Great results from the Upgrade Company
![[Deleted User]](https://w8.vanillicon.com/83b82048d67877ca27bbc25d5d38f9d3_100.png)
[Deleted User]
Posts: 7,658
in Electronics
This discussion was created from comments split from: Pioneer Elite SC-99.
Comments
-
My story with my upgrade began a few years ago when I decided to replace my Integra DTC-9.8 with a newer,network capable unit. I had been reading up on the differences between the Onkyo and the Integra preamps and decided to go with an Onkyo,since they were considered "Pro" units. I had heard about the Upgrade Company and wanted to try one of their upgraded units,but discovered I did not have enough credit available for one after I tried to get one. So I got a PR-SC5508 from accessories4less with the plan of having it upgraded in a year when I got my next tax return. Well THAT plan went south when the unit fell victim to what has notoriously become a VERY common problem with Onkyo Preamps and receivers. The HDMI board went bad (*which I later found out was because of some subcontractor that Onkyo had been using who decided to cut corners.This subsequently resulted in thousands upon thousands of units having the same problem*) I was instructed by Onkyo to bring the unit to an authorized repair center just outside of DC and then began trying to find out if it could be repaired since it was about five minutes out of Onkyo's warranty and I had purchased an extended warranty. Fortunately after a week of this intrigue,Onkyo untangled this web by authorizing the repair of the unit and the parts were ordered.
One month later the repair facility still had the preamp and were still waiting for the parts.
Then I was informed by them that Onkyo had ordered them to return the unit to Onkyo in New Jersey and they were going to send me a brand new PR-SC5509 (*the unit which replaced my PR-SC5508*) I asked if it really was a "New" unit,because the one I had was a B-stock refurb??
They said yes!!
Needless to say I was ecstatic
until it showed up on my dooorstep and didn't work.............................................continued in next post
-
So after contacting Onkyo I was given two choices
1)Bring the unit to the same repair facility in Rockville,MD just outside DC where they can perform a quick fix or
2)Ship it back to Onkyo and they'll send me another one
Well I do not have a car and ALL OF A SUDDEN all of my friends who have cars were unavailable at times when I wasn't working.
OY
So I was left with little choice but to schedule a pickup with FedEx and ship it back to Onkyo.
WHAT THE HECK DOES ANY OF THIS HAVE TO DO WITH THE UPGRADE COMPANY YOU ASK???
Read on boys and girls and you will see where they fit into this intricate puzzle yet again later on...................
-
And how long is the turnaround time?
Their site is very informative and detailed, even the room acoustic section was an interesting read. Perhaps that is why short pile carpet is favored in home and commercial theaters? However, following all of their ideas seems like it would be very costly, even if you were building a listening room from the ground up.
So, are you willing to put forth a little effort or are you happy sitting in your skeptical poo pile?
http://audiomilitia.proboards.com/ -
@mantis
Sorry to highjack your thread like this,but once I get to the end of this long tale you will see why I cannot recommend those guys highly enough and why you cannot go wrong with them if you decide to send your brand new Pioneer to them to get upgraded I promise you that! -
@polrbehr
Look at the date stamps on the pics I posted. You will see they are a month apart.
That is not their turn around time.It has a LOT to do with what happened during the course of this long tale.
@Nightfall
Breaking up the posts makes it less like reading a novel (*which I long ago discovered most are not willing to do*) -
So once I finally got a brand new PR-SC5509 that actually worked into the system,I was shocked to find out it sounded NOTHING like the PR-SC5508 that I previously had. So I brought it to the repair facility and had them look at it. I also looked at the wiring job I had done when I installed the new woofers that I purchased from Polk for my SDA-1C's. You see my dumb behind forgot to unplug the Sunfire Cinema Grand Signature when removing the PR-SC5508 because the Sunfire has a signal sensing auto on feature. Once I began unplugging all of the cables the Sunfire turns on and begins sending all kinds of nasty noises through the speakers,blowing or damaging four of the mid-woofers. So I wound up replacing all of the stereo woofers.Somehow the Dimensional woofers were spared. Once I got the new preamp installed,after listening to it I realized not only does it sound a lot worse that the older unit,but everything was out of phase as well. After investigating I realized I had accidentally wired two of the woofers out of phase. This is kinda what happens when ya don't mark yer wires and they are hanging loose for a month while awaiting new woofers and a new preamp................
-
So when I got the preamp back from the shop they said they found no problems with it.They contacted Onkyo and were told that Onkyo decided to go in a different direction and make the audio more home theater oriented. Kind of what Polk did with the RTi series and then changed direction with the RTiA series.
The new preamp sounded BRIGHT,hard,glassy,brittle,FORWARD,with LOTS of midrange detail that was just being THROWN at you!! When I read some reviews of some of Onkyo's receivers from the same period,I discovered the reviewers were saying the same things. Playing LP's wast just not possible,because all of the above attributes were amplified to an unlistenable level. I wound up purchasing a Musical Fidelity X-LPS and X-PSU external phono preamp and power supply.Both of which helped to mitigate the problem(* that and using the manual EQ features as the guy at the repair shop suggested*) to an somewhat listenable level. However I was never at all happy with the end result,especially compared to what I had previously. So I waited patiently for tax return season and plotted my Upgrade. I initiated contact with David Schulte the owner of the Upgrade Company in late 2014 to ask questions and let him know I was planning on sending him my unit early in 2015 when I got my refund. This did not go well initially AT ALL...................................... -
David can be extremely offputting at first.He is a bit abrasive and mouthy,but he knows WTF he talks about. I was not very receptive to his personality type at first. To be brutally honest he straight pissed me off!! (*and trust and believe I let him know that*) However my instincts kept telling me to continue moving forward with him.So I put my diplomat hat on (*and reminded him that this is not the way to talk to potential customers*) Then after a few months just as I was ready to proceed forward with the upgrade my preamp began having audio issues.Now I am pissed off,because I was told that by the repair faility and Onkyo the HDMI board issues were solved with this unit. So I contacted both David Schulte and Onkyo about the issue. I heard nothing at all back from Onkyo (*strange considering how good they had been previously*) I DID,however hear back from David. He told me how to do a hard reset and save all of my settings.
PLEASE NOTE-I HAVE NOT SENT HIM ANY MONEY YET.......................... -
He also told me to do it several times to make sure it took. It worked and I sent him the money for the upgrade. Then just as I was about to ship the unit to him and was trying to hammer out the details of how to do this (*the website was kind of confusing about this as well as whom is paying for what shipping*) the audio problem returns and gets even worse!!!!
So once again I fire off e-mails to both David and Onkyo and once again I hear nothing back from Onkyo!!
David sends me the link to Onkyo's website which has a free program to address the loss of audio issues. This has been discussed in another thread here that some of you have participated in that was started by @nbrowser about his Onkyo receiver having the same problems. So I start down that path to get the faulty audio chip replaced. Except now I have to scheme about how to get that done and then get it to The Upgrade Company. Easy huh?
PLEASE!
Long story short the repair gets done at some subcontractor in Illinois and then gets sent to The Upgrade Company in Michigan.They keep it for a week and while they have it I ask about a couple of other upgrades they can do to it. Namely the fancy Isoclean fuses and the Bybee quantum purifiers. David comes back and (*unbelievably to be honest,since he IS a salesman*) tells me that the Bybee's do not work very well at all with the Onkyo preamps and will likely make it sound WORSE. The Isocleans work quite well and he would be more than happy to install them and coincidentally he was just about to contact me to ask me if I wanted them!!
Then he suggests I purchase his Time Portal power cord,which kind of completes the upgrade. The Time Portal power cords are upgraded and shielded against EMI/RFI radiation as well. I could not as I had already overextended myself with what I was already doing................... -
Then by sheer coincidence five minutes later one of my creditors decides to up my limit.
SOLD!
So I get the unit back with the upgraded power cord.
Problem
One of his employees accidentally puts a euro spec power cord in the box with the preamp.
So I contact David to let him know about the mistake. He apologizes profusely and tells me that he will send the correct cord out to me and to please send the incorrect one back to him at his expense.
This is where I begin to see just how kick arse his customer service is.
I ship the cord back to him and even BEFORE he gets it back (*as in the day after I shipped it out*) he sends me the correct cord. Here is where I get a wonderful surprise. NOT ONLY does he send me a free upgraded Wireworld HDMI cable for my Blu-ray player,he also sends me a six foot power cable and I payed for a five foot (*and these bloody cords ain't cheap!*) -
As you can see in the pics these cords are water hoses!! ESPECIALLY compared to the original cord next to it in the pics.
This is where I am kind of glad this situation happened the way that it did. You see I got a chance to hear the difference that the upgrades did to the preamp BEFORE the power cord was installed. Right out of the box I was FLABBERGASTED and VERY excited about the sound I was hearing now even before the upgrades had had time to break in.
GONE was the FORWARD IN YOUR FACE midrange
GONE was the hard glassy sound
GONE was brightness
What stayed was the gobs of midrange detail and excellent bass.
NOW I COULD LISTEN TO MY RECORDS WITHOUT THE NEED FOR AN EXTERNAL PHONO PREAMP!!
-
Then I got the correct Time Portal power cord and installed it. I turned the system on to once again let it break in for a week like I did with the upgrades to the preamp.I had to go to work,so I didn't have time to listen for more than a few minutes.I didn't hear anything different then. However the next day after it had been running in for 24 hours,I was doing some household chores and decided to put on some music to work to. While standing in the living room in front of my couch,aiming the remote and selecting which ripped CD to stream over my network. I selected Oleta Adams first CD "Circle of one" and was quite shocked at what I heard. So shocked that instead of going to continue with my chores I sat down and listened. I have been using this disc to demo stereo equipment for 25 years since it first came out and had never heard it like this before. There was-for lack of a better description-an "ease" to the flow of the music that wasn't there before. Some digital glare was gone that I had never even noticed before................................
-
I was SO impressed that I decided to get another upgraded power cord for my Sunfire amp and that is where I REALLY noticed a big difference!!
Again that "ease" that I spoke of above came in spades,but just so much more than with the preamp.
Now at some point in the back and forth between myself and David I had asked if he could send me back the MIT cable box that I used to ship him back the wrong power cable. His employee had forgotten to ship me the new power cord(s) in the MIT box. So he had them just ship me back the box itself. Somehow I guess there was some sort of miscommunication and one of his employees sent me an another short power cord (*which I hadn't asked for or paid for*) which I immediately installed on my Oppo. I fired off an e-mail thanking him once again for the nice surprise.
He had no idea what I was talking about!
Once he talked to his employee he realized the mistake,instead of asking me to send it back,he told me to keep it and enjoy it!!!!!
This all happened a year ago.
Needless to say Polk people customer service like this is RARE nowadays and should be promoted through word of mouth advertising.
David even contacted me on Linkedin.com to wish me a happy birthday this past Friday!
If you guys decide to do business with him (*and again I CANNOT recommend this highly enough!*) feel free to let him know that I told you about him here on the forum.
Tell him that Carlton Simpson sent you!
@polrbehr the turn around time was about a week
Hopefully you can see why I waited to answer your question. -
@mantis Check their website for the costs of the upgrades.I honestly cannot recall,because:
1)It was a year ago and
2)I decided to upgrade my upgrades while they had my unit as detailed above.
No it ain't cheap,but I promise you WILL NOT regret it!
Besides he has a very generous return policy AND a warranty on his upgrades.
NO ONE takes advantage of the return policy.
https://upgradecompany.com/
P.S. The "mess" that you CLAIM is in the pics you posted is unbelievably neat.
ESPECIALLY when you compare it to what my spaghetti mess of cables looks like Mister OCD/NEAT FREAK!!
-
Okay thanks @KennethSwauger
-
honestaquarian wrote: »David sends me the link to Onkyo's website which has a free program to address the loss of audio issues. This has been discussed in another thread here that some of you have participated in that was started by @nbrowser about his Onkyo receiver having the same problems.
My Onkyo is currently on a truck heading home from Eastern Canada, when it get's home I'll test it, gently place it back in the box and it'll be listed on the local CL the second I obtain it's replacement. No more Onkyo in this house.
Marantz?
2 channel:
Bryston 4B3, Bryston BDA3, Cary SLP05, Shanling CDT1000SE with parts conneXion level 2 mods, Nottingham analogue ace space 294, soundsmith Carmen MKii, Zu DL103 MKii, Ortofon MC 20 MKii, Dynavector XX2 MKii, Rogue Audio Ares, Core power technologies balanced power conditioner, Akiko Corelli power conditioner with Akiko Audio HQ power cable, Nordost heimdall 2, Frey 2, interconnects, speaker and power cables, Focal Electra 1028 BE 2, Auralic Aries Femto, Black diamond racing cones, ingress audio level 1 roller blocks, JL Audio E110 with Auralic subdude, Primacoustics room treatments.
Theater:
Focal Aria 926,905,CC900, SVS PB ultra x2. Pioneer Elite SC85, Oppo BDP93, Panamax M5400PM, Minix neox6, Nordost Blue heaven LS power cables. -
Haha can you say threadjack?
-
How much did you pay to upgrade your onkyo?
-
Get them upgraded and you won't regret it!!
-
While I did not appreciate all of the failure nonsense I had to deal with,I have not had any other problems with my preamp since the audio chip was replaced and the unit was upgraded. Sound-wise it is freaking incredibke and I'll put it up against any of those "higher end" units any day!
-
Were any of the capacitors or resistors upgraded or does his entire upgrade process revolve around EMI?afterburnt wrote: »They didn't speak a word of English, they were from South Carolina.
Village Idiot of Club Polk -
Conradicles wrote: »How much did you pay to upgrade your onkyo?
Please answer. -
Conradicles wrote: »Conradicles wrote: »How much did you pay to upgrade your onkyo?
Please answer.
Before you say that you don't remember, just give a close guess. I don't remember how much I paid for my TV several years ago but I can remember that it was around $600.afterburnt wrote: »They didn't speak a word of English, they were from South Carolina.
Village Idiot of Club Polk -
honestaquarian wrote: »Sound-wise it is freaking incredibke and I'll put it up against any of those "higher end" units any day!
Have you?
Political Correctness'.........defined
"A doctrine fostered by a delusional, illogical minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a t-u-r-d by the clean end."
President of Club Polk -
Instead of grilling me gentlemen,please read the entirety of my series of posts. Since you cannot come to my place and hear it for yourselves, all that I can offer is my testimony. I was skeptical as well and decided to take a leap of faith. I was WELL rewarded for that leap of faith as detailed in my series of posts. The upgrade is expensive amd well worth every penny. All of the information that you need about what it costs are right there on the website.
-
-
Btw when I say I was skeptical that means I waited almost three years after I found out about the Upgrade Company BEFORE I took the leap. From some of the reviews and testimonials I have read I wasn't the only one.
-
Did a bit of research. Well, see for yourself. Looks like the wires were wrapped with tin foil and the capacitors got a small rectangle of Dynamat. There also appears to be Dynamat directly on the PCB, some dangerously close to some "traces" or whatever they're called as well as solder joints.
afterburnt wrote: »They didn't speak a word of English, they were from South Carolina.
Village Idiot of Club Polk -
I encourage you to compare The Upgrade Company to Modwright. Here is a Modwright Oppo 105:
The green PCB's are added by Modwright, you can see the tube sockets as well in this photo.
This is the addon unit that feeds the Oppo DC
Modwright also has no problems telling you exactly what they are doingTube mod includes:- Total redesign and replacement of single-ended and fully balanced output stage with our own tube analog stage (6SN7 driver tubes).
- External PS (new design) with one rectifier (5AR4, GZ34, 5U4, 5V4 and equivalents) and two voltage regulator tubes (13EM7,12EM7 and suitable subs.)
- ‘Truth’ umbilical of our own design.
- Upgraded Cardas GRFA series RCA’s for stereo outs.
- Upgraded Furutech cryo-treated IEC.
- Highest Quality resistors in key signal path applications.
- All signal wire = 99.9999% pure, cryo-treated solid-core silver wire from Cardas metals.
- Upgrades to internal stock power supplies (Linear power supply replacement for stock SMPS not included )
- Damping mods for chassis and transport.
- External supply available with optional ‘Hole’ to allow for use of taller, larger diameter tubes other than 5AR4/GZ34 (just ask).
Also given the owner of The Upgrade Company has personally attacked his potential customers on several message boards... well, I know who I'd go with if I were in the market to mod some equipment.
This is NOT an attack on you honestaquarian, please don't take it as such. I am happy that you are happy with TUC, more power to you.afterburnt wrote: »They didn't speak a word of English, they were from South Carolina.
Village Idiot of Club Polk
