I feel the need to make a public apology to Audiogon and explain my actions. This also goes to those people that may have seen another thread that i posted to and was pretty much "instantly deleted" or those that i contacted via email.
As many of you know, the original thread that D911 posted was recently deleted. Someone started another thread that touched on this subject the other day and i responded to it. I posted that i had thought that this was VERY wrong on the part of Audiogon and that Audiogon basically needed to do some explaining on the subject. Audiogon deleted the second follow-up thread as my post was the first and only reply at that time. Needless to say, i was pissed and went off the deep end. You can take it from there...
As it turns out, i was the one that was VERY wrong. As far as i'm concerned, D911 was out "shilling for business" in a very direct manner. I was not aware that he had business affiliations with the product that he was promoting. The fact that he started the thread and then later chimed in to support a product that he profits from working with appears to be a pre-planned move and what the thread was started for to begin with. As such, the truth was revealed as to D911's true motivations and i was not aware of this when i "stuck up" for the previous ART based threads and wondered why they had been deleted.
Quite honestly, i owe Audiogon an apology. I not only attacked them publicly in the second thread that was deleted, but approached a select group of others that i correspond with publicly and privately to make them aware of my thoughts on the thread deletion policy. Needless to say, i jumped to conclusions based on less than full understanding whereas Audiogon knew exactly what they were doing and why. As such, i should not have questioned the motives of Audiogon but been smart enough to see the motives behind D911's public manipulation of a thread for his own benefit.
To Arnie and all of the Audiogon crew, i say "I'm sorry and THANK YOU for doing your homework / protecting the users of this forum from unsolicited advertising. I hope that you continue to watch over these forums and disregard the outbursts from children like me that fly off the handle. Once again, i apologize for my less than adult behavior and admire your persistence in keeping these forums a "troll / commercial free zone".
To D911, all i can say is that what you did was wrong in my eyes and i'm sure that it was wrong in the eyes of many others. Some will not see anything wrong with what you did. Some may see these people as "bargain hunters" ( aren't we all ??? ) but i see them as gullible fools that have played right into your hands via your "master plan". If such is the case, they would be willing to be manipulated at their own expense. So be it.
I hope that they realize that they may end up sinking three to four times the money that they originally spent for a $200 product that is under-designed to begin with. I also hope that they realize that, should this product NOT live up to the hype, they'll have what is now a near $1000 product that offers very little resale value on the used market.
While we all make our own decisions and have to live with them, this does not seem like a very wise move to me. Then again, my flying off the handle in the previously deleted thread probably didn't seem very wise to others and they would be right. As such, that would be a mistake that i regret making. The main mistake that i made was in trying to support a thread that was directly posted as nothing more than shill by D911 and challenging the integrity of Audiogon.
Having said that, i am NEVER against someone mentioning products that offer good bang for the buck. That is, so long as they aren't out "shilling for business". In fact, that is why i got mad i.e. i thought that Audiogon had deleted these threads because they did not support the "high profit margin" of a dealer. My thoughts were that some of their dealers had leaned on them to remove these threads as the word of this "super bargain" could hurt brand new sales of other products they might carry. Once again though, i had jumped to conclusions.
With that in mind, i can see that if one were to buy TWO SLA-1's and have them modified in a very specific manner, it might overcome the majority of flaws that i previously mentioned. By using what is a shared power supply for two channels and converting the supply to feed only one channel per chassis, you would have in effect doubled the current capacity of the power supply. You would end up with what "should" be a pair of "relatively sturdy" mono-blocks for an appr $400 investment. One should keep in mind that i have no idea as to if the output stage of this amplifier can pass enough current to take advantage of the increased power supply capacity and reserve. As such, this could be an exercise in futility, but i sincerely doubt it based on past experiences with other under-designed "budget" type amplifiers. This would not alleviate the problems that come along with the use of other "low grade" passive parts that one is required to use when building a product built to this low ( phenomenally low ) price point. For someone that was "handy" and could do their own modifications / buy their own parts, the ART SLA-1 "might" be the basis for a very interesting and potentially highly worthwhile project though. Sean
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