Name "offbeat" audio companies

F

Fryguy8

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Sep 26, 2001
Messages
1,707
Always interested in hearing about audio companies with products that I may not have heard of before.

This thought was sparked by the reference to emotiva audio in another thread.

I'll contribute a few:

Emotiva audio (lol freebie)
Channel Islands Audio
Benchmark (DAC1)
Lavry (DA10)
 
No idea lol. I am being vague on purpose. I'd love to discover more companies.
 
Electrostatic speakers:
Martin Logan ***
Innersound **
Final Sound *
Sound Labs ***

Planar speakers:
Magnepan *

Top shelf conventional speakers:
Wilson Audio ****
BW speakers ***
Vivid Audio ***
Avalon speakers ****
Sonus Faber ****
Vienna Acoustics *
Hansen ****
Kharma *****
Magico *****
Thiel **
Legacy **
JM Labs ***
Wisdom *****
Coltrane ****
Ceramic Audio ***
Dynaudio ****
Paradigm **
Von Schweikert ***

Plasma-based speakers:
Acapella ****

Horn speakers (not just Klipsch):
Avante Garde ****
Klipsch *

Electronics:
Boulder ******
Ayre ****
Plinius ***
Cary ***
Cambridge *
Rotel **
Classe ***
Krell ****
Edge ***
Naim ***
Rogue **
Rega *
Prima Luna *
Pathos ***
Atmasphere **
BAT ***
ARC ****
Mark Levinson ****
LAMM***
Luxman ***
NAD *
T&A ****
VTL ***
Bryston **

Source-heavy:
Esoteric ***
DCS *****
Emm Labs ***
Meridian ***

Power-heavy:
PS Audio **
Shunyata **
Richard Gray **

Cables/Interconnects/Wire:
Nordost ***
Kimber Kable **
Crystal Cable **
Tara Labs ***
Signal Cable *
Better Cables *
Blue Jeans Cable *
Cat Cable *
MIT cables ****
Transparent Cables ****
Audioquest **
Acoustic Zen **

Analog:
XYZ ***
Walker *****
VPI **
ClearAudio ***
Pro-Ject *
Music Hall *
Artemis **
Acutus ***
Dynavector **
Sumiko **
Koetsu ***
SME ****
SOTA ***
Grand Prix Audio ***
Funk *
Linn ***

... and a WHOLE LOT more! I know I'm forgetting a ton. That's just off the top of my head and some that I've auditioned.
 
There are hundreds of them. Most of the best audio companies are companies 99% of people have never heard of.
 
SJetski71 said:
There are hundreds of them. Most of the best audio companies are companies 99% of people have never heard of.
Click to expand...

Just be careful about buying from companies that are far too obscure. You risk losing a lot of your component's resale value.
 
notice how Pini has the largest list? :p thats some serious demo'ed and research information rattling round his head....

Vintage
Dynaco (good ole DIY kits and stuff, youll find their stuff restored on audiogon)
Phase Linear

And no one has mentioned Polk

thats the most i can contribute
 
Weiss High End. Not too many products, but these are the guys that created the famed Weiss POW-R dither box. They seem to know their shit.
 
Pinipig523 said:
Cables/Interconnects/Wire:
Nordost ****
Kimber Kable ****
Crystal Cable ****
Tara Labs ****
Signal Cable ****
Better Cables * ***
Blue Jeans Cable ****
Cat Cable ****
MIT cables ****
Transparent Cables ****
Audioquest ****
Acoustic Zen ****
Click to expand...

Fixed. Monoprice would be ***.5 due to being slightly less consistent.
 
dandragonrage said:
Fixed. Monoprice would be ***.5 due to being slightly less consistent.
Click to expand...


My * (stars) are my way of crudely rating each company with regards to price and clout in the general eye of the knowledgeable audiophile.

Something like Boulder which is almost unreacheable by most gets a ****** (6 star rating from me).

The number of * does not directly correlate with sound quality though.
 
Monoprice is some good priced sh1t...

Twisted Pear Audio has some good products all of them are pretty much assemble your self, since they do the sodering for you, brian there is great, he's gonna build me a power supply unit for my Opus

Audio is just so vast....computers is simple, read the benchmark charts, slap together some products that are reliable, maybe mix in a high end cooling system and cater your mobo to overclocking......straight on benchmarks, no placebo, and no demoing needed
 
Cat1yst said:
Audio is just so vast....computers is simple, read the benchmark charts, slap together some products that are reliable, maybe mix in a high end cooling system and cater your mobo to overclocking......straight on benchmarks, no placebo, and no demoing needed
Click to expand...

Oliver,

That's the beauty about the internet... lots of information for the taking! If it weren't for the internet, I'd be as dumb as a rock regarding audio equipment.

Oh, and take it as a hobby adventure, it's not going to happen overnight, but in time you will develop a good idea of what makes something sound good and what constitutes "good". You will have a better grip of your biases and you will develop a sense of confidence regarding the products you like/want/need.

It comes with experience, reading/perusing online, forums like this, and auditions.

Yet, with everything that I've heard, read, owned... I'm still new to the game in the grand scheme of things.
 
Pinipig523 said:
My * (stars) are my way of crudely rating each company with regards to price and clout in the general eye of the knowledgeable audiophile.
Click to expand...

One that buys into stuff like speaker wire making a difference? You can call that knowledge, but I call it something else....
 
dandragonrage said:
One that buys into stuff like speaker wire making a difference? You can call that knowledge, but I call it something else....
Click to expand...

Speaker wire makes a difference. How much you spend on the speaker wire doesn't make a difference.

I got pretty damn good results by taking a high amperage power cable and cutting the ends off.
 
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