What's the Single Worst Piece of Audio Equipment You've Ever Experienced?

Spectral amps driving Wilson Alexandria II speakers. Ghastly. Drove me out of the room in less than 5 minutes.

 

Harmon Kardon tot with a Rabco linear arm. Hummed really bad from motor vibration. Finally tamed it down and it still was not good.

 

I have always noted that Japanese companies that made really nice receivers (back in the day) made very unimpressive speakers.

Never managed to figure that out?

 

A Mission DAD 5 CD player from around 1994? The only CD player I ever thought "That sounds dreadful!"

 

Cornwalls. Should have kept there little brothers. All the $$$$in the world couldn't tame em'.,

 

Digital amp. Ice amp.I swear a little t amp was better.

 

Give me a well-designed tube amp any day of the week, e.g., a C-J, Zesto, Octave, T+A, Quad, & Wavac, etc.

The only SS amps I've heard that are comparable in quality and charateristics are DarTZeel, Technical Brain, and Burmester. Oh, and my C-J Premier 350.

 

Yeah a had a Sound Design all in one back in the early 70s. Replace the 8 track with a Pioneer Centrex for my 1st decent system in the late 70s. Sadly the 8 track was still sorely lacking...

 

47 labs stuff - gaincard, dac, in fact all of it. For my ears it sounded absolutely mid-fi, like $150 receiver, just cheap, muddy sound.
Tried to listen to it twice, on different shows.

And yet there are many people who love this stuff.

 

Any idea on how this compared to the later version 3X?

Yes, I'm amazed at what these are selling for now. I bought mine, along with a Stereo 70 back in the mid '70's for $100 for the pair. I get that that was a long time ago but really?

 

It pains me to say this as a life long McIntosh guy. The McIntosh MVP-871 I had was junk. $5000 boat anchor. Refused to play random discs of random formats that played fine on players that cost 10% of what the Mc did. Still a fan of McIntosh amps, still own them. Disc spinners never again.

 

I had one of those for about an hour before I returned it. Thin, lifeless, fingernails on a blackboard.

 

Ditto for me. I can't ever remember vinyl sounding so bad. Even the cheapo P Mount cartridges I used in the 1980s sounded better.

 

I find it strange that so many folks would agree with us. My current cart is the cheapest i have ever owned but i love it. This is a very odd hobby. Also you have the same deck as me and you are the same age as me!

 

CJ units of the last 10-15 have become very unreliable. Still great sounding but would fail without even touching them. I had more units that had to be returned for service.

 

Nikko Alpha 220 power-amp. Looked cool as f**k in 1980 and the kicker was I sold my Accuphase amp to get it. Worst cold transistor sound you could imagine. The only good news here is I tracked down the buyer of my Accuphase amp half way across the country some 30 years later and got it back!

 

Alesis iO26 souncard, not hardware but software, it simply not working and support is ZERO!

 

Cambridge Audio integrated amp required two warranty repairs within 6 months. Warranty is good but you need it. Chinese made junk. Put it in the box and bought a Japanese made Marantz which sounds better and very reliable.

 

My buddy loves Nikko stuff but I think he has 70s receivers?
Was watching a Kevin Deal video ( Upscale Audio) and he had a vintage Marantz receiver behind him as he said “ These vintage Marantz receivers sound great, I think I have a Nikko that’s better”. Made me think what’s up with this Nikko stuff and does my buddy have a point?

 

First was a Sony digital tuner STJ 75 or something like that: LISTENING FATIGUE CENTRAL. Couldn’t listen longer than about 30 min max.

After using a KR Audio tube amp for a while I switched to what I now believe was a sort of experimental SS preamp. Looked great, sounded great. Second day got hammered with that insidious listener fatigue again. Really disappointed as the pre had great sonic attributes.

Lenco table: Should have come with a microphone.

Total SAE system: Had nice red lights also it had nice red lights.

A pair of speakers that looked like fancy column end tables: Much better for serving tea than listening.

I could go on but.......

 

Class d amp. Couldn't stand it. Bass was way to powerful. It seems people love that type of bass. Not me.
After trying to like,I sold them.

 

This thread can be easily summarized by -- "There's huge variation in how people hear." (Which also explains the mind-boggling number of companies making audio equipment, to serve those differences.)

It also is a textbook demonstration of how much some audio consumers exaggerate how awful (or great) a given component sounds to them ...

 

Nikko amplifier. Used so maybe it was sick. But I got rid of it quickly.

 

AKAI mini-component system. I got rid of it faster than quickly. Gave it away.

 

No wonder you did not rate it. There is no such thing as a Rega Exact2.