Why is gear so expensive and why not more vintage DIY?

[delphonic]

There is something I don?t understand about some the insanely expensive pro and high-end gear, especially those based on designs that have been around for decades. I am mainly referring to components like compressors and preamps. I have a degree in electrical engineering and have worked with some layout designs (but not with consumer electronics). What I don?t understand is ? PCBs are not expensive to make, and most electronic components are dirt-cheap. I can see how some of the transformers are more expensive, some VLAs, and even some pots and caps - but not much more than a few hundred dollars. I?ve had custom enclosures designed and machined, and they?re not that expensive (relatively). Most of the guts of all these circuits are long out of patent protection, and a lot of the layout is going to be standard. I can understand that a new company trying to reinvent the wheel will have a lot of engineering time and development, sales, marketing, product support, production costs ?etc. That makes a little more sense (especially those that integrate more digital and current tech). But I guess I?m surprised there isn?t a stronger market for the DIY (or even pseudo-DIY) for circuits that have long been in existence and less susceptible to protection problems (maybe I?m missing something with that?). I?ve made a few Hamptone and Seventh Circle Audio (which were both nice), and seen a few DIY designs like Gyratec (but trying to deal with things like the SSL clone and the nightmare that is the million posts of discussion forums is difficult for me to even consider). But some criticize these as not ?top of the line? ?even though I see the ?real thing? receiving such praise. (Which is funny to me because some of these are electronically the same).

I guess I am surprised there isn?t a better market out there for decent, vintage-based clones and people that are willing to spend some time putting them together (or even pre-assembled kits). I know some of this exists on the internet, but so much of the information is convoluted and spread out over such a vast number of discussions that it makes it very cumbersome to even think about. I am thankful for places like SCA and Hamptone that do a good job.

And for the record? what I meant by pseudo-DIY ? I was having a few hundred, multi-layered PCBs built. The company making the PCBs also offered to stuff and wave solder the boards with the basic components for me. They were actually able to do it (in the US) with the parts I specified for less than it would have cost me to buy the parts alone (not to mention the time it would have taken to build them). I was only required to populate with the major/unique components we special-ordered in house. This eliminated a ton of assembly error and made things a lot easier (hence my pseudo DIY).

[chris harris]

Sweet! Let me know when you've got "dirt cheap" compressors and preamps, based on classic designs, available. I'll place an order.

[Artifex]

I don't think he said anything about dirt cheap, just not insanely expensive.

[chris harris]

I took "dirt-cheap" directly from his post.
So, yeah... throw together some of these "dirt-cheap" components and make a bunch of great pres and comps that are affordable.
I'll standby, ready to place my order.

But, more to the point...

Why do you think that these pieces are so expensive? Is it some kind of conspiracy? Do tell!

[???????]

I don't know about conspiracy, but many manufacturers have figured out that you can actually increase demand for certain products by raising the price.

Gibson Guitars CEO Henry Juskewiecz (sp?) reportedly gave a speech about this at some university somewhere. He said that he figured out shortly after he bought Gibson that by raising prices on certain models, he could actually increase demand.

So that kind of thing might enter into it. Music types do like to have their pedigree cachet. If people can convince themselves that wooden knobs make their stereo sound better, then they could certainly convince themselves that this $5,000 compressor sounds better than the $500 one. In fact, most would find it hard to convince themselves otherwise. Let's face it... some of us can be enthralled by fancy, boutique-looking gear and set our aural expectations accordingly. And everyone wants to have their expectations fulfilled, so you are rooting for it to be good right out of the gate and you don't even know it.

[TV Lenny]

I think the bottom line companies charge so much is because they can. They know those of us who demand high quality audio paths will fork over the money.

As far as DIY projects: I think there is a relatively healthy market for that based on the websites offering up ideas.However, I don't believe MOST people will opt to make their own pre or comp or whatever. Whether its lack of interest, limited time, or you need something right away, I would imagine most recordists will buy something already available than DIY.

I know what you mean though about the price of gear. But you should keep in mind that if you buy a really good piece of gear, it very well may increase in value over time.

Tom

[dsw]

If you look for value, you will find it. If you are looking to be impressed, you can find that too.
Manufacturers make things people want at a price they can afford. If they didn't they wouldn't succeed. Some don't.
I think your idea to make easy to assemble DIY stuff is a great idea. I personally hate to solder and would never take on a Scott Hamptom project even though I greatly admire him and his products. But if I could put together a box without having to solder, I'd do it in a heart beat.
The trick would be to reduce labor cost by having the customer do the parts of the job that machines can't do.
You should get right on it.
The best selling price categorys are under $500 and around $1500. Under $500 sells because its the kind of scratch most people can come up with. $1500 sells because its enough to get some quality, but easier to spend than $2500 or $3000.

[curtiswyant]

I think a lot has to do with the lack of high-end electronics experience in the field (even for audio "engineers" with degrees), lack of time, lack of resale value for completed DIY projects, and rarity and high cost of components. I can solder and troubleshoot electronics ok but I'm no expert. So there's a risk that I could somehow ruin the project and be left with a pile of parts. PCBs are easy to make, yes, but if I'm spending big bucks on a project I want it as close to original as possible i.e. point-to-point wiring. That takes a lot of time. Also, I think a lot of people like to constantly buy and sell gear but a DIY project is usually harder to sell, especially if you don't want to lose money on the deal. Like you said, most of the common components are cheap but some transformers, meters, etc. are expensive and hard to find and can only be bought in large quantities. With all these things considered I can see why there isn't a big market for high-end DIY. But the Seventh Circle stuff seems to be doing pretty well, right?

[delphonic]

I took "dirt-cheap" directly from his post.
So, yeah... throw together some of these "dirt-cheap" components and make a bunch of great pres and comps that are affordable.
I'll standby, ready to place my order.

But, more to the point...

Why do you think that these pieces are so expensive? Is it some kind of conspiracy? Do tell!

You misread my post apparantly. I said most of the components are cheap (i.e. you can get resistors for pennies if you look in the right place). I recognize that if you want a quality transformer or anything custom to your application, it can get expensive. I never said the whole thing would be dirt cheap. But relative to a $10k piece of gear $500 is dirt cheap.

I wasn't indicating a conspiracy either. With newer technology a lot of time and money goes into their development - along with all the costs that go into manufacture and production. In the grand scheme I understand it's not just raw material cost, but enormous overhead that goes with running company.

Considering the service and quality of what SCA and Hamptone offer, I would say their prices are fair (I do own both). Those guys have also put a lot of effort in their product and deserve to be compensated for it.

I am just surprised there are not more legible, well-organized sources for some of these other "clones" of vintage year. For example, if I wanted to build an SSL clone (which I've been thinking about), I would have to spend a significant amount of time trying to figure out which PCB is the most current, and which of the hundreds of online posts actually apply to what I'm doing... not to mention spending the time trying to figure out the circuit to make sure what I'm doing makes sense.

I've come across a lot of people who are really into this stuff - mods, DIY...etc. It's been hard to come by well organized, consistent sources.

[rwc]

you can get resistors for pennies but metal film ones which are not as noisy cost more.

Good stuff costs money because it's good stuff.

I see a lot of posts here where people ask "I want 16 channels of conversion, but don't want to buy any new PCI cards. I want it to kick ass, and cost $200"

or "I want a mic that does this, that, and the other, sounds like this, but costs as much as an sm57"

FWIW I could give a fuck less about "vintage" sound. No one in 1970 was yearning for 1960s stuff. the beatles weren't recording straight to vinyl. they were using the best shit they had at the time. I would prefer to do the same. I like my THAT1512 preamp set, which cost me less than $200 for 8 channels. Probably closer to 400 for proper case and PCBs, but cheap is cheap.

[T-rex]

To be honest I have thought about this myself as I am getting ready to build an 1176 or a LA2A clone - not because I want a cheap 1176 or LA2A that sounds exactly like the original, but because I like DIY and would enjoy building something close to one of these comps for daily use for between $400 - $500.

I wondered why with all of the schematics for these vintage items pretty easily accessible, why no one straight up makes PCB boards that are carbon copies of the schematic along with BOM's for components. (Seems like that would be illegal and in bad form, but isn't that how Chandler Ltd got started? Didn't he trace the actual PCB's from neve gear?)

Anyway, I figure its because many of the original parts aren't available anymore and they have to do workarounds. Secondly, I imagine most people technically savvy enough to take on a clone project from scratch looks at the design and sees ways to improve it, which they implement in their design. Maybe the noise floor on an original LA2A is part of the magic, but most of the DIY projects I see are proud of their reduced noise floor etc. In cases like Seventh Circle audio, some people like his version of the API pre better than their original API's.

[delphonic]

T-rex are you putting the pieces of that together yourself or is there an actual good resource for that?

I do enjoy DIY to a certain extent, but I really don't have the time to redesign and go through a circuit, troubleshooting to make sure the components are correct and everything is working properly.

I should have been more clear when I mentioned "vintage" gear. I only mentioned older designs because I thought there would be less problems with legal aspects. And it just seems like it would be a much easier design to start with since there would be years of experience with them (and you'd be avoiding a lot of of the digital interfaces showing up today). So if there is a solid, high end circuit out there that has been around for years it seems a good place to start... not necessarily saying a 70's sound is what I want.

This isn't something I have a ton of experience with. I was just curious.

[lobstman]

If I understand you correctly, you're talking about something like the SCA and Hamptone stuff, but maybe with prestuffed circuit boards? Essentially leaving the buyer to do final assembly without so much fine soldering? I think it's a great idea. I think it might be better to stay away from the usual suspects, though- there are already enough Neve and API projects and clones out there, maybe kits based on Calrec or Helios modules would be a way to differentiate the product.

It's a great idea, somebody do it already! I'm in for two and I can pay!

The price difference between crap parts and good parts really isn't that much, either. I just bought some resistors- 1% metal films were twice as much as 5% carbon comps- $.06 as opposed to $.03! And that was in small quantities- if you buy in bulk, the price becomes almost almost negligible.

[Judas Jetski]

Seriously, this is starting to sound like a business plan.

[farview]

Here is another DIY source. These kits are very well laid out and thought through. I have two SC-1 preamps that I just love.

http://www.fivefishstudios.com/