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Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

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Re: Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

#201

Post by cydmax »

trentnix wrote: post #77

Now there are more avenues for Samsung to shove bloatware down our throats. I have a modestly high-end home theater and it is utterly maddening waiting for devices to “boot” and “handshake”. And after the wait, I’m presented with another “User Agreement” to sign that insists on shoveling ads down my throat and harvesting data. How much do you have to pay for a quick boot, no ads, and a private movie or music experien…

Buy a used Braun A1/A2 amp (100-200$). There are maintenance handbooks online for both. Replace the two main condensators, which cost about 10-20$ each. Buy a pair of Canton GLE 200 or their presuccessors (100-350$). They didn’t change much in the last 20 years. Still very good, neutral and enough bass for a small living room. Hook your Technics 1200 MK2/5 (1000$) with an all round needle (100$) to the Phono-In Cinch connectors. Select your favorite vinyl from your collection, put it on the plate of the 1200. Move the arm on the first track of the vinyl. Enjoy completely analog music without distractions. The A1 boots in under 100ms, so does the Technics 1200. Total costs 1670$. Beats any Sonos etc. setup in sound quality and convenience.

Disclaimer: I have booth systems in parallel and I feel disgusted and disappointed every time I have to use the Sonos system now.

Re: Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

#202

Post by Etheryte »

drodgers wrote: post #121
mrandish wrote: post #111

I'm a little surprised these four companies combined sold for only $350M.

Unfortunately the market is quite small and shrinking. I wish more people wanted great sound rather than phone/tv speakers (or soundbars).

I think it's not only that, but if you spend some time looking, you can often get really good deals on used gear. New gear is really expensive for what is at best a very marginal gain and all that translates into even fewer sales still. The target market isn't only people who want great sound, it's people who want great sound, have ample disposable income and live somewhere where they can actually use the gear to enjoy it.

Re: Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

#203

Post by BlobberSnobber »

HenryBemis wrote: post #195
frontalier wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you are being unnecessarily disingenuous gp is most likely using a display that quickly boots into "source" mode – think hdmi input

I don't like Apple and its 'stuffs' but if it works anything like Spotify, then I can control 'it/Spotify' from my PC/Firefox while the music is played by my phone to an bluetooth JBL. So even without a dedicated TV/screen, I can listen to Spotify in other devices. I assume the comment would benefit from a setup like that - smartphone to control, AppleTV and the rest for the audio.

Apple for some reason hasn’t implemented that feature, and it boggles the mind. Say I’m playing music on my iPhone and I try playing a track on my mac, it doesn’t ask me on which device to play, hell, it doesn’t even stop playing on my iPhone to start on my mac, it just puts an ugly warning in the middle of the screen saying something like “stop playing on your iPhone to listen to the song on this device”.

It’s actually insane to me.

Re: Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

#204

Post by ipsum2 »

wildekek wrote: post #174
drodgers wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately the market is quite small and shrinking. I wish more people wanted great sound rather than phone/tv speakers (or soundbars).

What also contributes to this, is that there are new (Chinese) players on the market that offer incredible value for audiophiles. Brands like Topping, Fosi Audio and SMSL completely outperform the incumbent brands.

You've listed DAC/Amp brands, what about actual speakers?

Re: Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

#205

Post by Etheryte »

numpad0 wrote: post #168

> Too many requests -- error 999. In case anyone need it, here's[0] Wikipedia list article for HTTP status codes(200, 404, etc.) "Too Many Requests" is 429. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_HTTP_status_codes

I think both the message and the code are wrong in this case. 429 too many requests indicates that you specifically as a client have spent too many requests, not that the site is being spammed to hell. If the site can't handle the traffic, a good option is 503 service unavailable, as that makes it clear that the problem lies on the server side, not the client.

Re: Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

#206

Post by bliteben »

al_borland wrote: post #74
bliteben wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got one recently for a room that was already wired with speakers, and man the ability to control the volume on Apple TV remote app on your phone is amazing. For whatever reason none of my other Apple TV's will allow that (could be the tv's fault, but obviously somewhere along the line they at least expect a speaker bar). I'm sure it's a fault of the HDMI spec somewhere that you can't easily change the volume on the…

I have an AppleTV on 2 different TVs and it works to change the volume on both of them. Sometimes it stops working, but a reboot of the remote fixes it. The idea that I need to reboot a remote hurts my soul a little, but at least it works. Hold the TV and Volume Down buttons until the LED on the Apple TV turns off. Wait a bit and you’ll see a notice that it disconnects. Wait a while longer and press a button (volume…

The difference is with the app. With the Apple Remote it works fine, but in the app it only works with HDMI magic (I'm sure some tv's allow you to use the HDMI magic with no sound bar / receiver)

Re: Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

#207

Post by steveBK123 »

It's a shame that big box stores (Walmart, Target) / online retail (Amazon) / brand owned stores (Apple, Bose) have all conspired to reduce consumer choice. Even in big cities, there's practically no specialty stores to go to in which I can demo a product category across brands.

Think pre-GFC peak Best Buy & the old CompUSA/Circuit City chains of the past or even Apple before they captured every other product category and actually had entire tables of headphone and speaker brands.

It strikes me as very hard for any new brand to come about in this environment if they aren't already big enough to have their own storefront. As you are generally left shopping online by price (DTC / China alphabet soup branded sop on AMZN) or by known brand (I'll just get a Sony / Apple / Sonos / Bose).

Re: Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

#208

Post by moontear »

numpad0 wrote: post #168

> Too many requests -- error 999. In case anyone need it, here's[0] Wikipedia list article for HTTP status codes(200, 404, etc.) "Too Many Requests" is 429. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_HTTP_status_codes

https://web.archive.org/web/20250507182014/https://www.engad...

Re: Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

#209

Post by itsoktocry »

Spackonewz wrote: post #191
trentnix wrote: post #77

Now there are more avenues for Samsung to shove bloatware down our throats. I have a modestly high-end home theater and it is utterly maddening waiting for devices to “boot” and “handshake”. And after the wait, I’m presented with another “User Agreement” to sign that insists on shoveling ads down my throat and harvesting data. How much do you have to pay for a quick boot, no ads, and a private movie or music experien…

[flagged]

>Retards here just want more connectedness. What besides a storage backend, a UI frontend, and analog audio do you need?

Little harsh, but yeah.

People are in here saying, "I love controlling receiver through my Apple TV!" That's why we are where we are. Apple may be good right now, but may not be forever. People literally ask for this stuff to be integrated, buying Sonos systems that brick and what not. It's too bad.

Re: Samsung is paying $350M for audio brands B&W, Denon, Marantz and Polk

#210

Post by ThatMedicIsASpy »

hsbauauvhabzb wrote: post #143
timc3 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly are you waiting for. I have two Dolby atmos systems, denon receivers, Apple TVs, OSMC boxes on both, and LG Smart TVs disconnected from the internet. Start up time is less than a second.

are you telling me the reason my tv turns on slowly is because it has internet access?

I can enable fast start for a lot of things and have them draw 100W doing nothing or I can live with a 15W idle TV shelf and slow startups.
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