"Grant Sellek" wrote in message
om
"Arny Krueger" wrote ...
"Peter Werner" wrote

I figure I'd like to spend about $500 to replace them, but
would consider going higher, especially if I found something
discounted.

Bizarre logic - you spend more if offered a discount?

I think he means going from $500 speakers to $600 speakers won't buy
enough improvement to be worth exceeding his comfortable budget, but
if he could get $1000 speakers for $600, the improvement might be
worth the financial discomfort.

I presumed that thinking of that sort might be involved, but it still isn't
good logic.

When all is said and done speakers need to be evaluated based on their cost
and their benefits at the point of sale. The fact that speakers might have
their price jacked up to $1,000, and then subsequently discounted to $500
shows up as $500 worth of cost, not $500 worth of benefit.

To me and I think most purchasers, the benefits of a speaker are primarily
sound quality and appearance.

One might argue that the $1,000 speakers have $1,000 worth of some
intangible such as "panache", but they also might have $500 worth of some
other intangible such as "mark them down LOTS because they ain't worth the
current asking price".

The existence of really broad auction markets like eBay eliminates much of
the "one-time, only" justification for making a big-ticket purchase.
Experience shows that if some kind of thing goes up for sale on eBay once,
another one like it is probably going to go up shortly. If someone goes
crazy for one auction and bids prices up unreasonably, just wait for the
next auction of the same kind of auction.

I think that the ghost of eBay stalks every mid and large ticket purchase
these days, especially those that are in some sense discretionary.