Not every audiophile is a middle-aged robber baron who plays $1,000 records on a $300,000 turntable. Most audiophiles today are actually young men—yes, almost always men—who listen to ALAC files on their iPhones through a pair of $200 IEMs they scored on Amazon for $120.

This is the discriminating but financially strapped segment of the audio market that "Chi-Fi" manufacturers cater to. Once dismissed by critics as junk gear, some of these companies in China and Hong Kong have ramped up quality to the point where fancy audiophile companies are getting nervous. Consider Well Tempered Lab, a venerable American brand known for its premium turntables and Rube Goldberg LTD tonearm. They decided to surrender rather than compete; all their decks, including the $4,450 Versulex (sans LTD) are now made in Beijing by the Opera Audio Company.

Opera's own Consonance line of components has gained a loyal following among European audiophiles, but most Chi-Fi badges are far more obscure. GemTune anyone? With no budget to splurge on full-page ads in Stereophile, these small startups depend on Web reviews and word of mouth to move inventory. There certainly isn't much to glean from the lost-in-Google-translation product literature. Here's a typical "Chinglish" passage about the Matisse MDS-623 Tube Preamp describing what may or may not be a vacuum tube that may or may not be Russian: "This pipe features such as forums to talk about sound, the low frequency full, with a very strong taste of bile, so some fans are fascinated."