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Your most disappointing purchase or audition?

I've had a few.

bought a Naim Nait 3. Loved it in the store. Returned it within a week- way forward at home

Brought home some CJ preamp to audition perhaps 22 years ago. Noisy as anything and a turn off transient destroyed a tweeter (though years later i bought a CJ 17LS2 which I thought was the finest preamp I ever heard in my home)

Auditioned a VPI table (HW19) in a store- the store just could not get the belt to stay on. Bought a Rega instead. This was in perhaps 1990.

Fortunately, I never really experienced buyers remorse say 6 months or more after settling on a piece of gear.

Finally, there have been too many speakers that got stellar write ups which I just didn't care for.
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audiolabyrinth's avatar
audiolabyrinth
4,555 posts
 
I have had junk audio in my life time that is more reliable than alot of today's High- End audio.
chazro's avatar
chazro
635 posts
 
I remember bringing home, on loan from my local audio dealer, on separate occasions, a Mark Levinson amp and a pair of Thiel spkrs. Both of the items were being raved about in the audio press but the amp got a solid 'meh' and the Thiels' were a complete disappointment. The only item I've ever bought and was disappointed by was the original Phillips CD recorder, due to it producing so many duds. I'd say it had a 25-35% failure rate! That said, I still recorded a load of CD's with it until replacing it with a Pioneer Elite and later a Tascam, both of which very rarely failed/fail me.
mapman's avatar
mapman
22,151 posts
 
"I have had junk audio in my life time that is more reliable than alot of today's High- End audio."

I think there is some truth to that.

Was it truly junk then if at least reliable?

Reliability is an often overlooked attribute when it comes to the quest for the "ultimate" sound. I would expect the good expensive stuff to also the the MOST reliable. Its worth nothing if it doesn't work, right?

Personally, I never drop big bucks out of the gate on one off boutique type brands. I do test the waters with less expensive product offerings from such companies though if justified. Problem with many boutique lines is cost of entry is always high so a significant "leap of faith" may well be needed.

Another problem is that once one drops big bucks on gear, in some cases to vendor that might mean deep pockets for service to keep things going as they should. Especially if the feeling is when working it will alternately also have to cost a fortune to replace
hasmarto's avatar
hasmarto
192 posts
 
Krell kav 300i - just horrible.

Plinius 9200 - the mids were MIA.

Musical Fidelity A5 integrated and CDP - very unmusical and sterile.

Trelja, basically, what's been implied here by you in not politically-correct language is that Robert Lee doesn't know a thing about crossover design, and coated paper drivers qualify as plastic. Correct me if I'm wrong.
ampus
33 posts
 
Parasound CD1. I had high expectation for the Parasound, but my cheaper Emotiva ERC-3 sounded better!
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