Saw 3 NEW pairs of SR6500's on e bay and wondering if they're real?

catch22atplay

Been looking for a pair or 2 of these everywhere. Finally saw 3 new pairs and 1 used pair in the last 3 weeks. So i bought 2 pairs of the NEW 6500's. I want to give them a thorough inspection when i receive them to ensure they are real and are new.

1 Can you tell if they are refurbished?

2 Has there been any reports of fake SR6500's being circulated?

3 If any fakes were reported there are still ways to tell the real from the fake. Anyone know what to look for?

4 UPC code?

Thanks for any insight.

Vital

Every product has its vin number sorta speak. Call polk, give them that number (ull probably find it on the speaker itself) and see what they say.

catch22atplay

Got them in today. They were a mix of new and not new. Clearly the seller attempted to make them both appear new by interchanging parts between boxes. He should have just sold 1 pair as new and the other as used but in excellent condition. I may end up returning everything. Or interchange parts and keep the new pair and return the used pair. Or test the old stuff and see how they perform.

God i so F ing hate E-bay and bad sellers trying to rip people off.

TakeTheTime

But hey, if they work as they should - it's worth keeping...!?

Vital

How much did u pay for them?

MacLeod

Just one more reason why I never buy anything like that off EBay or any other unauthorized dealer. It's just to easy to get ripped off.

exalted512

MacLeod wrote: »

Just one more reason why I never buy anything like that off EBay or any other unauthorized dealer. It's just to easy to get ripped off.

Yeah but youre old and resist change:p

You just have to make sure whoever youre buying from has good reviews (or feedback on ebay).

Authorized dealers are not a safehaven. Thezeb.com was an authorized dealer and they tried to screw me...and screwed hundreds of people when they closed their doors.

I'm not saying everyone with 99+% feedback on ebay is perfect either.

Ive had one mediocre experience and one bad experience on ebay. The bad experience was actually when I was trying to sell something.

-Cody

EDIT: www.onlinecarstereo.com is a great example of a 'non-authorized' dealer that has EXCELLENT customer service. I had a set of diamond components and blew out a driver. This was about 9 months into the 1 year warranty and they no longer carried that speaker. So they gave me full in-store credit of what I had originally paid to go towards anything they had.

catch22atplay

The guy had a 99% positive rating. I checked before buying. I'm sure he works out disagreements and kicks back some bucks to appease people. Selling or buying can be a pain. I'd not want to sell knowing that some people are never satisfied even if they get exactly what they wanted.

And i paid way to much for what i received. Let's just say more than SR5250's from Frye's and less than retail. Find the middle ground and you'd be close. And if they all work fine maybe i'll keep em. But i'd need to really stress test them. I've listened to speakers before that sounded fine with 40 watts but crapped out with higher levels. Crossover fuse blown already indicating they were ran at a high level or a short caused it.
And i know in my previous speakers you really had to push it to cause that to happen. May not be an issue. But opening a box and seeing that is cause for worry.

It's to bad there are no authorized dealers that still sell these or i'd have bought from them. Ebay was basically my last hope as i tried everywhere else.

catch22atplay

I tested everything out with 100 watts rms. Tested using my old Fosgate amp. Everything passed with high marks. Can't wait to finish the install.

And god did it sound good.

arun1963

Cody is probably right. As an older guy I have a bit of a midset about buying off a place like ebay. That, plus the fact that I'd never buy used speakers. I buy a used amp before I bought used speakers.

For the price you paid, I'd keep the new pair and return the used pair. You don't need more than one pair in any case.

catch22atplay

Not part of the less is more crowd. I may be a grampa but i still prefer it loud. METALLICA

I was wrong about the blown crossover fuse. 1 Tweeter may have been installed it looks like after closer inspection. Although maybe they just uncoiled the wire. Everything is just way to clean looking.

I made the mistake of testing the speakers with Enigma, McMxc A. D. the track "Callas went away" Not being at all familiar with this song at all mind you. At approx 2:30 Sandra starts singing er well sort of. I first thought omg this crossover is f**ked or the speaker. So i tried a few more speakers with the same results. I then grabbed a new crossover and it was the same. I could understand her words as she sung. But it was abnormally low.

So not knowing what was going on i went inside and grabbed my trusty old Sennheiser HD540 headphones and fire up i tunes on the pc. Sure enough it had the same problem. Sandra's voice is recorded very low here or she's just being quiet, whatever. So i then decide to compare the Polk to my headphones. Now i don't know if you own a pair of these headphones. But they're extremely well detailed. Although my home system speakers are better. But still i actually thought the SR6500's sounded better. Her voice was more clear or easier to distinguish. Besides everything else sounding great.

So now i'm giddy like a kid at x-mas. I'm loving these speakers. Can't wait to get everything installed.

cam5860

Woofersetc, onlinecarstereo, sonicelectronix, is all good stores with good prices. I have had goodluck on ebay with 99% feedback. What I do on like 97% or 98%. I go to there negative feedback and see what people are complaining about and that tells me if they are actually selling bad products. Some people will give bad feedback on late shipping, wrong item, and so forth. These power sellers make mistakes at times because they ship so much. So I always look at negative feedback even if they have 10,000 positive reviews and only a 100 negative reviews. I don't see how crutchfield stays in business with all the bargains prices online. It takes a fool to pay full retail price for something when you got these good online stores now like Woofersetc, onlinecarstereo, sonicelectronix. Take the new alpine pdx amps. crutchfield wants 850 for the 1200.1. I can get it online for 515 brand new right now. These amps just come out there is no way these online stores are selling refurbs. I think what these online stores do that are not authorized dealers for these products is they have connections with local dealers and the local dealers save more money if they buy in bulk. So they sell the extra bulk they don't need to the online stores. That's about the only way they can do it. There is always a way around the rules.

catch22atplay

BTW the 3 you mentioned

onlinecarstereo SR6500 799.00 msrp 899.00
woofersetc SR6500 589.00 msrp 899.00
sonicelectronic SR6500 499.00 msrp 899

None have any in and all say they won't be getting any in. Tried them and others a few weeks ago. Getting a manufacturer warranty by using an authorized dealer to me is well worth the added cost. If you want a decent price you wait for a sale from them. I've been screwed over so many times over the years by not buying from an authorized dealer. The seller says RMA to the manufacturer. The manufacturer says RMA it to the seller. You end up paying for the repair work to be done. At times it's best just to toss the product and buy another.

Frye's is one crooked company. They'll rebaggage returned items and sell as new. Or you'll get an empty box. Or the model inside the box doesn't match the model number outside the box. I've had all the above happen to me there. I go off of my experience and not what others may say. I do like the people there though. I just open every box at the cash register before i buy it now. They stare at me thinking wtf is he doing. But that's the only way to buy stuff from them. I won't however ever buy anything online from them. Terrible support and they take way to long to ship items.

Everything i have i paid a lot for. Some items were decent prices like the SR5250's were 350 bones. But everything was bought from an authorized dealer except the SR6500's only because no authorized dealers have any.

Crutchfield i've used in the past. I've had zero issues with them. Very nice customer service. Very helpful technicians. They will be getting repeat business from me.

Polk Audio is the same with buying from and talking to directly. Very nice and very helpful people and always a pleasure doing business with them.

I buy about 1m worth of products a year for my company. If i don't get good support i won't buy from the seller again. I don't have the time to deal with problems. **** better be buying me lunch as well and they do.

And because i buy so much stuff for work i expect the same support when i buy stuff for myself. Although a free lunch i don't expect. Would be nice if they tossed in some cookies though.

Polk Audio has been good to me since 1991. So they'll have a repeat customer for life. Provided they keep producing good products and continue their previous and current customer support ways.

cam5860

Crutchfield don't even have the SR6500 anymore. Polk must be getting ready to update the line. Clearing out inventory. That's why those stores don't have any right now. Crutchfield is the best online store. They are just to damn high. My money don't come that easy to make bill crutchfield rich.

TakeTheTime

So Polk Audio is gonna produce more SR6500 and SR520 when everyone's out of stock?

chu

last I heard was the sr line is being discontinued.

catch22atplay

So we have collectors items now.

I called Polk when i tried to find some SR6500's a few weeks ago. Was told they no longer produce them and have none in stock. I didn't ask about future intentions. The SR line been around for what 4 years? Or has it been longer than that? Is it time to update the line? Are they profitable in today's current economy with ruthless competition? I don't have any answers to the last. Although i can speculate as we all can. I'd guess it's a very difficult market during these trying times.

I'm just happy i was able to get 2 pairs.

TakeTheTime

Can't believe they're stopping. The SR's are the best car speakers I've ever heard!
I think I'm gonna get an extra pair just to have it, though then I'll maybe get 6500's.
Maybe I'll try a three-way setup with 6500's as midbass playing 40-100hz in the doors,
and 5.25" with tweeters on the dash playing everything above 100hz. Sounds like a plan?
I know about a Norwegian store selling SR6500's, but it's very expensive. Think I'll wait...

Vital

Anyway to find out if Polk will come out with something new to replace SRs?
If they will I might as well wait till they do & get whatever it is they think is better then SR, if not I need to buy SRs asap lol

cam5860

There is only one reason they would discontinue the line. They are not selling. Which I could understand that in this economy. When you see jl audio producing all these cheap lines and stuff the last couple of years. You know they are feeling the heat too. Jl audio be producing W0'S and -W0'S the last two years.

TakeTheTime

Yeah, I don't know, but I don't think it can get much better?
Though I've only heard SR5250's (in my car ), and people
says the SR5250-midwoofers has better midrange, and midbass
is more punchy than 6500's - though 6500's play lower with better
authority. Maybe Polk can make 6500's that goes very low (down to
31.5hz or something), has great punchy midbass and excellent midrange?

catch22atplay

TakeTheTime wrote: »

Can't believe they're stopping. The SR's are the best car speakers I've ever heard!
I think I'm gonna get an extra pair just to have it, though then I'll maybe get 6500's.
Maybe I'll try a three-way setup with 6500's as midbass playing 40-100hz in the doors,
and 5.25" with tweeters on the dash playing everything above 100hz. Sounds like a plan?

My plan as well. Although crossed over higher than that. Optimally you'd want each driver to cover 3 octaves or so. 3 1/3 octaves would be 575hz and 4600hz. If you crossed over at 100hz you wouldn't get enough midbass out of the 6.5 as it would be 3db down at the 100hz crossover point. Well depending on slope. I think 240hz would be min as that's 2 octaves. 480hz for 3 octaves.

Since i may be doing the passive crossovers i still need to decide on what frequency to design it for. I know i don't want voices in the 6.5's. So would 575hz be low enough? I don't believe so. What about 480? Maybe the answer is somewhere between 240 and 480. Would like to know before i build the crossovers.

TakeTheTime

I wouldn't go higher than 200hz, dark man voices go very low.

If you crossed over at 100hz you wouldn't get enough midbass out of the 6.5 as it would be 3db down at the 100hz crossover point. Well depending on slope.

Well, I was thinking a pretty shallow slope, 12db or 18db/octave.
Since SR5250 has best midrange-response, I'd use
them all the way from low midrange...

catch22atplay

Ya you're probably right if voices go that low. Oh then again i'll be using active for a while with 18db slopes. So i can try many different settings.

TakeTheTime

Okey. I cross my SR5250's at 63hz (25db/octave) now, in order to have some "headroom" at max volume.
But I notice that they have really punchy bass all the way from 40hz and upwards...
In this video, they're crossed at 50hz and sounds loud & great (no distortion): Link.

catch22atplay

With the limitations of the recording device, watching that video doesn't help except to make me cringe. If anything of mine sounded like that i'd rip it all out. The microphones just can't handle the volume so everything sounds bad in the video. Your other vids don't sound way better as mic isn't being overpowered. You'd have to use something like my Sennheiser 815S to record with. Plenty of pro singers have used em. And i'm sure the camera or phone uses lossy encoding as well.

TakeTheTime

Yeah, I know. Sorry 'bout that. It sounded really great, but the microphone causes the bad sound yes.
The purpose of the video was only to show how the mirrors rattle of the bass only with the SR5250's playing.