I don't know where you've heard "lots of negative quality reports on Kavent...in the past couple of years."
I don't own any Kavent, but did some correspondence with them earlier this year, so I am familiar with the company.
I Checked for the validity of your claim by doing a word search on AA and here at Audiogon of Kavent. There are no posts before March of 2004. There are no negative posts period. Fact is Kavent, which sells modified Shengya's, didn' exist before 2004.
I have a Chinese made Jungson amp, Chinese made Eastsound CDP and Chinese made Meibao stands. Needless to say I have few reservations about dealing with products from Chinese manufacturers. My reservation is be careful buying equipment from American and European manufacturers who are simply outsourcing to China. They do this to keep cost low and sometimes a cut in quality as well.
I've perty much eliminated American and European made amps and CDP's from consideration. You simply way overpay. Europeans are buying Chinese audio by the boat load because you pay 3-4X more for similar domestic equipment. We still haven't gotten over this bias here in the States.