Phoenix Engineering Falcon and Eagle


Read a one-liner in a different forum related to Phoenix operations.  Tried to access their website without success. 

Are they still around?
bpoletti

Showing 4 responses by lewm

 Slaw, I think the only issue would revolve around Phoenix's willingness or lack thereof to service products still in warranty.  To back out of that pledge could be said to be "unethical"; I would say it's more in the area of "unprincipled".  Some others would say there's no difference between the two.  Since rumor has it that the designer did not really retire, he only bowed out of the commercial audio business, he may still be in a position to honor any warranty on any of his products, so long as the warranty lasts.  Do you or does anyone else have information to suggest that Phoenix will not take care of units in the field?

On another note, I once owned a Notts Hyperspace that benefitted hugely from powering it via a Walker Audio Precision Motor Controller.  The difference with vs without was rather astounding to me.  Furthermore, selecting correct electrical phase, using the switch on the Walker, was an important link in achieving max benefits. Thus I don't doubt for a moment that any good motor controller would help the feeble Notts motor.  (Notts make their own power supply, as well.) This is not to dump on the Notts; the feebleness of the motor is a deliberate part of their design philosophy: massive platter/weak motor.  Walker uses the same strategy with their Proscenium.

BPoletti, I am a bit confused by your last post.  Do you mean to say that a variac or similar device that merely reduces AC voltage going to the motor would do as well as one of these power source/controllers, like the Eagle, etc?  Just wondering; I probably misunderstood you.
Out of curiosity regarding the reported price increase at Hi-Fi Heaven, I just searched their website.  Apparently they sold out of Eagle, still have some Roadrunners left in stock.  So, the price increase, whatever it was, did not hurt their sales of the Eagle.  Looks like the RR is up about 20% in price from what I paid, but I don't even remember for sure what that was.
I bought a set of RR plus Eagle from Hi-Fi Heaven, apparently before they increased pricing.  For installation on my Lenco.  Haven't yet found the time to do the work necessary to mount the sensor on my platter.
Stringreen, When you say you've heard "it", do you refer to the Eagle plus Roadrunner, connected so that the RR feeds information about speed back to the Eagle, or do you refer to just a straight ahead comparison of the Eagle to the SDS?  Because the SDS does not have provision for feedback from the platter on speed.  For this reason the Eagle + RR ought to have an advantage in any comparison to the SDS alone.  However, there is no guarantee that you or I would easily hear it.