Skip to main content ↑ ↓

Notice

Please note that most of the software linked on this forum is likely to be safe to use. If you are unsure, feel free to ask in the relevant topics, or send a private message to an administrator or moderator. To help curb the problems of false positives, or in the event that you do find actual malware, you can contribute through the article linked here.
Topic: Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO. (Read 79270 times) previous topic - next topic
0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #75 –
Quote from: ELMitz on
Quote from: andy o on
I've never heard a gullible person say they're gullible until after the fact. And you don't need science to tell you if something "sounds" better to you, that's explainable and even expected sometimes by placebo, but you do need science to tell you if there's an actual perceivable difference.



This is why I avoid these discussions as a rule of thumb... I am a clinical neuroscientist who does experimentation with the human nervous system for a living. Believe me when I say that I am fully aware of the scientific method, the power of placebo  and the psychoacoustic.

And believe it or not Andy, most guys like me, who can actually buy the stuff the rest of the verbal-masturbaters berate are successful financially because we make sound decisions, are smart and not gullible.

ymmv


Then as a scientist, you'd freely admit that the 'increments' in audio quality that you believe you hear under sighted conditions, might well be imaginary, yes? In other words, that your belief that sound quality has improved, might well be no more than mental masturbation on your part?

That's really all it takes to 'prove' that you're neither gullible nor stupid *as regards high end audio*. 

As for financial success being proof against dumbness and gullibility, one word:  MADOFF.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #76 –
Quote from: ELMitz on
Quote from: andy o on
You remind me exactly what Randi said about scientists being one of the easiest groups to fool, what you said is exactly what he meant. If what you said is even true.

And of course most rich people are rich cause they're smart 



Enjoy the minor leagues Andy.


My wife an I are academic scientists; our combined income is sufficient to keep us in Audi TTs, a loft in Manhattan, and other perks of the 'major leagues'.  And I am a true audiophile, i.e., one who loves the hobby of sound reproduction.  Yet my audio gear is by no means 'high end' in terms of brand or reputation.  When I want to upgrade sound, I invest in better loudspeakers, software, and room adjustments, not jewelry.

Btw, since you put stock in anecdotal evidence, it is a not-rare opinion among academic scientists in my acquaintance over two decades, that clinical scientists are often arrogant a-holes (and inferior scientists as well).  You stay cliche, ElMitz.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #77 –
Quote from: odigg on
Quote from: andy o on
Now THAT is hilarious. Their whole line of "Linn" products are rebadges of ugly cheap plastic amps!?


Excuse me, you are not looking at this correctly.  They chose to spend that extra $3250 in engineering the insides of the amp.  Any money spent on beautifying the outside would have taken away from the engineering budget.  Didn't your mother tell you, it's what's on the inside that counts...and of course the $0.01 Linn Audio text printed on the front 

The funniest one is this one. They didn't even spend the $0.01 to change the original maker's logo.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #78 –
Quote from: odigg on
Quote from: andy o on
Now THAT is hilarious. Their whole line of "Linn" products are rebadges of ugly cheap plastic amps!?


Excuse me, you are not looking at this correctly.  They chose to spend that extra $3250 in engineering the insides of the amp.  Any money spent on beautifying the outside would have taken away from the engineering budget.  Didn't your mother tell you, it's what's on the inside that counts...and of course the $0.01 Linn Audio text printed on the front 


As if that's not entertaining enough, this 'Linn' is not connected to the Linn that has been making hi-fi since the 1970s. I can see a bright future for Mr Linn - as a 'Notable case' on Wikipedia's page on trademark infringement.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #79 –
Quote from: Gag Halfrunt on
As if that's not entertaining enough, this 'Linn' is not connected to the Linn that has been making hi-fi since the 1970s. I can see a bright future for Mr Linn - as a 'Notable case' on Wikipedia's page on trademark infringement.


One of the lovely ironies of "Linn Audio of New Hampshire" and its rebadged products is that the company is an advertiser in Stereophile: there is an S'phile forum which had a long discussion thread on the Oppo/Ayre debacle. Those dots have yet to be connected.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #80 –
Quote
IME, that would be a financially suicidal thing for him to do, as it would be for any of the editors of high end publications.


You are correct on that, but if ayre and Charlie are "serious" audiophiles and have 100% faith in their products like they talk about then they should take the next step.

Quote
Paper, schmaper. It doesn't matter what kind of Magic Beans DAC you use, so whether it's an overpriced DAC or a really, really overpriced DAC in the player, it's still not going to make any difference.

Snake oil is still snake oil, whether it comes 'reasonably' priced or not.


Correct and more studies need to be done on what is and is not audible. But the audiophools do not want to know this information.

Quote
One of the lovely ironies of "Linn Audio of New Hampshire" and its rebadged products is that the company is an advertiser in Stereophile: there is an S'phile forum which had a long discussion thread on the Oppo/Ayre debacle. Those dots have yet to be connected.


Most of stereophile is a complete joke.



Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #81 –
The Linn Audio of New Hampshire web site has got to be one of the most amusing audiophile sites I have ever seen and probably deserves its own thread rather than being buried in this one.

How can anyone that has taken the trouble to organise the manufacturer of a pair of speakers end up with 2 tweeters that far apart? Have they got crossovers? Do you think anyone has ever turned them on and checked they work?

The pictures of the speakers look superimposed on the backgrounds. Too much effort required to actually put them in houses and photograph them?

Do you think this this a variation by the companies that sell their speakers out of the back of white vans? The connection with higherfi.com looks interesting.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #82 –
This one is hilarious. Sorta reminded me of this (don't know why).

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #83 –
Quote from: honestguv on
The pictures of the speakers look superimposed on the backgrounds. Too much effort required to actually put them in houses and photograph them?


Everything there looks like a simulation to me.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #84 –
Quote from: andy o on
This one is hilarious. Sorta reminded me of this (don't know why).


Wow, this has got to be one of the most incompetent photoshop jobs I've seen... And let's not discuss the loudspeakers.

I can't even imagine anything like this happening anywhere except in "high-end" audio...

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #86 –
Quote from: Gag Halfrunt on
Quote from: aclo on
Wow, this has got to be one of the most incompetent photoshop jobs I've seen... And let's not discuss the loudspeakers.

I can't even imagine anything like this happening anywhere except in "high-end" audio...



Dude, where's my landing gear?


Haha!

A site on which I periodically waste an hour or so:
http://photoshopdisasters.blogspot.com/

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #87 –
Still no word from ayre on getting a unit reviewed.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #88 –
Ayre and charles are now playing down HDMI 1.4 and saying 3D is not a big deal.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #89 –
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.ph...p;postcount=499

You have to read this, I was reading through the ayre thread on avs since I have not posted there for 6 months and it turns out that ayre has not even measured jitter in the DX-5 despite talking up and down how it is better then anything on the market. Charles Hansen of ayre is your tpyical snake oil sales man, he will sound intelligent at first glance but one you read into his postings one will realise he has no understanding about the aspects of audio, let alone jitter. Keep it up Charles Hansen you are just digging yourself a deeper hole.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #90 –
Quote from: odigg on
Many "High End (read: High Priced)" consumers would not even look at devices with switching power supplies.  They've got a set of biases and every device has to adhere to those biases.  So engineers, even ones with PhDs, are stuck.  If they embrace these improved designs nobody will buy their product.

What about buying a cheap unit, replacing the PSU, leaving you with lots of spare switch-mode PSUs which can be retro-fitted as an "upgrade" at a price? 

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #91 –
Welcome to the world of high end audio.

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #92 –
Hi from Canada

Firstly - title of this forum is clearly wrong - it is NOT a rebadge like the Lexicon fiasco
Secondly - MANY companies are using this unit as a basis for modded units - good sign for OPPO
Thirdly - OPPO is offering great price for value and 2 versions (reg & 'SE') depending on your needs/wants
Fourth - Ayre's CURRENT universal (pre-bluray) player is based on a horrible Pioneer unit yet SOUNDS AMAZING so they clearly do somethings right - stereophile compared it to the Pioneer it's based on and said it was clearly better

Ayre is VERY expensive, but at least does a lot for the money compared to what Lexicon is accused of having done. So it is NOT rebadged. You will have to decide. If you have a crappy stereo, will spending $10k for the Ayre matter? NO

I've listened to this new Ayre unit at the Salon Son & Image in Montreal and spoke at some length with the Ayre rep. He was VERY CLEAR that they did not make the transport.'We are NOT a transport company'.  HE was the one who TOLD ME it was based on the OPPO for the transport and then completely rebuilt with the DAC added. Cheap DACs are $400-$1000 and LINN has the testicles to charge up to $25k for their new DAC!! The unit sounded great. PS: so did LINN's ridiculously priced DAC. They had head to head listening with their cheaper DACs and there was a slight difference in 24/96 audio. IT WAS NOT WORTH THE $25k price tag to me (the difference was so subtle it was arguably not even better)

WRT listening. I listened to the new AYRE at the show. It was great but I couldn;t compare it to the old Ayre on the same system (wasn;t hooked up). At a friend's house however we compared his Quad CD player with a Denon universal player and his Ayre 5xe universal (pre-bluray). They all had a different sound on CD playback and for SACD and DVD Audio the Ayre was superior to the $2.5k Denon unit. I had him do switching so I was listening to the same thing blindly. This was done on a nice system with Quad amplification and B&W speakers.

I currently have an OPPO universal DVD player (DV 981 HD) and I love it. I paid $250ish for it and there's a simple remote hack to make it DVD region free but I can also appreciate the difference in the Ayre. I use my PS3 for Bluray playback and love that too. I don;t think I need the new OPPO right now so will wait to see what comes down the road. ALL AUDIOPHILE AUDIO reaches a point of diminishing returns where you spend more and more to get less and less incremental improvement. Sometimes you get no improvement at all for spending more money... There are great bargains and what sounds great to some sounds harsh or brash or soft or mellow or whatever to someone else.

We should all just shut up and listen and buy what we like and what we can afford, trying to also factor in build quality wherever possible (which is hard to assess). If you can hear an audible difference then the question is: is it worth the price differential and is there a cheaper unit that gives me the same result?

At least ayre is truly in the high end; I don;t know what Lexicon is doing...

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #93 –
Audiophile fight!

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #94 –
Quote from: honestguv on
The Linn Audio of New Hampshire web site has got to be one of the most amusing audiophile sites I have ever seen and probably deserves its own thread rather than being buried in this one.


I wonder if they know of the existence of http://www.linn.co.uk/ and are trying to trade off their name?

Ayre DX-5 at $10,000 is a rebadged $500 OPPO.

Reply #95 –
Quote from: BeckMutations on
WRT listening. I listened to the new AYRE at the show. It was great but I couldn;t compare it to the old Ayre on the same system (wasn;t hooked up). At a friend's house however we compared his Quad CD player with a Denon universal player and his Ayre 5xe universal (pre-bluray). They all had a different sound on CD playback and for SACD and DVD Audio the Ayre was superior to the $2.5k Denon unit. I had him do switching so I was listening to the same thing blindly. This was done on a nice system with Quad amplification and B&W speakers.

.
.
.

We should all just shut up and listen




But first, *you* should read this:


Hydrogenaudio Terms of Service
8. All members that put forth a statement concerning subjective sound quality, must -- to the best of their ability -- provide objective support for their claims. Acceptable means of support are double blind listening tests (ABX or ABC/HR) demonstrating that the member can discern a difference perceptually, together with a test sample to allow others to reproduce their findings. Graphs, non-blind listening tests, waveform difference comparisons, and so on, are not acceptable means of providing support.


Quote
If you can hear an audible difference then the question is: is it worth the price differential and is there a cheaper unit that gives me the same result?


There's a more fundamental question than that: is the difference real, or are you imagining it?