Cambridge Audio products unreliable/unsupported?

This is not just cambridge
its %80 of audio mfgr’s!

 They are to make money, not lose it,
cheap parts, and high prices, it breaks, 60% throw out and buy new.

 This is most,common.

 All my gear I’ve had, warranty service and this crappy 1 year warranty is horrible.

I have a very low tolerance for unreliable equipment, but I have been happy in the whole with Cambridge. I have a BD650 universal disk player that I have had for maybe ten years. Never had an issue. I use it now to play SACD (DSD over HDMI).  And I have an 851N that I bought in May 2016. The sound is great. It froze up twice and I had to reset it twice—a couple of years ago.   Other than that no problems. Cambridge has answered my questions promptly and has updated the firmware a few times (I now use it to stream Qobuz).

I have a CA 752BD player for about 5 or 6 years. No problems. 

More grief than average ,

I had a CA AVR that required service, but it was handled easily by my dealer.  It was by far the best sounding receiver I've ever heard.

A clip from my network player.Notice the distortion and the varying pitchhttps://youtu.be/ph3QxRNTXcg

Nowadays to lure potential customers they have put up phrases like "British engineering" "British sound" etc on their website and products. Just another ploy to fool people. Its beyond doubt now, if you are buying a CA product, you are taking a giant leap of faith.

phd is correct.  This is an eye opener, but why we are here, to share our experiences both good and not so good.

I had a CA Minx Xi Network Player. The software was buggy from day 1. Used it for barely 3 years and the it started producing only garbled noise instead of music. Now, out of warranty ,and months of email exchanges, CA support suggested a main board replacement.Only problem is the product is out of production and all i got is an apology from their support team. They said my unit cannot be resurrected.Below is the actual email.

Nicholas (Cambridge Audio)

Jan 30, 16:41 GMT

Hi Deepak,

I am sorry to hear that but if the parts are no longer available, there is no further action that can be taken to resurrect the unit.

Please accept my apologies for the inconvenience.

Kind Regards,

Nicholas

Technical Support Agent
Cambridge Audio

This is not good and shouldn't be. Cambridge did build a reputation on designing good sounding gear for the price. I purchased a Cambridge phono preamp a few years ago, not only does it sound good but haven't had any issues at all with it. This sounds like the same problem NAD was experiencing with their new gear of being unreliable, the old stuff being much more reliable.

I owned threeCA products, the StreamMagic 6, the DACMagic Plus and the Azur 551r AVR, both purchased new. The DACMagic Plus and StreamMagic 6 worked flawlessly, the 551r blew some caps in the video subsystem after a year of operation.

I live in LA and since I purchased online, I took it to an authorized CA repair shop here (George Meyer). They fixed it under warranty with zero hassles. Sounded better than stock afterwards.

I would have no hesitation buying another CA product based on this experience.

I have had 2 CA products. An 840 CD deck and (still have) an 840 preamp.

The 840 deck was reasonably reliable until the CD tray failed to retract into the deck on command from the remote. Still worked if manually nudged. Sold the unit soon after that, but the new user has had no problems with it.

My 840 preamp had the dreaded volume relay issue (they use an array of relays and discrete resistors to adjust volume). After a time period, the volume will suddenly jump up when adjusting up or down in level. The issue has been widely reported on the NET. My unit was no longer in warranty as I bought used, but CA was very responsive and sent me an entire set of replacement relays no charge. They are relatively easy to replace if you have de-soldering equipment. I did find, however, that the CA engineers had specified an incorrect part for this relay, because the relay manufacturer states the relay should be used intermittently only, and CA uses these "on" continuously.

The problem has not returned after the replacement, and I suspect the problem is aggravated by using the ramp volume mode where all the relays rattle as the volume is ramped up from a low level.

Update

The CAMBRIDGE AVR crapped out again a second time with catastrophic effect early in its 3rd year of operation.
The Cdn distributor said that the HDMI issue was somehow outside of the warranty coverage ....not a time issue but a "non-warranty" repair on my dime.
One week later their top. CAMBRIDGE bluray player suffered its own sudden catastrophic FUHBAR meltdown. It was 4 months after the 2 year warranty was up.
The cost to repair exceeded its FMV at that point.

I scrapped the bluray player, sold the AVR and went to an ARCAM FMJ bluray and went to high quality non-chifi separates instead of a chi-if AVR

'Nuff said

My 740c cd had issues about 6 months out of warranty. The tray was not operating correctly going in and out. I contacted the us distributor and found there was no local repair. Directed to George Mayer in LA. as certified repair source. Cost a bit to ship there and back to HI and the repair also was on the high side for labor. Still that was around 2012 and the unit has been fine since. The issue was with some wheels that drive the tray and door. Kind of wierd issue but repairs have held up. $300+ to repair. If other issues came up now after buying in 2009 I would probably just get rid of it. I already have a sub Sony ES5400 waiting.

Akg_ca Interesting the thread link you left has been deleted. I have had posts here deleted so I, for the most part, do not participate in the forum.
CA has such a good PR line that I had been recently considering buying a used 851e preamp. I had been looking online for reviews that sunk their teeth into the matter but there really wasnt much to find out . the dirty laundry Im referring to. I had my initial red flag when I was reminded that they are China made. Now, that in itself is not a crime. Purportedly good product can be made in China if its paid for and a viable QC is maintained. Then, I found a review that was positive overall but revealed one telling little detail that coupled with the complaints in this thread have me just saying no. The reviewer mentioned that the volume control knob was cheapish and light and it was mounted lopsided. uneven clearance with the face. The incidence of minor issues revealed in this thread seem to me to be saying lots of cheap parts.

Check out the AGON thread nelow: re: ARCAM pulling its AVR600 out of Chi-Fi production and also the other ARCAM models Chi-Fi sourced quality control issues,

http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?bhome&1324311378

I always maintain the perhaps unrealistic attitude that gear, especially things without moving parts, should never break. Is "Chi-fi" actually more breakdown prone? I would think that could be true if the quality control part of the process is flawed, but I certainly haven't noticed any issues with my current pile of Chinese stuff...if anything my Kavent preamp, Jolida amp, Dacmagic, Squeezebox Touch, and 640p seem extremely well made. Maybe disaster is around the corner...being paranoid will give me something else to do I suppose...living on the edge!

Had two CA items, a surround sound receiver and a tuner. Both were already out of warranty but not by so very much when both developed problems. In my view CA products sound good but in my experience are not reliable.

Purchased online - dealer is useless ~ more effort to ship to them and time spent waiting than benefit. I tried this path - I also tried to get local repairs done by a Cambridge certified repair shop - no luck.

I have been in contact with Cambridge customer service - they stated that the US distributor (Audio Plus Services) will contact me to resolve the problems.

I will post an update after I hear from Audio Plus.

Yeah...the dealer seems like the proper path here.

I've also experienced the "lost Canadian week" when I bought a minor thing from Canada...gets stuck at the border it seems.

You should contact the dealer you bought it from to assist you with service. That's what they're there for.

4 and also 3 years ago I had to send my Cambridge 840C in for repair, once under warranty and once out of warranty.
First time it was a connection that had come undone, the second time it was a faulty power supply. 2 breakdowns in the span of less than 2 years. Both times it was serviced, it was returned to me in working order. After those incidents, later it developed an intermittent nuisance problem - every couple of weeks the unit would freeze=up and not respond to commands, I would have to completely power it down to get it to work. I would rate my experience with the 840C on the low end of reliability given my better experiences with owning other cd players.

Not at all

My CA 650R AV receiver suddenly failed in its audio board and cooked some capacitors with other failed pieces. The unit was 12 months old with very very little use on it. The product was made in China and the risks with buying Chi-Fi are well known to all in advance. Forrest Gump highlighted it best : "S**t happens."

The Canadian warranty is three (3) years assuming that it was purchased from an authorized dealer with an invoice and related proof of purchase. PLURISON here in Canada were polite, prompt and efficient in repairing it: the support was there when I needed it.

Two years ago, my Cambridge Audio 840C CD Player experienced a failure when it was just a little more than a month out of warranty. I called my dealer who contacted CA's service department which, at that time, was in Canada. They repaired the unit under warranty which I thought was an exhibition of exemplary customer service. The only issue I had, and considering their service, a minor one, was the delay in getting the unit from upstate New York into Canada. Somehow there was a missing week, but I've nothing but high praise.
Jerry