, is just an elongated bookshelf only it has a cabinet instead of a base (yes,the cabinet can help but miracles don't happen) .

So it will be unfair to compare price tags of it with a 3-way, it's obviously a lot cheaper to design, built, etc.
It's much more fair to compare 2-ways, or 3-ways not matter the form.

8361A for example is really small compared with other 3-ways but their price tag suggests that that's their territory, and rightfully so.

Now,there are older stuff with big drivers that could not be made as bookshelf or glorious 2 meter high horn speakers which are essentially 2-way but that's not the norm these days.

(the unfortunate imitation of the Snell you posted has no category, maybe for laughs? Although it's convenient for a fast write-off around December describing it as "conference announcement system" )

 

[kemmler3D]

So, on the production side, there might be accelerating returns to marginal investment, at least if you believe (as I sometimes do depending on my mood) that the multi-kilobuck speakers have higher margins than mainstream speakers. Do we really think Magico is making a paltry 20% margin or anything like that?

As for the varying definitions of "diminishing returns" in the thread, here's my take:

-Where you start to get less than 1 unit of "better sound" per additional unit of money: ~$200 (my reference point: JBL 305p)
-Where additional money gets you improvements that are more of a matter of opinion or starting to be hard to discern at all: $5,000 (KEF LS60)
-Where additional money gets you zero sonic improvement at all: $65,000 (Genelec 8381)

Certainly debatable, but this is my hot take.

This is talking about speakers, though. If you shift the discussion to IEMs it's very interesting. I think diminishing returns probably start at $20 and you're in a purely stochastic price/quality model by $300 or so? I remember listening to a $>1K 16-driver IEM and thinking it sounded like comb filtered soup.

 

[Mart68]

But the increments in “ improvement” that I personally care about are very important to me, and so it was worth paying for.

Whenever I listen to or try various cheaper loudspeakers, it reminds me of why I spent the extra for mine.

Exactly. The returns don't diminish until they get to the point where you personally don't think it's worth spending the additional.

In my own 'end game speaker quest' that turned out to be $6K. I could have spent more, I was prepared to spend more. In the end I didn't personally think it was worth it.

For others it may be more - or less.

 

[Sokel]

LS60)
-Where additional money gets you zero sonic improvement at all: $65,000 (Genelec 8381)

I think it's the complete opposite:




SPL is the highest audible improvement combined with all the other sonic virtues.
And I don't mean any continuous silliness, I mean the ability to play even the highest CF tracks which once you listen too you can't forget.

Now add to this the easy integration with rooms that cuts a huge cost (it won't be perfect as mounting but still) ,solved amplification, versatile modes, etc.

 

[2Sunny]

Not definitive by any means, but certainly interesting.

Yesterday I discovered the SPINorama.org website (thank you eddantes!), and wanted to better understand what the graphs mean and Google directed me to a YouTube video put out by Floyd Toole which I watched in it's entirety last night. Here's a gentleman who spent his entire life studying the "science" of loud speakers and at 1:03:30 he says this about a pair of $1800 speakers:

"For $1800 a pair if you were fortunate enough to go and find those and buy them you ended up with something that is dangerously close to something that is the best that can be done. Period. Dangerously close. Then, certainly. If you were to pick actually what was the Point of Diminishing returns would be, it's clear that would be an example of it because honest to God you could pay ten times that or more (and) not get as much in terms of timbral excellence and accuracy that portrays."

I'm not a historian of speakers so I don't know how many speakers of that day had data like that, but today as I peruse SPINorama data I find many speakers with similar graphs in the sub $2k arena. This is not to negate anyone's opinion here at all, but I must admit it does give me some sense of personal satisfaction that an audio scientist puts the number of where the Law of Diminishing returns starts for speaker purchases in the neighborhood of $2k.

taken from an earlier post:

 

[eddantes]

Not definitive by any means, but certainly interesting.

Yesterday I discovered the SPINorama.org website (thank you eddantes!), and wanted to better understand what the graphs mean and Google directed me to a YouTube video put out by Floyd Toole which I watched in it's entirety last night. Here's a gentleman who spent his entire life studying the "science" of loud speakers and at 1:03:30 he says this about a pair of $1800 speakers:

"For $1800 a pair if you were fortunate enough to go and find those and buy them you ended up with something that is dangerously close to something that is the best that can be done. Period. Dangerously close. Then, certainly. If you were to pick actually what was the Point of Diminishing returns would be, it's clear that would be an example of it because honest to God you could pay ten times that or more (and) not get as much in terms of timbral excellence and accuracy that portrays."

I'm not a historian of speakers so I don't know how many speakers of that day had data like that, but today as I peruse SPINorama data I find many speakers with similar graphs in the sub $2k arena. This is not to negate anyone's opinion here at all, but I must admit it does give me some sense of personal satisfaction that an audio scientist puts the number of where the Law of Diminishing returns starts for speaker purchases in the neighborhood of $2k.

View attachment 438179

taken from an earlier post:


View attachment 438182

@2Sunny - The speakers Mr. Toole is speaking about are likely the Infinity IL60. They can be had for ~$300-500 on the used market. The challenge with the IL60 is the powered subwoofers (likely failing point)... So to me, the ones I am after (purely for academic reasons) are the IL40 (same as the IL60, less subwoofer).

To put into context of this thread, if we include the used market, PODR can be as low as $500. But if we strictly keep it to new and current - I'd agee, $2K buys you a hella lot of speaker, and spending more is almost purely for aesthetics and bragging rights.