Here's a company bringing out the ol' exaggeration in a bid to take a bite out of the consumer market. Goldster's Concertino iPod-styled system came out a while back and here they are in Hammacher and Schlemmer going for a sweet $3999. Check this out:

...the system consists of an aluminum-encased amplifier housing four powerful Class-A tubes which glow gently as they generate warm, low-octave sound that is virtually distortion-free, considered by audiophiles to be the most pleasing to the human ear. The tube amplifier smoothes over distortions found in modern digital recordings while helping to compensate and minimize the quality loss inherent in compressed audio such as MP3s.

Then they go on and on about the special drivers as if they invented full range speaker technology. Low end? Hardly. When I first looked at this system I distinctly remember seeing low end extension to about 80Hz. Now their specs don't even mention frequency range or amplifier power for their "powerful Class-A tubes". And what's that about tubes smoothing over digital recordings? Seems to me the only thing "iPod" about the Concertino is the color since the only connections included are RCA - no iPod dock or USB.

Of course, this system could be the bomb, who knows. But for $4000, I bet you can put together a much better system. Then again, you wouldn't get shiny iPod-matching components which is, of course, all that really matters. All said and done, I hope they sell a million of these things. The truth is this is a great idea. While it may be overpriced in the audiophile market, it's exactly what the audionewbies need to make the big leap into the high-end market.

News via Gadget Review.