The cost for high quality plummeted, especially in audio storage, playback, and amplification. That was 1980-2010. The technical advances were not particularly big in microphones, but very big in analog-digital conversion, digital storage, digital editing, and digital-to-analog conversion. Amplification was rejuvenated by switching power supplies and class D amplifiers starting in 1996. The availability of high quality measurement techniques vastly improved the state of the art in speakers since 2000 or so.
Meanwhile, mass-market audio has gotten better but not consistently. The speakers are usually the limiting factor for quality: you can have at most any two of small speakers, deep bass, or volume for a given power budget. Lots of consumer systems go for small speakers and don't have either deep bass or high volume.
Does sound quality matter? That's an individual choice. It's available to you at a much lower cost than ever before in history.
Meanwhile, mass-market audio has gotten better but not consistently. The speakers are usually the limiting factor for quality: you can have at most any two of small speakers, deep bass, or volume for a given power budget. Lots of consumer systems go for small speakers and don't have either deep bass or high volume.
Does sound quality matter? That's an individual choice. It's available to you at a much lower cost than ever before in history.