Some People Gotta Learn The Hard Way

jbreezy5

IME, most people have bought and sold gear throughout their audiophile journey and along the way, became a little too familiar with something they had, sold it, only to discover they were entirely dissatisfied with the gear that replaced it.

This thread is for sharing those before and after experiences.

What equipment do you regret selling, and what piece of garbage took its place?

treitz3

I regret selling nothing.

Tom

jbreezy5

I’m going to share a double-negative; a from-bad-to-worse scenario.

Many years ago I was seeking to get my first experience with tube sound and purchased a new Musical Fidelity x-10v3. Right away I hated this thing, it sounded bright, brittle, added unwanted gain (though, minor) and always sounded like it was out of phase. This persisted with break-in, swapping L/R interconnects, etc. I just could never get natural sound, and certainly, none of the tube characteristics I kept reading about in reviews.

I returned this for store credit with the reputable e-tailer I purchased it from, and replaced it with a pair of Epos ELS-3 speakers that were all the rage in reviews at the time. Talk about a swift kick to the cajones. These were the worst speakers I had purchased up to that point. Even my long-gone first audiophile purchase (Boston Acoustics CR9s), with way too prominent of highs, destroyed the Epos in terms of bass, coherence, and smoothness. In comparison, the Epos treble was grainy and somewhat rolled off in the upper registers, mandated a sub due to early low-frequency roll-off, and they just didn’t do anything particularly well. They were midrangey, and one could see the 5 1/4” driver straining under moderate loudness.

One might say, “What do you expect from such a small speaker?” My answer is “Sonics at least as good as many various such Polk Audio speaker designs, or my Wharfedale 10.1s, or KEF Q100s.” All of which I have purchased at or below the $330/pr. price I paid for the Epos at the time.

heiney9

I'm with Tom. I've been lucky to always move up and have no regrets. But, I am super anal about doing the research, reading the articles, reading reviews, taking advice from those in the know, etc. I drag my feet and it takes me a long time to pull the trigger for the very reason this thread talks about. I also rarely sell the piece I'm replacing until I'm sure about the new piece.

I have had a couple disappointments in the secondary office rig, mostly some gear that didn't live up to the hype. Not necessarily a poo poo piece, just had higher expectations about how it would perform.

I've never had a piece of gear that I thought "that really stinks".

I was never thrilled with the complete performance of the LSi9's. They did most things well, but they had a very unnatural mid-range hump in the frequency response that I never could swallow. Shortly after I sold those I think Trey attributed it cross-over components and he did his magic on LSI9 crossovers and I think that eliminated the frequency anomaly.

There was a time when GD Audio dac's were all the rage. They seemed to be a great company with lots of knowledge and deep dives into the design of the gear. I bought a used piece from Tony, had in the office rig and it just never floated my boat. Might have been my high expectations???

Generally on the lower end of the price spectrum you get what you pay for. A $250/pair of bookies isn't going be a giant killer. I bought a pair of Athena bookies after many glowing reviews thinking these $250/pair of speaker was going to perform like a $1K pair. Not even close, they sounded like a really good pair of $250 speakers.

Fast forward to the R200's and those blew me away. I was skeptical, but I listened to many on here about what a great speaker they were for the $$$ and then realized they performed way above their price point..............and that's the kind of gear I try and gravitate towards

H9

P.S. I don't rotate gear near as much as some on here.

mhardy6647

Wait, what?!
You can sell this stuff!?

Umm... 'scuse me... I've got... umm... something to do...

jbreezy5

heiney9 wrote: »

I'm with Tom. I've been lucky to always move up and have no regrets. But, I am super anal about doing the research, reading the articles, reading reviews, taking advice from those in the know, etc. I drag my feet and it takes me a long time to pull the trigger for the very reason this thread talks about. I also rarely sell the piece I'm replacing until I'm sure about the new piece.

I have had a couple disappointments in the secondary office rig, mostly some gear that didn't live up to the hype. Not necessarily a poo poo piece, just had higher expectations about how it would perform.

I've never had a piece of gear that I thought "that really stinks".

I was never thrilled with the complete performance of the LSi9's. They did most things well, but they had a very unnatural mid-range hump in the frequency response that I never could swallow. Shortly after I sold those I think Trey attributed it cross-over components and he did his magic on LSI9 crossovers and I think that eliminated the frequency anomaly.

There was a time when GD Audio dac's were all the rage. They seemed to be a great company with lots of knowledge and deep dives into the design of the gear. I bought a used piece from Tony, had in the office rig and it just never floated my boat. Might have been my high expectations???

Generally on the lower end of the price spectrum you get what you pay for. A $250/pair of bookies isn't going be a giant killer. I bought a pair of Athena bookies after many glowing reviews thinking these $250/pair of speaker was going to perform like a $1K pair. Not even close, they sounded like a really good pair of $250 speakers.

Fast forward to the R200's and those blew me away. I was skeptical, but I listened to many on here about what a great speaker they were for the $$$ and then realized they performed way above their price point..............and that's the kind of gear I try and gravitate towards

H9

P.S. I don't rotate gear near as much as some on here.

^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^^
These are great examples of the purpose of this post.

SCompRacer

mhardy6647 wrote: »

Wait, what?!
You can sell this stuff!?

Umm... 'scuse me... I've got... umm... something to do...

What are the odds so we can get the betting going? I'm amazed by what folks out your way have dumped for you to rescue.

VR3

Two times

Rt35i to the rti70, definitely not an upgrade

Tyler acoustics taylo 7u to the Tyler decade d2, by and large the worst upgrade ever and thankfully there was a return policy

Emlyn

My one recommendation would be to think twice about selling a good amplifier. Sources, preamps, speakers, cables can come and go as technology changes but any decent amp can always be used for something and they can usually be repaired or refreshed if necessary.

Clipdat

I wish I did not send back the pair of Wharfedale Evo 4.2 speakers that I reviewed.

skrol

I avoid sellers remorse by not selling my stuff. It just accumulates and drives my wife crazy.

Toolfan66

I’m one that buys then gets rid of what I don’t want.

A few items i did not care for.

Polk
SDA 3.1TL
15TL
11TL

Emotiva XPA 2

MF CD/SACD Player, wouldn’t play SACD

The 3.1’s were in rough shape when I brought them home, if the end caps would have been removable like other SDA’s i might have considered restoring them. It may just be what they needed.
Some people love the 15 and 11tl’s, I did not like them at all, I do like the look of the 15tl’s, the people that love these speakers would hate me to know these are in Polk Audio heaven..

The Emotiva XPA 2 was the quickest piece of gear to come in and out of this house.

The MF was a nice piece of gear, but I couldn’t get it to play SACD, so I couldn’t fully fall in love with it..

I only have one piece of gear i wish i had kept, and that is the Adcom GFP 750. With that said I probably still wouldn’t be using it, so hopefully it’s keeping someone from murdering/smiling when they turn it on.

jbreezy5

Great post @Toolfan66. Thanks!

erniejade

I had a sunfire signature II 625x2 that was re-done by Rolland. I sold it to " upgrade " to a McIntosh mc402. Outside of beautiful looking and heavy as heck, i realized it was not an upgrade. It was a change in sound but not an upgrade. After living with the 402, I thought the sunfire sig II was the better sounding unit. I believe Craig still has this unit.

Another unit I got rid of and regretted was the Audio Research sp16 and Jolida cd player. It took a bit to find a tube cd player that did sacd and had that bloom and magic the jolida had but, i finally did with the cayin. Sometimes I also regret selling the Legacy Focus and SDA 1.2.

audioluvr

I love my system. I have some extra stuff in my closet I wish I didn't have right now but not that it failed to impress me but because I don't have a 15 bedroom mansion with a half dozen listening rooms. Of course that could all change because I bought a Mega millions ticket last Friday when the jackpot went over a billion dollars....

pitdogg2

audioluvr wrote: »

I love my system. I have some extra stuff in my closet I wish I didn't have right now but not that it failed to impress me but because I don't have a 15 bedroom mansion with a half dozen listening rooms. Of course that could all change because I bought a Mega millions ticket last Friday when the jackpot went over a billion dollars....

You didn't win 😜

jbreezy5

@VR3 - looks like in both cases switching from simpler to more complex designs.

erniejade wrote: »

I had a sunfire signature II 625x2 that was re-done by Rolland. I sold it to " upgrade " to a McIntosh mc402. Outside of beautiful looking and heavy as heck, i realized it was not an upgrade. It was a change in sound but not an upgrade. After living with the 402, I thought the sunfire sig II was the better sounding unit. I believe Craig still has this unit.

Another unit I got rid of and regretted was the Audio Research sp16 and Jolida cd player. It took a bit to find a tube cd player that did sacd and had that bloom and magic the jolida had but, i finally did with the cayin. Sometimes I also regret selling the Legacy Focus and SDA 1.2.

I heard an SP16 back in the day driving a large Classe stereo amp and a pair of B&W 800 Nautilus at a dealer.

That made those speakers listenable, giving a slight softening to the treble and introducing some nice instrumental texture.

I also regret not purchasing it at that time, it was a dealer demo for $1500.

VR3

The decade series was extremely over damped internally. They had no output or dynamic range, woofers bottoming at 80db, a true mess.

The rti70 had a really veiled sound

audioluvr

pitdogg2 wrote: »

audioluvr wrote: »

I love my system. I have some extra stuff in my closet I wish I didn't have right now but not that it failed to impress me but because I don't have a 15 bedroom mansion with a half dozen listening rooms. Of course that could all change because I bought a Mega millions ticket last Friday when the jackpot went over a billion dollars....

You didn't win 😜

Crap!

skrol

Toolfan66 wrote: »

I’m one that buys then gets rid of what I don’t want.

A few items i did not care for.

Polk
SDA 3.1TL
15TL
11TL

...

The 11TL is one that I haven't been able to bring myself to part with. I guess I have lower standards. Keeps things cheaper that way.

billbillw

I don't regret selling much of anything over the past 20 years...
Perhaps my Luxman R-117, got it for $50, but I never really had a place for it (and still don't).
Perhaps the Technics SL1200mkII that I picked up from a DJ in new condition for $140. I think I sold if for $250 before the price went through the roof on those. I still think they are one of the best simple vinyl playback setups. Yes, my VPI is much better, but it is more finicky.
I'm sure there will come a day when I regret selling my recently departed Sony SS-M9, but that probably won't be until I move to another place, that may or may not have been a good match for the big Sonys. Regardless, I'm not one to keep a huge amount of surplus gear in storage, especially not 300lbs of speaker that take up 10 sq-ft of floor space.
I loved the sound of my big LSA Integrated Amp, but after the 1st repair, I didn't have confidence that it wasn't going to end up back in the shop. I was, and am still glad it sold. I am quite happy with the W4S combo that I have now. Maybe not as magical at working with bad recordings, but better with the good recordings.
So I guess my point is no regrets so far.

engie490

I wish I would have kept my Infinity RS-IIAs. My listening space was too small when I had them so I decided to sell them. Then I moved and ended up with a large space that would have been great for them.

VR3

billbillw wrote: »

I don't regret selling much of anything over the past 20 years...
Perhaps my Luxman R-117, got it for $50, but I never really had a place for it (and still don't).
Perhaps the Technics SL1200mkII that I picked up from a DJ in new condition for $140. I think I sold if for $250 before the price went through the roof on those. I still think they are one of the best simple vinyl playback setups. Yes, my VPI is much better, but it is more finicky.
I'm sure there will come a day when I regret selling my recently departed Sony SS-M9, but that probably won't be until I move to another place, that may or may not have been a good match for the big Sonys. Regardless, I'm not one to keep a huge amount of surplus gear in storage, especially not 300lbs of speaker that take up 10 sq-ft of floor space.
I loved the sound of my big LSA Integrated Amp, but after the 1st repair, I didn't have confidence that it wasn't going to end up back in the shop. I was, and am still glad it sold. I am quite happy with the W4S combo that I have now. Maybe not as magical at working with bad recordings, but better with the good recordings.
So I guess my point is no regrets so far.

That is why I never considered that lsa amp, the amount of broke units in the sold history in hifi shark was staggering