Why is the market for used Levinson amps so slow?

I've called most of the service centers on their web site anywhere from $800 to $2500 not shipped pretty messed up....so I may start amp shopping

But the caps yourself and find a qualified repairman and ship the amp to them. Pretty damn simple if you want to keep the amp. They are very good amps but not to everyone's tastes. It's that simple because I know there are some ML haters here and you have to overlook that fact.

I have heard that the new 532H, 531H are very reliable. Anyone know of the reliability on the more expensive ref 532 amp?

Thanks

Lots of what I just read in this thread is old horror stories, some are even true. Harman has shuffled things around more than once in the last several years.

But Levinson Lexicon Proceed service stabilized years ago after High Tech Masters was let go. Turn around is reasonable if not good and we can make the equipment more reliable than ever.

For example some of the No33 were known to have buzz in the speakers. We now know the massive transormers leak enough flux to be audible in a speaker NOT connected to the 33. just loop the speaker wire around the 33. similarly you can loop your wires around the the 33 and cancel the internal buzz picked up. NO BUZZ

just contact us for more information and support.
Pyramid Audio or The Service Bench

Wow, did catch this lively thread until now. I guess people will believe whatever they want to believe.

I personally experienced the Levinson nightmare three times a few years back, and have documented my experiences in detail here back then.

There were two core issues:

1/ Reliability with the 33X series amplifiers: The caps were known to break down. The ML tech I spoke with confessed that it had to do with both design and reliability of supplied capacitors from the original supplier. My #333 had been "recapped" 3 times. Twice by me, and once by the dealer before I bought it. (Found that out through the service log from the service tech). I had to pay out of pocket for the third replacement. Less than a year after my last repair, ML issued a note internally regarding the capacitor failures and extended the warranties on capacitors for 5 additional years.(Basically free of charge for any capacitor failure on 33X amps.)

Again, the issue is with the 33X series only. I have not heard of any issues with the 33, 33H, or any other models.

2/ Shady service practice: As pointed out earlier, you were required to pay a high charge in advance before ML would issue a RMA. Both my amp (#333), and transport (#37) went into service a week apart. The tray on my transport was not closing properly. The tech assured me on the phone that it just required some calibration and would not reach the maximum amount. At the end, I received the max bill on both the transport ($1,400+/-) and amp($1,100+/-) after the fact even though I had requested that they notify me before fixing anything. They cited that they had to replace my entire transport mechanism and upgrade the software. Few months later, while talking to another audiophile, I found out that ML had issued a technical bulletin to all the dealers indicating the fix for this issue a few years back - a push of few buttons on the faceplate to initiate recalibrate. He had also pulled the notification from the internet and sent to me.

I've since traded my amp for a Pass X3505. I still have the #36 and #37 in my second system. I've written the company off ever since that experience. Spending that kind of money ($10k in the late 90s) to get a faulty design/built amp certainly is unacceptable. But what really pissed me off was the shady service practice. Maybe they have improved since, but ML would need to do a lot to convince most of us ex-owners to go back to their product.

FrankC