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Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

asia.nikkei.com

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Re: Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

#281

Post by NoPicklez »

jinto36 wrote: post #206
rixrax wrote: post #59

I feel that the AV-receiver market has gone the way of the DSLR market. Compact speaker systems like Sonos (that don't need a separate AVR) simply got good enough. Thus the need for buying a separate AVR to drive your Dolby / DTS / etc. setup has all but vanished except maybe for the most determined audiophiles (and even most of these would do well to simply get a compact wireless speaker setup instead of some monstr…

Sonos stuff is also outrageously expensive for mediocre audio quality. I have a really nice home theater from hand-me-downs, friend's basements, and yard sale finds, and sure I had to re-foam some woofers, but it sounds quite a bit better than anything Sonos offers. But yes, I've always been an A/V nerd. Just like with Bose, it bothers me when there are companies that manage to market their way into getting people to…

The difference with Sonos compared to those speakers is that these are wireless and work very well together. They can play music from your TV and also virtually any other music streaming service directly from the app or through the native app itself (e.g. Spotify).

However, I'll never forget the big floor standing speakers my parents had and how great I thought they sounded. The difference was they were all wired to a receiver and if you wanted to add any additional speakers outside you needed to hardwire everything.

Re: Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

#282

Post by girvo »

bambax wrote: post #240
girvo wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My Yamaha 2.0 amplifier is “buggy” in that it sometimes fails to turn on, so I have to pull it’s power cable and plug it back in to get it to turn on again. But it’s also 6 years old, and was a cheap model. I’m still trying to find a decent amplifier for my home setup that’s not some 7.2 giant monstrosity but I’ve not had much luck.

I bought a Yamaha amp in 2000, still works perfectly. If I needed a new one I think I would go the DIY route; there are many models for less than $50 that seem very appealing. You can make a case around them to fit whatever setup or shelf organization you have.

Man that's fascinating: I just found a digital amplifier board that does 50W-50W 2.0 channel output with coaxial digital input, perfect for what I'm after, for like $70 lol.

I wonder what it sounds like. I might buy one just to find out.

Re: Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

#283

Post by lowbloodsugar »

Marsymars wrote: post #195
lowbloodsugar wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The convenience / sound quality balance has shifted because things like Sonos are very convenient, even though the sound quality has, if anything, gone down for the price. Certainly the convenience of streaming has curtailed the AVR market, since streaming has shit audio. But SPDIF is limiting you to DD at best which is 640kbit/s IIRC. Steaming services are often DD+ which won't go over SPDIF. I've got discs, so look…

> But SPDIF is limiting you to DD at best which is 640kbit/s IIRC. Steaming services are often DD+ which won't go over SPDIF. Yeah, but an Apple TV or HTPC or w/e can transcode your DD+ media to DD in realtime. (And current Sonos products support HDMI.)

>Yeah, but an Apple TV or HTPC or w/e can transcode your DD+ media to DD in realtime.

Sure. But that means tanking the quality. It doesn't magically keep the quality just because it started as DD+.

>(And current Sonos products support HDMI.)

Which is why I was making the point about going the SPDIF route.

Re: Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

#284

Post by Nursie »

emkoemko wrote: post #276
Nursie wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the point is that sure, recently DSLR got more or less replaced by mirrorless, tech wise, but the camera market as a whole has been massively diminished because smart phones ate it from the bottom up. Now they're good enough that basically the DSLR/Mirrorless market is really just for enthusiasts or those with very specific needs.

enthusiasts? its for professionals and some enthusiasts, i doubt high end camera gear has reduced market share but the lower end consumer grade stuff has for sure gone since most people don't care about image quality etc when their phone can do basic photography. Just checked the sony A series lines cameras since 2015 have increased units sold every year.

The camera market has cratered, from 2010-2020 it dropped from 120 million units sold to under 10 million:

https://www.popphoto.com/news/the-camera-industry-is-changin...

The total market for all interchangeable lens cameras appears to be on the decline as well:

https://1kcreatives.com/smartphone-vs-mirrorless-vs-dslr-cam...

The point of the argument was that sonos and other smart speaker tech like sound bars etc, have eaten the market for hi-fi in the same sort of way. There is an enthusiast market, sure, and likely always will be. But it's way, way smaller than the old 'full' market and it's slowly declining as the convenient, easy to use products continue to get better (or continue to be terrible but convenient, if you want to be dismissive, but objective tests seem to show smartphones taking pretty damn good images these days).

Re: Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

#285

Post by itisit »

brokenmachine wrote: post #234
moralestapia wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Compact speaker systems like Sonos (that don't need a separate AVR) simply got good enough. I don't like em. I am not the stereotypical smug audiophile but the sound on most of these new systems, soundbars, headphones, etc... is absolute trash. Any pair of moderately-decent bookshelf speakers blows them out of the water and you can get them for ~300USD so they're actually cheaper than "high-end" speakers from brands…

Old audiophile saying, "there's no replacement for displacement". No amount of whizz-bang tech is going to get around the problem of tiny speakers crammed into a small box in a ridiculous location.

About a year ago I tried the top-of-the-line soundbars from LG, Sonos, and Samsung respectively. They all went back to the store. A time-consuming, but worthwhile reminder of the adage you mention.

Re: Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

#286

Post by HollowEyes »

It is weird this. I have just been trying to juggle a few home systems. I have pretty good bulky amps, but the problem is, they are bulky. And the inferior soundbar gets more use, as Bluetooth is convenient. I also have a dlna renderer with an onboard DAC, but the software is abandonware, and client support for dlna is just horrible. Particularly dlna controllers. Not sure why it is so utterly terrible, license fee induced hellscape? Casting could be good, but software support is all over the place, not to mention hardware.

Quality mini-amps with some over the air playback options. And polished/supported software would go a long way. I am getting so infuriated by the landscape, I am tempted to just buy active speakers.

Re: Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

#287

Post by HollowEyes »

HollowEyes wrote: post #286

It is weird this. I have just been trying to juggle a few home systems. I have pretty good bulky amps, but the problem is, they are bulky. And the inferior soundbar gets more use, as Bluetooth is convenient. I also have a dlna renderer with an onboard DAC, but the software is abandonware, and client support for dlna is just horrible. Particularly dlna controllers. Not sure why it is so utterly terrible, license fee i…

Oh and only two devices I have have ever had, kind of play okay with Bluetooth When it works, it is good.

Shame you can't easily get diagnostic/feedback, about codecs and transport. Let alone volume.

I had sensitive ears when younger, probably lost a lot of my hearing. And the biggest annoyance ainhave with the TV is just trying to hear dialogue. The soundbar I have is good at background music in shows, and okay for music, but dialog it sucks at.

My onkyo GA speaker is okay for some types of music, sucks with others, and is terrible again for voice/podcasts etc. Different domains, I understand that. But not even configurable eqs.

Re: Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

#288

Post by Marsymars »

lowbloodsugar wrote: post #283
Marsymars wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But SPDIF is limiting you to DD at best which is 640kbit/s IIRC. Steaming services are often DD+ which won't go over SPDIF. Yeah, but an Apple TV or HTPC or w/e can transcode your DD+ media to DD in realtime. (And current Sonos products support HDMI.)

>Yeah, but an Apple TV or HTPC or w/e can transcode your DD+ media to DD in realtime. Sure. But that means tanking the quality. It doesn't magically keep the quality just because it started as DD+. >(And current Sonos products support HDMI.) Which is why I was making the point about going the SPDIF route.

> Sure. But that means tanking the quality. It doesn't magically keep the quality just because it started as DD+.

I'd say "marginally degrade" rather than tank. DD at 640 kbps is pretty close to transparent, and E-AC-3 to AC-3 transcoding uses hybrid recompression to avoid the full quality hit of lossless -> lossless.

Re: Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

#289

Post by flobosg »

lynguist wrote: post #55
Hamuko wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it refers to Tokyo’s To such as in Toshiba. You mean it refers to "east"?

No, it’s an abbreviation of Tokyo. Even if To means East - in a compound To often stands for Tokyo. Same concept in these words: 来日 - Nichi means day, here it stands for Japan. Here’s an article about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_abbreviated_and_contr... More examples: Todai (To for Tokyo), Nissan (Ni for Nippon)

There’s a missing “s” in that URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_abbreviated_and_contr...

Re: Japanese audio brand Onkyo files for bankruptcy

#290

Post by emkoemko »

Nursie wrote: post #284
emkoemko wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

enthusiasts? its for professionals and some enthusiasts, i doubt high end camera gear has reduced market share but the lower end consumer grade stuff has for sure gone since most people don't care about image quality etc when their phone can do basic photography. Just checked the sony A series lines cameras since 2015 have increased units sold every year.

The camera market has cratered, from 2010-2020 it dropped from 120 million units sold to under 10 million: https://www.popphoto.com/news/the-camera-industry-is-changin... The total market for all interchangeable lens cameras appears to be on the decline as well: https://1kcreatives.com/smartphone-vs-mirrorless-vs-dslr-cam... The point of the argument was that sonos and other smart speaker tech like sound bars etc, ha…

i am not being dismissive, phone cameras are just no where near as good as a larger sensor camera, yes probably most people wouldn't be able to tell the difference on a smart phone small screen, but when your editing and doing large prints its very obvious especially when the phone camera uses anything higher then base ISO it becomes mush or that fake bokeh to mimic real cameras and editing latitude is really bad

yes smart phones did cut in the consumer grade camera market but the professional level cameras continue to do well and have increased in sales.

thing is about cameras you can't make a small sensor better then a larger one its not physically possible, this is a big difference between cameras and speakers... speakers have not changed much in the last 20 years most people won't be able to tell a difference between a 20 year old speakers sound quality then a modern one, so less and less people invest in those, who needs to upgrade a speaker every few years? so you can't compare cameras to speakers.

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