Who Killed the Middle of HiFi?
Danny, congratulations on making the USA track and field team for meet in South Korea. Your recent video and the questions raised inspired me as High-Performance High Value HiFi is my passion. Inspired as 2000+ words so get your favorite beverage and settle in. Or declare TLDR and move on.
Danny’s recent video is titled and asks “Who Killed the Middle of Hi-Fi?” He asks some very interesting questions listed out and discussed below. The premise that the middle of Hi-Fi has been killed is based on his visiting Southwest Audio Fest in Dallas TX July 2026. I exhibited at SWAF’26 in the Marketplace and thanks to my co-exhibitors teaming to cover our exhibit had the opportunity to see and hear most of the rooms. Based on the sample at SWAF the middle of Hi-Fi is missing, perhaps killed off or withered away. My take is the middle is alive and well, but not marketed at shows like SWAF. In 2026 with a very limited supply of brick-and-mortar dealers both smaller boutique and the high-end, higher-end, and hyper-end manufacturers & distributors & dealers use shows like SWAF, T.H.E., and AXPONA to market to both dealers and end users. The ‘middle’ manufactures have by and large moved marketing to YouTube and other of the “socials” online, deals with Best Buy, Crutchfield, Music Direct, et.al.. And a good number of brands sell direct themselves. Amazon has got the middle class used to an ecosystem of order online today, it arrives shortly, and after trying at home keep or use the generous no or low-cost return policies to send it back and try again. Extended in-home auditions were once reserved for dealers’ top frequent flyer clients, now one can have it for a $600 Denon integrated amp.
Questions To Discuss• What do we name this movement?
• Should High-End brands go more affordable?
• Who Abandoned the middle – Brands or Buyers?
• Are Hi-Fi shows reaching new people?
• Has YouTube helped or hurt the divide?
• What’s the upgrade path from affordable Hi-Fi?
• Is DIY the missing middle?
• What does expensive audio actually buy?
• What about a price-capped Hi-Fi show?
What do we name this movement? My suggestion is High-Performance High Value HiFi. Gets the concept across without some damning with faint praise phrase like ‘mid-fi’ or ‘middle’.
Should High-End brands go more affordable?My observation is that is a heroic but often suicidal mission. If the market longed for ‘affordable high-end’ then Hafler and Adcom would still be in business. The PS Audio Sprout would still be in production. Not always the case, below I feature a gem from Parasound I discovered while writing this, the NC 200INT Integrated Amplifier.
At play the typical High-End brand’s manufacturing capabilities if made in USA, UK, or EU are geared to lower volumes in high labor and regulatory cost regions. Is location of manufacture a key part of the brand identity? Do they have the capability to locate and QC OEMs in Asia? A marketing and brand identity consideration is likely the first consideration. Like it or not many if not most buyers of luxury goods judge prospective purchases based on price and market hierarchy. It is a difficult equation to solve, can an ‘affordable’ version of our high end products be made with sufficient margin to be worth our investment and marketed in a way that does not diminish the hard built status of our brand?
Complicating these discussions is defining ‘high-end’ and ‘affordable’, which we are never going to agree on. My definitions are as follows.
Hi-End HiFi are components and systems placing primary importance on using the current state of the art knowledge set to produce sound reproduction at the highest level a product’s budget will allow. Second high priority is good design, fit, and finish recognizing pride of ownership comes from both sonics and visuals.
Affordable is what a music and HiFi loving student or just-got-my-first-real-job young adult can afford. I agree with Ken Kessler’s great article here (
https://www.soundstagehifi.com/index.php/international/soundstage-uk/1564-ken-kesslers-new-stereo-system-part-one) for us grey beards a good way to put a number on that is what did I spend on my first HiFi? In this article Kessler writes:
“
Back to being spoiled rotten (as a professional HiFi reviewer): I will never forget my roots, beginning with the system I purchased at the age of 16, the loan for it taking two years to pay off. It was 1968, and I was working two jobs, but I just had to have a decent sound system. I went into hock for $700—equivalent now, I was horrified to learn, to $5378. What 16-year-old wants that kind of debt? But—unlike the whining bitches who reek of envy because someone else has a costly MC which they claim they can’t afford—I prioritized my finances, decided music was more important than a car, food, a steady supply of pot, or saving for college, so I paid it off from a paper route and slaving over a vat of hot fat at KFC.”
I love Ken Kessler’s writing, have read him for years in Hi-Fi News. For me the stereo that went into my dorm room sophomore year 1974 cost $850 or $5,757 in 2026 US dollars.
For this discussion let’s say affordable is $5,500 USD. Let’s put together some systems with that in mind. One leveraging high-tech integration, what I call Moore’s Law HiFi or John Darko labeled Future-Fi. Second a more traditional HiFi from separate components. Third a starving-artist option for as little cost as possible to get into the wonders of HiFi. Finally, is the Hi-Fi music lover I am calling the Young Married; getting started, first baby has arrived and some discretionary income is available but must be spent wisely on a system that will last years.
Moore’s Law Future-FiKEF LS LUXE $3999/pr, stands KEF S-LUXE Custom floor stands $799/pr, subwoofers KEF Kube 8 MIE $699 each total is $5497. This is Future-Fi so we’re streaming music from our laptop or tablet or phone via Ethernet or WiFi via Roon or UPnP or KEF Connect app. My 1974 dorm stereo was powered by a Marantz 1060 integrated amp with a big 30 watts per channel. Thanks to class-D (A/B for the tweeters) this Future-Fi rig has 100 watts for each tweeter, 280 for each woofer with motion control feedback, and 300 watts on the subwoofer, total 1,060 watts. Thanks to Moore’s Law the multiple DSPs involved have 100 or 1000 times the processing power of the mainframes we programmed in Fortran using punch cards in 1974.
Traditional separate components HiFiI have to do a couple here. First EverSolo DMP-A6 Gen 2 Network Streamer & DAC $859, Parasound NC 200INT Integrated Amplifier $1000, GR Research X-LS Encore Extreme carbon fiber $2499 (pair) OR GR-Research Allie $3900 totals $4358 or $6217. Allie, bad girl you broke our budget, try again. Rega Planar 1 Turntable (P1) turntable & carbon cartridge $595, Parasound NC 200INT Integrated Amplifier $1000, GR-Research Allie $3900 totals $5495. Note the Parasound NC 200INT has a DAC with USB, Toslink, and COAX inputs so owners existing laptop or smart TV can supply digital content.
Starving-artist or high schooler HiFiFiiO Jade Audio LEVEL 1 Power Amplifier $140 (
https://apos.audio/products/fiio-jade-audio-level-1-power-amplifier?_pos=1&_sid=3212b640f&_ss=r) latest of the Texas Instruments TPA3255 platform wunderkind with Bluetooth 6.0/LDAC, USB, coaxial, and line inputs, along with speaker, subwoofer, and pre-out connections. Its 2026 so even starving artists and especially high school kids have smart phones to use as first source here. Cambridge Audio SX-50 $229/pr and totals $369.
Young Married’s HiFiYamaha A-S501 $650 85wpc, line, phono, and digital inputs. First source is the smart HDTV &/or laptop they already own. Arendal 1961 tower $2000/pr. Total $2650 for a system including tower loudspeakers with near-SOTA measurements (
https://www.erinsaudiocorner.com/loudspeakers/arendal_1961_tower/).
Pricing for the above scenarios is taken from apos.audio, musicdirect.com, crutchfield.com, gr-research.com, and arendalsound.com.
Who Abandoned the middle – Brands or Buyers?My take as stated above is not abandoned rather in stealth mode of largely direct to consumer sales. One group who absolutely abandoned, then turned around kicked, stomped, and laughed as running away is status seeking snob audiophiles. Genuine High-Performance High Value HiFi components and systems are sneered at by those who live in HiFi’s ivory towers protected by $50,000 entry pricing. Lest I tar individuals unjustly with too broad a brush I will hasten to add there are plenty of audiophiles blessed to own very high dollar systems who recognize in 2026 a few thousand (or even hundreds!) will buy very good very enjoyable music reproduction. Alas there are also too many of the other kind who engage in a type of audiophile virtue signaling of their self-judged ultra-refined tastes by telling unsuspecting newbies that a minimum entry level HiFi system must cost the equivalent of a new Toyota Corolla. A pox on their house.
Are Hi-Fi shows reaching new people?Based on people watching from my booth and in the halls and rooms at SWAF’26 I would say 10% to at tops 15% are young, new, or returning to the pursuit after a long absence.
Has YouTube helped or hurt the divide?Helped, absolutely helped. For example, the KEF LS LUXE I used for my Future-Fi system above was marketed by many review samples going out to YouTube reviewers, influencers, and tech channels prior to its formal introduction in time to prepare videos all hitting more or less simultaneously when they went “out of embargo” on the formal release date.
What’s the upgrade path from affordable Hi-Fi?To quote the Talking Head’s David Byrne and producer co-author Brian Eno ‘Once in A Lifetime’ “
Same as it ever was Same as it ever was. Same as it ever was”. For normies just looking for good music and video sound, I will assert the middle of the bell curve quality of the sound is so good in 2026 just enjoy no upgrade necessary. For those whose curiosity leads to joining us in a practice of HiFi as a journey to greater refinement and power, welcome. Now tell me about your system and how do you imagine it could be better? Default suggestions as frequent answers include a pair of subwoofers and better or additional source components.
Is DIY the missing middle?DIYers are my tribe. I was one of those nerds in 1987 de-soldering op-amps and caps from Magnavox CD players to replace with upgraded parts to hear more goodness from their Philips TDA1541 DACs. DIY is a wonderful part of HiFi and sweat equity is a powerful multiplier of dollars into performance. But the middle is not missing and DIY is too narrow a niche to replace it if it were.
What does expensive audio actually buy?As price and complexity rise noise gets out of the way of the music while bandwidth and dynamics expand. Real, quality first octave bass is expensive. Then the ability to reveal the fine filigreed details of instruments’ tonal nuance, including the human voice. Hearing why a Fender CD-60S is $230 and a pre-war 1930s Martin D-28 costs $120,000 to $190,000+ is thus allowed. Along the way effortless dynamic loudness swings into the territory of big band jazz orchestras, romantic era classical symphonies, and stadium rock enter the picture. And we get choices. Like collectors of luxury mechanical watches or sports cars one can load up with complications and really exquisite finishing. My practice is along the path where once distortions, noises of all stripes, resonances, bandwidth and dynamic limits are brought into line the system always sounds great but…there are moments..when the emotional impact is stunning.
What about a price-capped Hi-Fi show?That would be fun. Who pays? I do not know exact numbers, I have been exhibiting at HiFi Shows since 2005 so I will guesstimate to put on a show in a good hotel with professional staff and marketing to get attendees in the door is $20,000 - $50,000. It’s done because, well look at AXPONA, 12,500 attendees’ times $32 tickets equal $400,000 gross before counting exhibitor payments. Of course, with 235 exhibit rooms my guess is the contract with the hotel for that event could be six figures. For a price capped show can I still charge $32 for attendee tickets to help cover it all? For exhibitors the small hotel sleeping room size exhibit rooms market rate range from $3500 - $5000 per show. Plus, staff travel expenses and lost opportunity costs. Plus, expense of demo gear that comes back scratched, dented, or broken or stolen or lost in shipping. The equation to solve is which sellers or makers of High-Performance High Value HiFi can do sufficient business in a weekend to cover the $5000-$10000 cost of exhibiting? Damn spreadsheets always spoil the fun. A more obtainable IMHO goal is what’s been done at several shows over the years. A room or two of High-Performance High Value HiFi to compare and contrast with the usual suspects. Someone or a team with passion to make it happen can sometimes persuade manufacturers and showrunners to sponsor such room(s) as a gesture that HiFi has attainable entry points.
