My worst experience relates to a Sonic Frontiers Power 2 amp that developed a hum in the left channel. I contacted Chris Johnson who was very helpful in guiding me to isolate the problem as a bad selector switch on the back side of the amp for the left channel. I did not want to ship the one hundred pound beast to Canada and back for what I thought was a simple switch replacement. Chris provided me the part number for the switch so I ordered a pair from Mouser. A techie friend stepped up and did the repair and replaced both switches. Turns out the repair was a major undertaking which led to 7 hours of bench time.... unsoldered circuit board..... so forth. This repair was more complex than it needed to be for a simple selector switch. I sold the amp and never looked back.
Your Worst Audio Breakdown
Checking out the forum today and I saw mention of a posters' 1st breakdown, and another about a fella with a broken tape deck wondering about fixing it. He than tells us that 3 other parts of his rig are in need of repair (whoa!). Got me to thinking, in close to 30 yrs of being in this hobby, I ruined a cartridge (my fault!) and I blow fuses on my amp from time to time. That's it! I'm wondering; am I just extremely lucky or what!?
Equipment failure is the nightmare of any audiophile, what's been your experience with gear breakin' down?
Equipment failure is the nightmare of any audiophile, what's been your experience with gear breakin' down?