FatElvis2000;173898 Wrote: > "Logitech" doesn't make high-end stereo componentry!
I suggest you check out Christensen's book The Innovator's Dilemma if you have not done so. If you have, well... The packetization of audio is a classic disruptive technology. It follows directly on the disruption of the entire telecommunications and data communciations marketplaces that has taken place over the last 25 years due to packetization, CPU and DSP processing power. I think if you look around you will be amazed by the number of companies that used to be the dominate players in these marketplace that are no longer, specifically due to disruptive technologies driven on packetization, CPU and DSP power. It is absolutely amazing how many technical problems that used to cost big dollars in the technical domain of synchronized clocking and bit stream processing can be solved very cheaply at high quality with playout buffers, packets on networks, disk drives and DSPs. SB3 and Tp are excellent examples of this shift. Logitech a player in high end audio? Well, why not? How is that any sillier than Slim Devices being a player in high end audio(Slim who?) Logitech already plays in computer audio (somewhat). They appear to be targeting the Home Theater market a bit (remotes). They understand the consumer market and consumer electronics channels. They understand audio enough to pay to acquire a streaming media division. The Transporter is the distruptive displacement of the highest end of the audiophile market (the 10K+ CD player & preamp section all for only 2k. And the Transporter will inevitably drop in price and do more) Amazing what some packetization and DSP technology can do. The fact that audiophiles may take a dim view of something like packet audio shows the point exactly: if you compare the Transporter against a Mark Levinson DAC and top end CD Transport that looks like a small alien spaceship landed in your living room, maybe it looks "cheap" and unable to compete. But, those are the "old world" metrics! When you look at the Tp as the living room extension of your portable music player, but way better, well, its a whole other set of marketplace metrics coming to the table, isn't it? Who will pay 20-40K for audio equipment when your portable music player is a couple of hundred and sounds just as good or maybe almost as good. But a lot of people will pay 1-2K for top of the line audio on the margin of existing portable audio player infrastructure. In my opinion, the Transporter is just as good as the top end of the current audiophile market. There is definately some value based pricing going on right now - I am getting probably 20-50K worth of today's gear for 2K. Of course, tomorrow that price will get driven down, or the feature/function will get driven up. If Logitech doesn't kill the golden egg of Slim Devices in the integration effort, and they have some kind of product plan (its not mice and keyboards now), they might just do something here. Don't underestimate this issue though - I have personally participated operationally in over 15 mergers or aquisitions. I know how easy it is to mess it up and be left with nothing. All just my opinion of course. Only time will tell. Let's agree to come back in 2.5 & 5 years and reopen this discussion :-) -- Eric Carroll ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Eric Carroll's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=9293 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=31935 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
