Reliability of Cary Audio Products

My Cary amps and preamp have always functioned flawlessly and sounded great; the amps are now almost 10 years old.

4+ years with a Cary preamp and never a problem. (Your mileage may vary)

Tarasando, I'm sorry, I don't follow your logic. Either my point was valid or it is not. Either getting a response on reliability from <20 people about a product that has sold in the multi thousands will help to determine the overall reliability or it will not. I say not.

I do see your point about most posts. Does A sound better than B, Is X a better match for my Y than Z. These do not have a definitive answer. HOWEVER, this post does have a definitive answer. Either Cary products on average are reliable or they are not. The problem is we are never going to get to the answer in this thread. The only way to get the answer is to poll a statistically significant portion of Cary owners.

We're not talking about opinions here. Either Cary products are reliable or they are not. If my logic is valid then the responses to this post will do nothing to determine if the products are reliable.

Herman,

I agree with your input, as far as it goes. However, conducting a systematic random sample of Cary users would be very difficult.

As with any potential purchase, I try to gather as much information as possible and weigh the reliability and validity of the information sources. I like the sound of the SLI-80, but when I was told by a somewhat biased friend that Cary had reliability problems, I wanted to gather additional information. One of the difficulties of this hobby, from a cynical perspective, is that many dealers, distributors, and manufactures have a self interested point of view and do not provide trustworthy information. Many end users have a narrow perspective regarding function and form - either a produce works well or it doesn't, and either it meets a subjective ideal or it doesn't. End users are not usually aware of the percentage of product failures. The end result of this is that there is not any way to find good information.

However non-statistical a thread of this nature may be, it does pull together a general feel for a product which I find useful. From what I can glean from the few responses is that the Cary service has been good. This is a plus! Also, out of the 17 responses (not counting the 2 by Herman and one by Tarsando), it appears that most people who responded have not had problems with Cary equipment, some over a long period of time. This is also a plus. One person did have some problems with tubes and sold the amp. Not all of these responses have been about the SLI 80, which narrows the utility a bit. I am a believer in the human capacity to complain, and so few moans (thus far) is, again, a plus for Cary.

Thanks to all who have responded so far.

John

I have had great experiences with my Cary products. My first Cary products were a used pair of SLM-100's bought from a Cary dealer. When I auditioned the amps, one was blowing fuses. The dealer selling the amps sent both amps back to Cary for service and inspection. After that, I used them for 3 or 4 years with no problems, only replacing the KT-88 tubes once.

I upgraded from the SLM-100's to a used pair of 805C's sold on Audiogon. I have had the 805C's for about 5 years now with no problems whatsoever. I have replaced all the tubes, but only to improve sound, not because they were worn. The people at Cary are always very helpful with their customers whether the products were bought new or used. I have called them seeking advice on everything from the best tubes to associated equipment matching.

With all the good things that I have read about the SLI-80, it's hard to see how you could go wrong.

Jeff