I saw some unreal deals on sky on eBay. It seemed to good to be true so I asked Audioquest and they were very vague and wouldn't give me a straight answer. The seller on eBay got weird when I asked him if they were definitely authentic and told me not to bid. For theses reasons I would never buy any Audioquest sky. Who knows what you would be getting.
Fake Audioquest sky cables
One of my friend had bought an audioquest sky cable from someone that i do not know. My friend knows that i am using audioquest sky cables, and when he tried the cables in his system he had some doubts about their fake or real, then he came to me. My friend sky cables has different color shielding and different kind of 72 v dbs and same connectors but different signs on them. When we tried my friends sky vs mine, friends sky has no stage, no 3d images, sloppy bass, and very highs were very harsh. There is no doubt that this cable is fake. He emailed photos of the cable to the audioquest, and they gave very vague answers, as far as i understand from my friends telling, there are two versions of sky, early model looks like my friends sky, later model looks like mine. I think they mentioned sonic improvement between two models, but not like our comparisons. I heart fake sky cables many times, but never met one. My friend is trying to give back cable, i do not know whether he succed or not. Have you ever seenor heart fake aq sky, did you have a chance to compare with a real one, are your findings similiar with us ?
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I have owned Audioquest Sky, and I know that there are a lot of fake Audioquest cables out there, as well as fake cables from other manufacturers, but I haven't been able to compare the authentic with the fakes. Audioquest has a AudioQuest Authentication Process , of course if the cables are discovered to be fake, they will be destroyed and not returned to you, nor will you receive any compensation. Hopefully your friend can get his money back, but I doubt it. Good luck. |
"01-18-14: Danielk141 So Audioquest's stated policy is to destroy the evidence, if they verify you got ripped off in a bogus purchase. I won't be buying into this brand, ever." What else can they do? If they give them back there's a very good chance that the person who lost them will try and sell them to someone else to try and recover their money. Also, they are letting you know what their policy is before you send them. "I saw some unreal deals on sky on eBay. It seemed to good to be true so I asked Audioquest and they were very vague and wouldn't give me a straight answer." How can they possibly give you a straight answer? They don't have access to the cables being sold on ebay. It has nothing to do with them. Do you get mad at Rolex if you get tricked into buying a knock off? |
Zd542, Audioquest can simply set a policy where they agree to ship the evidence to the agency the buyer uses to lodge their complaint against the person who sold them the bogus cables. That can be Audiogon, a local court, etc. They can request the cables be destroyed after the legal proceedings are complete. I don't bid on any "unreal" deals on eBay. That's why I buy and sell on Audiogon. |
It has been my experience - bought an AQ Diamond RJ/E digital cable from Hi-Def Lifestyle, since first time buying on-line and quality of cable and packaging weren't all that convincing, for reassurance thought I'd just recheck to be sure. Sent a couple of good close-up shots of cable and box (various angles) to AQ, their marketing director got back to me via e-mail within 2days confirming that the cable is indeed genuine. So perhaps this is another way to verify - less headache, no risk - IME. |
I noticed length inconsistency of umbilical cords to DBS modules (from various pics on webs), workmanship too wasn't of best quality/standard, also the 'Made in China' instead of USA or Colorado? printed on box which left me quite a bit jittery initially hence my rechecking. They had their explaination.. Well, to me, as long as it is genuine, and ultimately thought that its sound to commensurate with $$ paid.. I'm happy. |
"01-28-14: Danielk141 Zd542, Audioquest can simply set a policy where they agree to ship the evidence to the agency the buyer uses to lodge their complaint against the person who sold them the bogus cables. That can be Audiogon, a local court, etc. They can request the cables be destroyed after the legal proceedings are complete." That's a reasonable request. In a case like that, I don't see why they wouldn't help out. The only thing I would add is that it probably wouldn't be necessary to send the actual phony cables out to anyone. A letter from AQ stating that the cables are fake and maybe a picture should be good enough for Audiogon, ebay etc. From AQ's standpoint, it would be very foolish to send the fake cables back out to anyone unless it was absolutely necessary to do so. The only reason I'm kind of standing up for AQ here is that so many people had negative comments without anything to back them up. It seems like in some cases, people are trying to hold them accountable for something they have little to no control over. If you don't want to get stuck with fake cables, you can always buy them from an authorized dealer. There's no shortage of AQ dealers both online and b&m. Even Best Buy sells AQ. But Danielk141's point is certainly a good one. If it can help out anyone that got stuck with fake AQ, by all means give them a call and see if they'll help you. If I had to guess why AQ seems a little off, or vague when people call, its probably because they don't want to give the impression that the will exchange fake cables for real ones. But that's just a guess on my part. |
We cannot get our money back if Audioquest does not return the fake cables to us, and the fake cable sellers make money out of us and Audioquest, so we and Audioquest are the ones that get hurt. If Audioquest return the fake cables to us stating it is counterfeit, we can return the cables and get our money back with shipping costs, and the fake cable sellers not only not make money but lose some. And eBay or AudiogoN has legitimate reasons to ban these sellers. |
About 7 years ago I ran across a couple pair of fake AQ Sky IC's.I was working at Sound Factor at the time. We called AQ and talked to Andrew who had me send them the cables.About 1 weeks later they sent them back and said they where fake. AQ places a serial# in the cable itself so they know if its theirs or fake. Also all higher end AQ cables are cold welded not soldered. AQ is a great company and they do stand behind there products, I have 4 pair of the original Sky cables and I have sent them back for upgrade. They simply have a stunning sound and presence to them. |
Audioquest (AQ) destroying somebody’s else property is, most likely, illegal but who will even consider challenging it in a federal court (maybe a class action would make sense here). The main reason why it is a really bad idea is mentioned already here: after destroying a cable there is absolutely no way for a victim of a scammer to get any portion of his/her money back unless the transaction was insured by a 3rd party. Probably the only way to get money back would be to obtain AQ’s statement which is linked to the specific fake cable. For that reason, AQ could thermally (laser?) brand fake cable’s connector (let’s say with the 3-letter code such as "ABC" for the total of
15,600
unique combinations) and attach a related dated & coded statement stating that the cable is fake. They could charge a fee for such a service because losing all the money on a fake cable is much worse. By destroying fake cables they are serving nobody except themselves. I actually have such a case now: I purchased an AQ cable from an Ebay seller, evaluated it, discovered it is underperforming, returned it to the seller, and he is about to send it to AQ for authentication while my refund is depending on a result of this process. |
For me AQ are the best! I use their Everest speaker cables (previous Mont Blanc and Volcano), their WEL XLR IC (previous Panther and Sky), NRG-1000, Hurricane power cords (previous NRG-5 & 10) and Diamond USB (previous Coffee). Amazing performance for the buck! Yeah, there are a lot of counterfeit cables out there (Siltech, Kimber, Stealth, Nordost, etc.)... So what?! That doesn't mean that you shouldn't buy their cables... And I find their policy pretty hard but fair. That's what happens to counterfeit products everywhere in the world. |