The worst piece of HiFi Equipment you've ever owned?

[ceylon]

pro-ject debut carbon evo. i owned two because the motor noise and excessive rumble had me returning the first. the replacement had the same defects, and i also noticed the off-center platter. thanks to the cartridge the sound was pretty good, but the performance didnt measure up to the $60 BPC table i bought from a street addict.

 

[jayvis]

but the performance didnt measure up to the $60 BPC table i bought from a street addict.

Wow, some of you guys really dip low to save a buck.

 

[GChief]

Wow, some of you guys really dip low to save a buck.

Probably even lowballed the addict.

 

[Bushikan]

Probably even lowballed the addict.

Nah, @ceylon gave the street addict one last hit from the stylus before he took off with the TT. Fair and square.

 

[Bill Murray]

Wow, some of you guys really dip low to save a buck.

I spent $500 on my first stereo. 1965 bucks, prolly worth 5 times that by now. I got a Scott 299D for $195, 2 Jensen raw speaker kits for $180, and a Garrad AT60 turntable for $60. Maybe a cheap headset too, can't remember. Plus 10% sales tax. I still have, and use, the speakers every day....................

 

[ceylon]

I spent $500 on my first stereo. 1965 bucks, prolly worth 5 times that by now. I got a Scott 299D for $195, 2 Jensen raw speaker kits for $180, and a Garrad AT60 turntable for $60. Maybe a cheap headset too, can't remember. Plus 10% sales tax. I still have, and use, the speakers every day....................

man thats fantastic, but what is

The worst piece of HiFi Equipment you've ever owned?​

 

[ChrisCables]

A 'professionally refurbished' Sony TCK808ES. Paid too much. Sounded crap. Chewed tapes. Put it down to poor workmanship, false advertising.
A second 'professionally refurbished' Sony TCK808ES. Sounded crap. Chewed tapes.
Later found out that most owners think they also sound crap, uninspiring, undynamic and eventually chew tapes just to rub your nose in it.
Never meet your heroes.

 

[Jarred555]

Parasound phono preamplifier , thing had me chasing my tail in circles , sometimes it would sound like I had a blown mid in my right speaker sometimes a blown woofer out my left other times I swore it was my cart wasn't aligned right , I would adjust this or that and it would go away then something new would pop up like there was something screwy with my turntable then feedback thru my RCAs would move them around and things would be better for a minute and throw me off it's trail , I swear to God there was a demon inside this thing trying to deceive me , only thing I ever bought new I can really recall and the phuckery was endless , took out the stupid parasound and went back to my mmc cart and things have been lovely since , thing is from the seventh circle of hell

 

[jayvis]

I spent $500 on my first stereo. 1965 bucks, prolly worth 5 times that by now. I got a Scott 299D for $195, 2 Jensen raw speaker kits for $180, and a Garrad AT60 turntable for $60. Maybe a cheap headset too, can't remember. Plus 10% sales tax. I still have, and use, the speakers every day....................

Where did you have to pay 10% sales tax in 1965? Did you buy it from a street addict too?

 

[Bill Murray]

Where did you have to pay 10% sales tax in 1965? Did you buy it from a street addict too?

I had to pay it to a much bigger criminal..... the state of Illinois sales tax. Probably the biggest POS I ever bought was a Knight 940A amplifier. Used. $10. No bass end, blasted your ears if you turned on the speakers while the headset was on.

 

[hellhound94]

Way way back in time, I bought a pair of Utah (yes, Utah) speakers because of their impressive size. I have no idea what the model number was and I have no idea how I got rid of them. All I remember is that they were pieces of crap and I learned a hard lesson from that whole experience.

 

[NoTransistors]

Well, 55 years years ago I was running a set of Utah HS4B, powered by a Bogen tube amp, and fed by a BSR mini-changer.
While not exactly as smooth as a good aged Scotch, the set-up sounded pretty good.
And when I replaced the BSR with a Dual 1229Q, my listening experience shot up ten-fold.

 

[big2bird]

Nakamichi 700 casette deck. I sold it back in 6 months. Great deck, but casettes just don't have the bandwidth., I bought it new back in the day.

 

[BmWr75]

A Lance Cochrane 6L6 push/pull tube amp. Didn't own it long, was lucky the seller gave me a full refund.

 

[MX117.MC7150]

Most disappointing were the McIntosh MC352 and Accuphase E-280. Purchased both new (about 25 years apart) and tried to get them to sound good for a about a year with various speakers before giving up. Both were boring and lacked any ability to provide "life like" SQ.
However, the absolute worst was a set of PMC speakers from around 2005. Absolutely the worst sounding piece of gear I've ever owned. Sounded worse after being broken-in.
Obviously, YMMV.

 

[Bill Murray]

Way way back in time, I bought a pair of Utah (yes, Utah) speakers because of their impressive size. I have no idea what the model number was and I have no idea how I got rid of them. All I remember is that they were pieces of crap and I learned a hard lesson from that whole experience.

UTAH was always selling these 2 speaker for $1 more deals. I bought 2 UTAH AS-2 bookshelf speakers for $50 from Allied radio in 1969. 8 inch woofers and 3 inch or so tweeters. Used them as extensions in the bedroom. Sound was so-so. It was my first experience with acoustic suspension speakers and I didn't like it as much as my bass reflex types. Also, you can't mate the two in the same room. AS needed more watts. But a friend of mine bought 2 of the bigger UTAH systems and ran them for years without complaint. Too each his own. Anyway my UTAHs have spent many years in my basement, but I still hook them up occasionally for the hell of it. Lots of watts gives you a rather stiff sound.

 

[Volvo242GT]

A couple tape decks. First was a Realistic SCT-72 dubbing deck... Meh... The second one was a Sony TC-RX79ES. Friend of the family owned one that worked quite well and sounded good. So, I bought one new to replace a TC-RX420 that I bought earlier on. Mine kept killing off one of the transport motors, since, for some reason, Sony had it run continually whenever the deck was powered up. Had it replaced once by a repair shop, then, the second time it occured, dumped the deck. Replaced it with a used TC-RX77ES, which worked fine.

Got another of the TC-RX79ES decks, so we'll see if I have better luck with this one. Seems good so far.

 

[Bill Murray]

Got another of the TC-RX79ES decks, so we'll see if I have better luck with this one. Seems good so far.

I have always been disappointed with SONY. No matter what I had, there was always some aspect of it that annoyed me. I had a SONY 4-channel decoder that, on paper, seemed ideal for the need I had at that time. BUT it made a noise in the volume control I never could clear up. I have had other, small cheap crap, that didn't work right in one way or another. So SONY is on my **** list, along with PANASONIC and all of the house brands from back them, like ALLIED, KNIGHT, LAFAYETTE, OLSON and REALISTIC. I have modified my opinion of the latter to the extent that they made good little switch boxes and accessories.

 

[Volvo242GT]

Depends on the gear you buy, I guess.

So far, we've only had a few Sony items that weren't great. The first TC-RX79ES that I mentioned a few years ago, four TVs that developed issues over the years (two had the bad solder joint problem in the IF assembly, the other two were just getting up there in age), a shortwave radio that had an issue where you had to depress the area around the speaker for the batteries to make connection, and a couple clock radios that had their stepper motors stop running. Everything else has been working well. Yes, a couple receivers I've owned did need work, but were purchased as project units and, after repair, they were/are fine.

Can't say the same about a Harman/Kardon stereo receiver that my parents' had when I was younger. Always had an 80 Hz hum that was audible through speakers and through the headphone jack. Sent it in for repair a couple times, and it came back with the same problem. Haven't had great luck with Kenwood either, but that's usually because car audio. Almost every single Kenwood deck I've owned has had problems. Had two KRC-878 decks that both had cassette deck problems, one also had no illumination for the display; had a KRC-610 that ran hot and started distorting its output after a few minutes; a KRC-2005 that randomly just lost the FM band; a KRC-1004 that couldn't get stations; a KDC-67R that blew its left channel, so, for stereo output, had to run all four speakers off a two-channel power amp, etc. Yet, except for two decks, the Sony car units were great. Never ate tapes, the CD players worked properly, tuners were able to get stations from afar without too much interference.

So, YMMV, I guess.

 

[Bill Murray]

Depends on the gear you buy, I guess.

So far, we've only had a few Sony items that weren't great. The first TC-RX79ES that I mentioned a few years ago, four TVs that developed issues over the years (two had the bad solder joint problem in the IF assembly, the other two were just getting up there in age), a shortwave radio that had an issue where you had to depress the area around the speaker for the batteries to make connection, and a couple clock radios that had their stepper motors stop running. Everything else has been working well. Yes, a couple receivers I've owned did need work, but were purchased as project units and, after repair, they were/are fine.

Can't say the same about a Harman/Kardon stereo receiver that my parents' had when I was younger. Always had an 80 Hz hum that was audible through speakers and through the headphone jack. Sent it in for repair a couple times, and it came back with the same problem. Haven't had great luck with Kenwood either, but that's usually because car audio. Almost every single Kenwood deck I've owned has had problems. Had two KRC-878 decks that both had cassette deck problems, one also had no illumination for the display; had a KRC-610 that ran hot and started distorting its output after a few minutes; a KRC-2005 that randomly just lost the FM band; a KRC-1004 that couldn't get stations; a KDC-67R that blew its left channel, so, for stereo output, had to run all four speakers off a two-channel power amp, etc. Yet, except for two decks, the Sony car units were great. Never ate tapes, the CD players worked properly, tuners were able to get stations from afar without too much interference.

So, YMMV, I guess.

One thing I don't like about Sony is that they make everything from TOTL gear to little throw away junky things. I also don't like Yamaha because they can't make up their minds about whether they make Audio gear, Motorcycles or Pianos. I lean toward a company that makes only Audio gear, and does not design models down to a price level, which ends up junky. Of course so many have gone. Like H.H. Scott, Pilot, Fisher (until they pimped out their name), Sherwood (until they sold out), Bogen and speakers like Electro-voice, University, Jensen and Altec (before they sold out). I personally think the best equipment was made in the 60's before the Japanese invasion. American companies simply couldn't match the advantages of lower labor cost and mass production the Japanese had.