Let it be clearly understood that Frank is a stand-up guy, basing his designs on sound engineering principles.
The cost/weight relationship is
cost/weight, not
sound quality/weight. Sound quality, valid engineering, and performance is a whole 'nother thing and their relationship to a product's weight, be it aircraft, car, or amplifier, is not the point I was making.
There are too many guys on this circle that would bench test a unit to determine if it delivers the advertised performance.
This is great. Missed the point entirely. Any manufacturer who makes a performance claim deserves to have that claim validated. Any of us who can test performance
ought to do so. Now, we should all know that a product's sound is not necessarily determined by measurements - but if a manufacturer states a certain performance, then, by gum, it ought to be true and we ought to test it if we can. An analogy, and a true story: A car manufacturer claims 300 horsepower. His cars only make 275. This does not mean the cars drive nicely or poorly - it just means that the manufacturer lied. Likewise, I like to know if an amplifier manufacturer lies. Krell, for example, claiming 150 watts on a box that craps out in 45 minutes during a Stereophile review (they liked it anyway!?!).
For the record, I am not accusing AVA of lying. I think they are tops.