With regards to CJ. - I would like to state that there are a few companies that really value their customer. One in particular, is Van Alstine. Frank Van Alstine is all about customer satisfaction. An email from my wife was received and returned by the owner Mr. Alstine. He spent time discussing the product that she had written about and HE wrote the email. To say the least we purchased the integrated amp and could not be more pleased by his professionalism, respect and honest concern for the customer. In the end they do exist.
Bad Experience with Conrad Johnson
For many years I have admired Conrad Johnson products and waited for the right opportunity to try them out. Fortunately, I was able to get a great deal on a mint condition ET3se preamp and MF-2275 power amp.
Overall, I enjoyed the sound of this combo but then I started to have issues with the preamp and then the company itself.
After I spent much time with the ET3se preamp I became to feel that it was a flawed product.
When I first listened to the preamp, the background noise was very loud in both channels, even at low volume. The preamp came with stock tubes which were EH6922 at the time.
I then tried two new pairs of 6922 tubes (JJ Tesla and Mullard) and I could still hear the background hiss in both channels. On the Tesla tubes, I could also hear a pop in the speakers every time I adjusted the volume up and down with the remote.
Another problem I had was during the power up/warm up process. When powering up the preamp I could hear music (not source dependent) even when the unit shows zero volume. Then if I turn the volume up then back down to zero; no music was heard.
So I called Conrad Johnson for help. The new owner of the company, Jeff Fischel, answered the phone and proceeded to help me. From the very beginning of the call I started to feel very uncomfortable. He was talking to me as if I was a child, in a very condescending tone, telling me what I was doing wrong and how I should operate their products.
When I described the issues I was having, he said they no longer use 6922 tubes and only recommend NOS 7DJ8 tubes from Philips and Matsushita, which are more rugged for his preamp. I then asked him why normal 6922 tubes do not perform well in the preamp. He said it was because they run the heater voltage to the tubes much higher than the 6922 spec, the NOS 7DJ8 perform much better.
Jeff was right. When I tried the Philips 7DJ8, the background hiss went away in both channels. But the question I ask myself is what happens when all the NOS 7DJ8 tubes are gone, you have to just deal with background noise? What kind of product design is that? Through other research I found that this preamp just eats up tubes, even the 7DJ8. Eventually they will also develop noise over time.
So in summation, I think the ET3se preamp is a flawed product. It is a high-maintenance piece that is quirky and you just have to come to terms with its issues. I am so glad I did not pay full retail for this preamp.
Now on to the other bad experience I had with Conrad Johnson, the company. Once I had all of these issues with the preamp, I decided to sell both the ET3se and MF2275 power amp. I did not have the original boxes so I called Conrad Johnson to see if I could purchase replacement shipping boxes for both of them.
I had the ill-fated pleasure of speaking with their shipping clerk, Jasmine. You will not believe what Conrad Johnson wanted to charge me for shipping empty replacement boxes:
ET3 - $55 for box, $70 for shipping ($125 total)
MF2275 - $95 for box, $70 for shipping ($165 total)
That's right folks, Conrad Johnson wanted to charge me $70 for shipping an empty box.
I was willing to pay for the boxes and offered to send them shipping labels and have UPS pick them up for me. They did not want to work with me.
Here was the final response from Jasmine at Conrad Johnson:
"Box, packing and shipping is not negotiable. I think it's best you purchase them at FedEx as it seems to suite you best."
It is clear to me that Conrad Johnson is not the same company since Bill Conrad and Lew Johnson left.
Needless to say, I will never buy (new or used) a Conrad Johnson product again.
71 responses
To those of you who asked, yes I did inform the buyer of my experiences with the preamp and what to do to get the best performance. I pointed him to Parts Connexion for the Matsushita 7DJ8. So thanks! Hi roxy54, No crickets here. I have a day job so my apologies for not responding back in a timely manner. Hey jjss49, I was just trying to share my first experience with CJ products and that it was not a good one. You might think that this case was trivial or that I am an entitled moaner and that's your opinion. But I am sure I am not the only person who would complain of a high-end tube preamp that: - has so much gain, that I have to use the variable volume control on my music streamer to just control volume. - always has background hum with standard 6922 tubes and reduced tube life. - has audible clicks in the speakers when you turn volume up and down because of tube noise. - that has music playing when the volume is at 0 on power up. Have to cycle power again to get volume display to work again. If I would have known of these issues with this model, I never would have purchased it. Lesson learned. And as for the shipping box issue, it was not so much the cost of the boxes, but how I was personally treated by CJ. I am a big believer in the Golden Rule. Treat others the way you want to be treated. For what it is worth, I have had nothing but great customer support from Rogue Audio and VTL. Hope everyone has a great and safe Memorial Day weekend! |
@wkass i cant believe they answered the phone. i called, emailed, called, emailed, left messages with a very basic question, and they refused to even acknowledge my atempts to contact. they made no effort to return my contact. i finally got a real person on the phone, and there was some more agitation on my end to speak with someone who could answer a simple, basic 2-part question. when i got the person on the phone they werent entirely cooperative, but eventually i steered them towards actually answering my simple, basic, 2-part question. |
Terrible spelling of “suite”. Definitely a terrible company 😳😱🤔🤷♂️🤯
On a serious note, whether you ship empty or full boxes, shipping costs money. As shocking as this sounds
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on a slightly more serious note... -- when needed, i have bought original shipping boxes before with manufacturer foam inserts for specific gear (c-j, arc, pass, ps audio, vac)... with shipping they have always been in the range of $80-150 depending on size and complexity of the foam protective system used -- for c-j gear, they engineer first and foremost for best possible sound, and so they decided to run the et series (single 6dj8) linestage tube section at 6.3v heater (this is exactly high limit of the tube heater spec, not over it) for ideal sonic performance - it was a such pleasure for me to change over to the et series (et5 for me for several years, and now the et7-ii) using its single tube, whereas i came from the premier 16ls2 (6x tubes) and art (10x tubes) - this made tube rolling so much easier, cheaper and fun -- over time, it became known to c-j and et series users that regular 6dj8’s would sometimes get noisy in 6-8 months with intensive use, still a very small price to pay in money and inconvenience ... running only a single tube, so compared to an art, you got 5-7 years of tube life using the same 10 6dj8’s, so aggregate tube cost is the same ... but c-j acknowledged the issue and suggested use of 6h23p or 7dj8/pcc88 equivalents, which, btw, are relatively plentiful and cheaper than top grade old stock 6dj8/6922’s -- and these tubes with the stronger heater element last years remaining dead quiet so long as you bought a good one to start with all this said, for a high end tube gear user to belly ache like this about a single tube wearing out and paying for some oem shipping boxes is, well, ’funny’ (being nice here...) -- indeed first world problems and sense of entitlement we have here!!! |
Hifiguy42. +1 Ditto for Bryston. I bought a box for an amp a few years back. As I remember it cost me about $110-$120, including shipping. I was informed that sending in equipment in a non-Bryston box was a little perilous because, if the outer box showed any damage Bryston might not accept delivery, and my equipment would be returned, unopened. I did ship an amp to them in a non-Bryston box, but I had to agree to purchase a new Bryston box for the return trip. No so bad considering the amp was about 18 years old and they fixed it up, under warranty. A long way to say, keep your boxes |
As much as all the space they take up, I still have all the original boxes, receipts just in case of a repair need. Thanks for sharing. I don't see the NEED to have the original boxes for returns in need of repair. Though other than fit. (styrofoam) of the component so that it doesn't bounce around. As far as I'm concerned as long as you send the item in two boxes one inside the other for return, who cares? |
I had a problem with another hi-fi manufacturer that I will not name here. I went through similar steps that you did as I was very unhappy with the performance and customer service from the company. I ended up selling the gear back to the manufacturer because I didn’t want to lie about all the issues I had to a potential buyer, thus passing on my headache to them. Lost a fair amount of money and lesson learned..... much, much time goes into research now. Anyone can still get stung though.... It is a fair question... did you tell the buyer about your issues? |
They did not care from the start, designing the product, just to play better with increased heater voltage is not so consumer friendly. There are not not the only ones though that followed the same technique. Still you could try to insert 6n23p that has a wider working window 5-7volts compared to the much narrower 6922 tube. But still you cannot name a 6922 circuit that performs out of range for the certain tube. |
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Sorry to hear about your experience. I know that I read on the Upscale Audio website years ago that they wouldn’t sell tubes for c-j gear. I guess because of the same problem that you had. I don’t understand why anyone is making preamps that go through tubes like that. c-j isn’t the only audio company that gives customers the kind of treatment you got, but it’s still not excusable. I completely understand your being angry. I suggest that you pass along the 7DJ8 info to whoever wants to buy the preamp just to keep your own ethics out of the tank. Thanks for passing your experience along. It’s good to know this stuff. |
Did you share this story with the new owner before they bought it from you?
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