I see your point.
In my experimenting with Short Intakes, one thing was usually the case, they are noisy.
Here you have to make sure not to confuse sound for power or lack of
If you look at this dyno, again it is evident that 04 stock tsx MT back to back comparison, actually demonstrates power gain from 3 K +, and slight loss at 2.5-3K using AEM SRS intake.
http://www.vtec.net/articles/article...tovtsx_aem.gif
This would indicate that you are actually making more power everywhere other than under 3K, and even there penalty is not major.
Stock car might be slightly better 2-3K rpm, but after that aftermarket is better.
I suspect that stock intake resonance is around 2750rpm, and it would explain a lot of these dyno charts and also why it is hard to beat stock at that rpm...