Who is buying all the hi-fi equipment 2 Channel
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Member 290 posts TKimages Member 290 posts
TKimages
A good friend of mind who is seriously into his hi-fi and photography saves up his photo and hi-fi mags for me, which I collect when I visit to listen to some music and look at his photos.
While reading the last batch of hi-fi mags, mainly HiFi News and What HiFi, I couldn't help noticing the number of ads and reviews for speakers costing 30K-40K, cartridges for 10K, turntables at 20K, streamers etc. seem to be non-stop. I know equipment at these prices (and much higher!) have been around for a while, but it seems that there are now many more new companies, from all over the world, selling at these prices, all competing for the same market.  People must be buying the equipment or the companies would soon go bust, but there is often forum chat suggesting that 'proper' hifi is no longer what people buy.
 
I often save the magazines to take with me when we go away in the caravan, and after I've had them I put into the caravan site 'library' for others to read, and in every case the photo mags are gone within a day or two, but the hifi mags don't seem to be wanted.
So who is buying all this hi-fi?
Marj, my wife and best friend, says my passions are obsessions 😆
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Rabski Moderator 3,028 posts
Rabski
Amazon is used by people like me, for times when being pragmatic overrides ethical concerns. I hate their company, business model and practices. But when the choice is between having what I want delivered to my doorstep in a day, or driving fifteen miles to pay more for the same thing (assuming it's actually in stock), it's sadly an overly easy decision.
A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools
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Bob It Cost How Much!?! Member 1,069 posts
Bob It Cost How Much!?!
I personally, don't do Amazon, even if it costs me more as I know people who have worked for them in their warehouses.
Too much of everything.
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yespsb Member 135 posts
yespsb
Like many on here they are for me a last resort choice but I think a lot of folks under 40 don't have the same resistance to Amazon as we do because they have literally grown up with Amazon.
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Tony_J Moderator 4,237 posts
Tony_J
Living way out in the boonies as I do, Amazon is one of the few companies that deliver stuff at a reasonable cost, "free" if we pay the annual Prime tax, which equates to the cost of a couple of deliveries at the exorbitant rates some companies charge to deliver here. So for us, it's pretty much a no brainer, regardless of what we think of them as a company.
 
Until BT/EE installed gigabit fibre broadband here a year ago, Starlink was the only way to get decent broadband here; I was glad to be able to stop putting money in Musk's pocket. If there was an ethically acceptable alternative to Amazon I would use it, but there isn't.
2026 Maverick Show Sunday 25th October
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