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Have you changed your mind about a brand? Was it you, or them?

I've changed my mind about many things.  Beer for instance.  Now I can really only drink IPAs and dark beers. Lagers?  Phooey.  This is very different than what I drank in my 20s though. 

Same for audio gear. 

So let me ask all of you, are there brands or equipment you've changed your mind about, for better or worse?  And if so, why?  It doesn't have to be a brand, it can be a TYPE or technology.

For instance, I used to love Ti and Be tweeters.  Now usually can't listen to them.

What about you?
erik_squires
twoleftears's avatar
twoleftears
5,318 posts
 
Totally agree on B&W, which is what I was going to post about.

Owned DM1800’s for a long, long time and thoroughly enjoyed them. Back then, I would have ranked them high in the pantheon of great British speaker makers.

More recently, auditioning much newer models, I thought them either mediocre or unlistenable.

I wonder if the reverse direction is less common: anyone dislike a brand and then later come around to them?
hilde45's avatar
hilde45
4,974 posts
 
@twoleftears And I held them in *really* high esteem, so they have really fallen.

I like your question about the reverse. And one has to be careful with these questions, since there can be a gap between the lower line of a brand and their upper levels of product. So, can be an apples to oranges comparison mistake.

I will add one comment, namely, that I really thought Adcom was very mediocre, but I realized that of my two units -- a tuner/preamp and the amp -- that once I paired a really good tube preamp with the adcom power amp (535L), it sounded pretty darn good. In other words, the amp is still only mid-fi, but it has much greater potential paired with a good preamp than I previously thought.
erik_squires OP
16,128 posts
 
Yeah, I wrote a whole blog about the modern B&W treble response and Stereophile pushing it.  Drives the fans bonkers.


https://speakermakersjourney.blogspot.com/2016/05/stereophile-reviews-data-doesnt-lie.html


Glad to know others have also been scratching their head in wondering.
unsound
7,329 posts
 
Yes.
Both.
bdp24's avatar
bdp24
9,819 posts
 

After living with a pair of Magneplanar Tympani's for a year, I was seduced by the new Fulton Model J, which offered deeper bass and the transparency of RTR ESL tweeter (6 of them per speaker). It took me only a coupla months to realize that what a big planar offers is more important to me than what speakers such as the J do (the midrange was reproduced by the 2-way Fulton Model 80, a real good box speaker for it's time). Back to planars!

Then there was the time I replaced my Van Alstine-modified Dynaco PAS tube pre-amp with the hot new New York Audio Labs tube/mosfet hybrid Super It phono stage, which turned out to be not-so-hot. Back to pure tubes!

Live and learn. One mistake I DIDN'T make was dumping all my LP's in the late-80's and replace them with CD's. Thank God!

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