Casper's Life

In an youtube video John Darko (could have been this one ) argued that a thing costing 25,000$ is reasonable well priced, if it provide the same as other things which cost around the same. The problem in this, is that will you actually get something which is really at that quality and/or good (to the price), or are you being ripped off. In another video (this one ) John Darko argues that the Allo DigiOne Signature (priced around 500$) is as good as a similar streamer, costing more than 3,000$ - now how does the first (later) comment connect to the first comment. It does not..... Yes the Hifi industry is driving by quality, but price does not have anything to do with it. Remember your iPhone which cost your more than 1,000$ actually only cost around 250$ to produce, then you probably have to take another 25-50$ for the work on the design and so stuff. But when you then hear than Apple earns +10 billion $ a quarter... then it starts to show that someone is paying a lot more for something...

I'm doing something which I can't really afford, but doing it anyway ... I'm upgrading my Stereo ... I like music, and  believe it should be played at the highest affordable quality. So after getting a new Stereo Amp (Creek Evolution 50A), I got a new Phono Amp. and then started looking for a DAC ... and after reading I do not know how many posts I decided to get an S.M.S.L M8 (from  Amazon  fro €249.99), not too expensive and according to what I can read very good. So I got it hooked it up to my amp, connected my Notebook (Macbook Air 11" / 2011) using USB ... sounded nice, then my Macbook Pro Retina with digital (fiber) in some way better than USB, slightly more air and openness. Then decided to use my old Apple Airport Express ( MB321LL/A  - 802.11n version 1) using it's digital output (I don't like the build in DAC - it's a bit too dark for me), and this is where I started having doubts about my buy. There was drop out, all the time. Right I changed, to...

It looks like I've not seen it all yet - the Apple store in The Netherlands have a 'new' concept for sale. It's called an Fatman iTube . It's a vacum tube based amplifier with an iPod dock, and a pair of speakers, it looks nice, but at the pice of €799, I'm not so sure that it's really worth the price Also it looks like it is more designed for the folks who cannot figure out how to use their money, than a person who really is into hifidelity. In which case one would probably use a turntable instead of an iPod.

So Paris Hilton have released an album.... I've (by accident) heard on of the songs on MTV... Maybe she should have continued just being famous for the reason of being famous. Oh, if you have enough money to buy your way into the music industry then why not, but please do not play that record where I can hear it....

One of the few things which really gets to me these days, is CD copy protection I buy a fair amount of CD's and would like to be able to listen to them on my iPod, and on my SliMP3, which is starting to get complicated. Lately I bourght the new Radiohead and Kosheen albums from Amazon (.de), I spend a few hours trying to rip them to MP3's .... not possible. I do normaly not break laws, and I think (my oppinion) that I paied for this album, and should be able to play it on any device I own. I would not mind to be able to buy music online - but the services which are currently available, do not allow to either play the music on diffrent devices, or you'll have to have Microsoft Mediaplayer version latest, or what ever.... The music industry took a very big gun and blew their left leg...