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You have a point....

Posted by mkuller on January 2, 2005 at 11:16:37

In Reply to: Re: Have you taken a look at.... posted by Mr. Black on January 1, 2005 at 09:31:53:

> I'm familiar with those, but if those are the references, it should be a simple matter for the reviewer to say: "this new $500 CD player is every bit as good as the Class B rated XYZ-2000 at $1500," but they usually don't say that. Instead, they say: "this sounds like it costs twice the price," or "this is as good as players at twice the price.">

You have to remember that even the stuff on the RC lists has not been heard by all of the reviewers. In fact it has usually been heard by only one or two including JA. So a reviewer can only talk about the stuff he has actually reviewed previously or seriously auditioned.

> If the recommended components were used as true benchmarks at a given price, it should be stated that way in future articles.>

No need to state the obvious - the 'class A' RC are the benchmarks.

> Of course, to further confuse matters, the recommended components are often the ones which are referred to as being "better than other players/amps/etc at twice the price," which gets us nowhere.>

Sometimes that's the best they can do to put the sound quality of a component into perspective. You have to remember that comparing two components is sometimes like comparing apples to oranges because usually they will do different things well. To say one is better than the other implies that everyone is listening for the same specific qualities - which is not the case.

I always thought it was important in reviewing to compare the DUT with a well respected similar product in the same price range and compare and contrast the two. But it takes a lot more effort to procure the second component and comparing the two can take longer than you have with your deadlines. That's why I always preferred TAS' intercommentary system where a second reviewer weighs in with his opinion. As it stands, one of the best at doing this is Bob Reina (who used to review with me at TAS) in Stereophile with his small speaker @$500 or so reviews. He does a lot of comparisons which help put the product into perspective. Too bad the other reviewers can't do the same.

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