Calvin, I know what you mean as I've heard enough cases, including audiophile friends who've had major issues with reliability, warranty, customer service etc, as well as the opinion of a good AE to certainly warn me off thier amps and lower range CD players. Knock on wood I never had a problem with my Ayon CD-5s, then again I took it to my AE when it was new to upgrade the Op amps, and he generally fixes anything that's loose or likely to fail. The first thing you need to know is Ayon is not made in Austria. All thier products are made in thier factory in Hong Kong by Chinese workers, using mainly Taiwanese boards. Also, thier amps are unnecessarily complex. They try to control tube amps with microprocessors using proprietary software, then within 1-2years the emloyee who wrote the software has left Ayon, and they (Ayon) can't fix the problem because the only person who knew anything about it has left the company! If you add previously poor customer service to the mix, there are just too many red flags for me. I now buy mainly new Vitus gear which is made in Denmark, using Danish (Vitus) transformers, modules and boards. They only import a small percentage parts like caps, Phillips drives etc. and Vitus's customer service is friendly and helpful.
