Not at all. It is all just fashion. The idea of believable music replay in the home is no less valid than it ever has been. The conventional hi-fi market is largely eating itself offering ever more expensive products to an ever-diminishing and increasingly ageing long-established user-base, but the music scene is alive and well. Just so many amazing new music in all genres and on all formats. Those who want high-quality audio in the home have never had more options as the used market is in rude health, classic kit is now largely documented in the public domain and easily serviceable. The pro-audio sector also provides amazing options in the active speaker domain.
I'd like to agree with you but if my experince is anything to go by we are an endangered species.
My daughters and their friends enjoy music, especially live but have no and I do mean no interest in hi-fi.
I'd like to agree with you but if my experince is anything to go by we are an endangered species.
My daughters and their friends enjoy music, especially live but have no and I do mean no interest in hi-fi.
All my friends growing up had something to play records in a room with loudspeakers. Today kids into music stream Spotify and use quality headphones to listen to music. They seem perfectly happy with a Bluetooth speaker if listening with friends. The idea of a rack of components with large loudspeakers and another source besides streaming has got to be a very very small percentage of people below forty years old. Sonos, Apple, Amazon and Google speakers with voice and multi room capability you would find with the more upscale user.
The large record collections we have today will be of the same interest in twenty years as a VCR tape collection is today. If it wasn’t for the baby boomers, the market for legacy hi-fi and LP’s would be significantly smaller.
Yes, when is the best time to tell the record collection, before prices head south?
No.
There is literally (almost) limitless choice now via the interweb - the radio plays what it plays.
I have no idea whatsoever how I could find out, but suspect that well over half of what I buy has never been on any radio programme. That could easily be a lot higher than 50%, and I can only ever listen to one radio channel at once.
Is Hifi, at least how we know it about to become extinct? Looking at the average show goer it seems that many are 40+ ... most probably 50+.
I would say definately NO ... both my boys would love my speakers and kit !!! they love it , only reason i dont encourage one is i know his neighbours and they would NOT appreciate it
When I discovered hi-fi in the 1980s, there was plenty of rock / pop music that sounded way better than it did on the sideboard system my parents owned. Nowadays, new music sounds no better on my system than it does on a ghetto blaster. Since new music drives interest in hi-fi to younger people, it’s inevitable that there’s no longer any point in hi-fi. This all started in the mid-nineties as far as I’m concerned.
Not at all. It is all just fashion. The idea of believable music replay in the home is no less valid than it ever has been. The conventional hi-fi market is largely eating itself offering ever more expensive products to an ever-diminishing and increasingly ageing long-established user-base, but the music scene is alive and well. Just so many amazing new music in all genres and on all formats. Those who want high-quality audio in the home have never had more options as the used market is in rude health, classic kit is now largely documented in the public domain and easily serviceable. The pro-audio sector also provides amazing options in the active speaker domain.
Obviously headphone listening has become mainstream. Everyone with a good smartphone and a £100 pair of headphones has a high-end music system. The love of music has gone nowhere. In the UK there are obviously huge political issues with widespread poverty and a young generation often condemned to staying with their parents into their 30s. That obviously limits options hugely. I suspect things are better elsewhere where housing isn’t so absurdly priced. Sometimes headphones are the only option for folk hence that being the one real growth area in the audio market.
PS FWIW I suspect if I was a young music fan today I’d buy a pair of Genlec or Neumann active monitors, an SL1200 or Planar 3, a nice second-hand preamp and a Raspberry Pi as a streamer. I’d have little if any need to go anywhere near a conventional hi-fi shop. That would give all I’d need to invest in cool physical media, support bands etc as well as give access to a whole world of music to discover. It actually makes where I started from look like the dark days. I often bought stuff on the strength of an interesting cover as there was no ‘try before you buy’ back then. If your interests were off the radio map then you were totally out on your own. As such (housing crisis aside) I think things are actually really good now. The ability to discover music has never been better.