Have your say & ask the experts

Clare Newsome:

We are (and always have been) a mainstream buyer's guide, and we're merely reflecting the market, albeit with far more of a core hi-fi emphasis.

This blog I wrote back in February explains how much TVs dominate the UK CE sales scene - accounting for more than half (£3bn+) of all consumer electronics purchases this year. Compared to that, the separates market (including hi-fi and AV) is £200m.

It's not the only measure that drives us - our passion for music and movie excellence typically means we're covering products above the average price/spec, and with far more of an enthusiast focus -  but without understanding what makes consumers tick, we wouldn't be the market-leading magazine we are.

In addition, our recent reader's survey - which more than 6000 users of the magazine and website were kind enough to spend a considerable time filling in - TVs were the single most popular planned purchase in the next 12 months:

42 percent plan to buy a TV in the next year; next up at 23 percent is a Blu-ray player, followed at 21 percent by people who intend to buy nothing major due to the economic situation.

Still in double-digits, we have 18 percent of readers planning to buy a home cinema receiver, with 17 percent due to buy a speaker package and 10 percent wanting a home cinema system.

Hi-fi results are as follows: speakers and stereo amps on 8 percent each; CD players at 7 percent; turntables at 4 percent. 

 

Looking elsewhere means you miss out on the exclusives, features and our full test team testing in our dedicated rooms. Rather, you'll get just a single reviewer testing in his shed with a cat on his lap.

As stated before, we actually review more hi-fi than rival magazines and make a magazine that gets new readers excited about hi-fi as well as home cinema products. Ultimately, once you've felt the benefit of one, you're enticed by the other. We just want to give people the best sound and vision experience and if the TV bits don't interest you, come here and see more and more hi-fi blogs, videos, podcasts, archive reviews etc.

Richard Melville:

Looking elsewhere means you miss out on the exclusives, features and our full test team testing in our dedicated rooms. Rather, you'll get just a single reviewer testing in his shed with a cat on his lap.

As stated before, we actually review more hi-fi than rival magazines and make a magazine that gets new readers excited about hi-fi as well as home cinema products. Ultimately, once you've felt the benefit of one, you're enticed by the other. We just want to give people the best sound and vision experience and if the TV bits don't interest you, come here and see more and more hi-fi blogs, videos, podcasts, archive reviews etc.

Think its more likely to be an oscilloscope on his/her lap..... 

Richard Melville:

Looking elsewhere means you miss out on the exclusives, features and our full test team testing in our dedicated rooms. Rather, you'll get just a single reviewer testing in his shed with a cat on his lap.

As stated before, we actually review more hi-fi than rival magazines and make a magazine that gets new readers excited about hi-fi as well as home cinema products. Ultimately, once you've felt the benefit of one, you're enticed by the other. We just want to give people the best sound and vision experience and if the TV bits don't interest you, come here and see more and more hi-fi blogs, videos, podcasts, archive reviews etc.

It does exactly what it says on the tin! I wonder what sort of reaction the mag would stir up if it was What S&V & Hi-Fi?

chebby:

An AV buyer will think nothing of spending £15,000 on receiver, projector and speakers and another few grand getting everything custom installed.

What AV buyers do you know?!

Clare Newsome:

.....42 percent plan to buy a TV in the next year......Hi-fi results are as follows: speakers and stereo amps on 8 percent each; CD players at 7 percent; turntables at 4 percent.......

Sums it all up and answers the OPs original question perfectly. I wonder what the percentages were for purchasing headphones and headphone amps? Less than 1%? Anyway, us headfiers have been well catered for in recent issues and I thank you for that. But what about the promised review of the FiiO portable headphone amp?

professorhat:

chebby:

An AV buyer will think nothing of spending £15,000 on receiver, projector and speakers and another few grand getting everything custom installed.

What AV buyers do you know?!

A few. An ex colleague who converted a double garage into a home cinema which eventually cost over £25.000 to equip and convert. A regular local taxi driver who is a customer of the same dealer I go to who has spent over £15,000 on home cinema and is about to spend another small fortune on a giant plasma screen for the living room TV just for his wife. (She does not find the 'cinema' convenient or easy use.) A relative of my wife's who has also spent a similar amount extending his house to incorporate a home cinema.

 The electrician who came to wire up our new conservatory last year works for a specialist company also installing AV/home cinema/multi-room etc. 80 percent of his work is ripping out plaster and installing custom trunking and the the requisite wiring for such systems. The AV crowd take this stuff really seriously and will spends thousands on installation. Our parochial little  'cable debates' would seem positively amateurish and quaint to them.

Chats with my local dealer has revealed that £10k - £15k AV/Cinemasystems are not at all unusual and are NOT all installed in large salubrious properties by rich folk but more typically ordinary blokes with normal jobs living in typical modest family homes. Circa £5000 receivers (Denon, Onkyo, Yamaha) and commensurately expensive speaker sets and TVs or projectors are very popular apparently.

I have no idea how ordinary 'salary slaves' like me can afford it - especially recently - but they do. 

jaxwired:

[...... I would argue that the level of passion and interest between the two groups, tv buyers, and hi-fi buyers is very different.  I would guess the vast majority of TV buyers don't care enough about specs and features to read group tests and research all that data.  They just want a decent, current, and functional TV at a good price.  The HiFi buyers are far more passionate and far more intersted in all the product details and comparisons.....  

Totally disagree with the above and the content of the magazine and Clare's survey results show otherwise. There are as many av enthusiasts here as hifi. Just look at the roughly equal popularity of the hifi and av parts of the forum and people's kit lists for further proof. I am more enthused about music than av, but I still fully researched my choice of TV, DVD how best to get the TV I want (ie Sky vs cable vs freeview). I have a decent mains extension and scarts to put it all together.

My hifi is almost sorted to do me for the next good few years and my attention will then switch more to av, and a nice blue ray player and I like the look of the Yamaha soundbars and maybe a mains cable upgrade for the Sky box.......

chebby:

I have no idea how ordinary 'salary slaves' like me can afford it - especially recently - but they do.

Can you ask a few?! I'd like to know that secret too!

idc:

I
wonder what the percentages were for purchasing headphones and
headphone amps? Less than 1%? Anyway, us headfiers have been well
catered for in recent issues and I thank you for that. But what about
the promised review of the FiiO portable headphone amp?

As more of the survey information comes in, i'm writing a blog that'll go into more detail  (expect to see that sometime next week).

No precise figures for headphone amps - we didn't have the survey space for every product - but headphones are a planned purchase for 6 percent of those surveyed.

(And I don't know the answer re the FiiO - will ask test team)

I agree with SoSwishy. I have been buying the magzine on and off since the mid 80's and prefer the mag then to now. There is too much TV stuff. I have just bought a TV (Pana 42X10) and will probably keep it for 10 years! In the mean time I'm not interested in reading about TV's I'm not going to buy. HiFi is different because it is more of a hobby. The never ending desire to improve a system to get a better sound. TV, to me is a one off purchase, not a hobby.

I have old copies of WHF going back 5 years or so and feel that the more recent issues are more lightweight than older ones. There were more detailed articles in 2004, for example, and more pages! I still buy the mag though so it can't be all bad!