Buyer Beware
This is my first post on Audiogon Forum but I have been a audiophile for almost fifty years. I like to buy and sell used equipment because it gives a chance to try a much wider range of products. Recently I wanted to try different USB cables and in that process I purchased two products from Mad Scientist Audio. One was their Black Magic and the other was the Ultra version. Both were purchased used from different sellers. I own two systems and decided to keep both. In both systems I use a AMR DP-777SE dac. In the system using the standard Black Magic USB the system was not using the built in volume control. About 2 month after purchasing the cable I tried using the internal volume control in the dac and it only worked at full volume. Thinking the dac was faulty I sent it back to TMR (great company) for evaluation. They tested it for 2 weeks in every configuration possible and determined it was working as it should. When i got the unit back (after a cost of approx. $200) I determined that the problem was the Black Magic USB cable. I contacted Bob at Mad Scientist Audio by email multiple times and he replied that his cable is incompatible with 1 in 50 produces and mine must be the 1. I then tried it in two other systems and also had the same results. Either the volume control didn't work or I would get cracking noises. after many emails back and forth Bob would not exchange the cable for a working one and only offered to sell me a Ultra cable at a discount. I don't know what his profit margin or warranty policy is but I have never experienced this especially with a cable manufacture, I offered to send it back to him so that he could access the problem but in the end his last email read "Therefore I don't think it's worth you wasting anymore money trying to fix or exchange your cable." Very disappointing. The cable is now in the trash. I know that this is a small boutique manufacture but with the controversy regarding cable costs and if expensive cable are necessary I thought that buy telling my story maybe it would alleviate this situation with this company.
+1 @lordmelton Although it’s usually best to be sensitive to not put down another’s system, naysayers system lacking transparency likely near 100% true. Also, there’s commonly a stubborn emotional resentment of unaffordability, so they rationalize by pointing finger than facing objective truths. |
You’re right, @kennyc it’s best to not just put down other folks’ systems, gotta put down their owners too!! 😂😂🤣
@lordmelton sounds pretty good right now Then, you’ll hear all these complaints about how young people are not interested in the hobby. Do you think it’s the hobby they’re not interested in... or the hobbyists? Some hobbyists? Just sayin |
I don't believe anyone is putting anyone else down but the naysayers are not just unique to the audiophile scene, they are in the wine, exotic car, art etc. scenes. I can't afford to pay $100M for a Francis Bacon painting but I can appreciate it and not be an ass and say my print is just as good. Everyone knows that a Tesla is faster than most supercars but it's a different ball game. The younger generations who were weaned on earbuds, MP3 and uninspiring pop music are unlikely to find audiophilia a worthy and rewarding pursuit. Exorbitant cost isn't always synonymous with great sound but it usually is. Most audiophiles have built their systems over many decades, trading their way to better gear and cables. So it does rub me raw when someone says they can't hear a difference and your money was wasted on that streamer when you could have bought some flavour of the month $100 black box instead.
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I couldn’t agree more (on a side note, part of my post was perhaps unclear; my intent in pinging you was to say that booze, hookers and blow sure seemed like a pretty good salve to @kennyc ’s dismissive, passive-agressive, classist post). As always, it’s complicated. Admittedly some "naysayers" are idiots - the coat-hanger-as-speaker-cables type. Or the tag team of cretins I once had a fight with on ASR, who insisted that 192k was all the resolution anyone needed and Spotify sounds great and just fine because they use ogg vorbis. On the other end, evidence shows unambiguously that favorite audiophile amulets and gris-gris, such as $3500 network switches and $500 cat6 patch cables, are utterly useless at improving sound quality. However, they might be beautifully made and look great. I don’t begrudge anyone for not wanting a cheap-looking plastic Ethernet switch in their listening room, even if it is functionally and sonically identical to the $3,500 one in every respect (do replace the cheap one’s SMPS though). And it chafes when some schmos start braying about what a stunning difference their audiophile switch makes... better than a new amp... You know. Intelligent and well-informed audiophiles of the sort you’re referring to will usually admit - privately - that anything in the TCP path is largely immaterial to sound quality. Does that make them naysayers? Like I said, it’s complicated. At the end of the day, I respect folks who put in the time and effort. You talk about cars, I respect the guy who dailies a beat-up, 200,000-mile flat-floor E-type that he fixes himself, but I don’t particularly care for the retired orthodontist who throws money at some guy to build him a Outlaw 356 he’ll drive 50 miles then list on BaT.
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What I would add is it's all about synergy. You need to get your system in synergy before adding expensive cables. Get your dealer to give you cables on a 30 day loan, a few days is not enough. (I'll get hammered for this but I've found British amps and speakers work well together). Your next upgrade should be power cables, next IC's and finally speaker cables. It took me years to realise that my speakers were the problem, in my present system. Changing the speakers made a massive difference. If I was a young guy with 2-3 kids and a mortgage that would not have been possible. I don't use room correction at the moment but a good friend has been raving about a mid-priced system he heard and he said it was amazing, so that's the next rabbit hole...Lol. |
