Manley Gold disbelief

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kingkorg

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Apr 15, 2017
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Norway
It just showed up in local ads. Is it possible this thing is priced at 5000$ and has this lousy manufacturing quality?

 

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Ahem - it's called (partially) "point-to-point hand-wiring" ;D Such guitar amps command hefty premiums over the mass-produced circuit-board ones, at least :p

And anyway, you're supposed to use them and be astounded... Or something - i wouldn't know  :D

PS: 2nd photo doesn't work, for some reason.
 
Well, it's a "ch00b" circuit - my guess is they wanted (if not even "needed") to make it look ancient ;D

Oh, i'm sorry, slight typo there - i meant "vintage" :p
 
In case anyone wants to buy my Frankentube for 5000$ pm. me here...  Its super ancient.

Yes those yellow things are premium 3M ear plugs 🤣🤣🤣
 

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You should see the inside of a u47.....

I’m not sure what the point is, or what it should ‘look like’. 
 
Yes it’s true, Manley’s mics are generally known to look quite sloppy and not very “pro” on the inside by remotely-modern standards; especially considering how pro inside their outboard gear is. Luckily, most eyes only see the outside, and along with our ears, we confirm it’s very pro.
 
Average point to point work - weirdly slapped on top of PCB. But nothing wrong with the quality and looks decent mechanically.

That's all. We all know what that's worth and speculating over end-user price is not meaningful.
 
That’s right. Rarely do I look at a piece of gear and see or imagine the said price. It’s what I don’t see that makes it impossible for me to measure; all the costs of doing a long-lasting, customer and employee supporting business, and making a sizeable profit to make it all worth-while. It takes money to make money is no joke and there’s an amazing amount of capital in every direction always on the line. It’s an enormous amount of risk!
 
kingkorg said:
In case anyone wants to buy my Frankentube for 5000$ pm. me here...  Its super ancient.

Yes those yellow things are premium 3M ear plugs 🤣🤣🤣

If your mic came with a $1500 Josephson capsule, maybe you'd have a point.
 
Looks on par with a lot of the projects on this forum. There is nothing complex going on in a tube mic, it's about the design and the components, especially the capsule. When someone sings into the mic and it SOUNDS like $5k, I think that's what makes it worth $5k.
 
I am yet to hear a mic that sounds like 5000$ compared to tons of great mics made for under 1000$.

Original C12, U47, U87 etc. prices are 100% justified. These guys invented these things and produced, designed, developed, every part from scratch. For the first time in hustory, very long time ago when technology was very limited.

Paying 5000$ for this kind of foot work, as the thing looks like it has been assembled with feet, not hands is ludacris. And believing that there is anything about it that sounds like 5000$ is nothing more than confirmation bias.

The same goes for Josephson capsule. C12 capsule made in California sounds exactly like Ford made in China to me, as i dont have any bias towards USA manufacturing.

However, people also justify price of Cardioid Reference which has the same capsule as 50$ Sterling Audio ST51, and sounds exactly like one, so i am not surprised by these reactions. Manley does obviously the same thing as Telefunken with their RFT series, which seems to be the way to go in the USA.

I, being European, am never going to be able to grasp the value in such products.

For those who dont get what i expect from a 5000$ mic manufacturing, just look inside any Brauner mic.
 
Sounds like Manley are aiming at the 'Veblen' goods market, where demand increases as the price increases,  (contrary to common sense, some would say!)
See here:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good

Rolls Royce, Gucci, etc. get away with it and make a very nice living from the concept ....
In the mic world, some Neumann and Telefunken mics have what appear to be silly price tags - maybe Manley feel they can be part of that same idea?.....
 
That, plus confirmation bias... [insert facepalm here]

If you paid a 4-5 figure sum, it WILL sound better (at least to you), because "obviously" you wouldn't have wasted a small fortune on a turd, right?  :eek:

kingkorg said:
Now that on the other hand is someting i can go with, and makes perfect sense.
 
I wouldn't pay $5k for that. You could get a lot of decent clones, a good interface, and some acoustic treatment for that. You could build a pretty decent home studio for that much. Same way I wouldn't pay the asking price for a lot of Peluso's mics (especially when the capsules I've heard sound no better than $50≥ Chinese ones). I don't care how hand built and made in the USA a mic is, if the components it's using aren't worth it I'm not gonna bite. Companies like 3U Audio are making great mics in China and most of them are sub-$500.

rogs said:
Sounds like Manley are aiming at the 'Veblen' goods market, where demand increases as the price increases,  (contrary to common sense, some would say!)
See here:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good

Rolls Royce, Gucci, etc. get away with it and make a very nice living from the concept ....
In the mic world, some Neumann and Telefunken mics have what appear to be silly price tags - maybe Manley feel they can be part of that same idea?.....
Neumann and Telefunken can justify it to some extent because their tube mics are originals others are based on and a lot of clones might not get that sound you're after. I think Manley is just pricing their mics at the price you pay for high end gear and hoping people will pay it and consider their stuff premium.
 
kingkorg said:
The same goes for Josephson capsule. C12 capsule made in California sounds exactly like Ford made in China to me, as i dont have any bias towards USA manufacturing.

It’s not a matter of bias, but instead the cold hard facts with cost of doing business in USA;  more precisely, CA. It’s a double-whammy there with Josephson and Manley!
 

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