Reaga Apollo At My Local Trhift

I was trolling the thrift stores for awhile and picked up several pieces of equipment. Among the best were a pair of AR 850 Powered Partners. The woofers need to be re-coned and a tweeter needed replacement, but at $18 they were a great deal. Among the worst was a champagne Yamaha RX-V1 receiver. I liked the look so I bought it for $150. It needed $350 in repairs so I paid it, because otherwise it was useless. They sell used on the internet for $300, so it wasn't such a good deal afterall. Sometimes, you get lucky. I hope the poster ended up with a Rega Apollo, and not a "Reaga Apollo". If so, a great deal!

I am sorry. Rega. I was dead tired when I posted this message last night.

It's funny how CD players are becoming what turntables were 25 years ago...

Unwanted junk you could find in thrift stores for next to nothing. :-)

That Apollo you picked up was a good deal. I've been enjoying mine for years.

Regards,
Tom

It was not reading discs. Rega Apollo, Initializing, would spin the disc, and read No-Disc. I thought if it didn't work I could still get some coin for it.
After some Googling I found a You Tube Video where an owner of the Apollo located in England had the same problem. Just on a whim he played with the laser cable, and the unit worked fine afterwards. I did the same thing, and mine worked as well.
Does the laser cable work itself loose somewhat over time? Kinda lame for a unit like this.
The problem is this unit can be finicky, and if you bought one new, and have had problems, as some have had, you are probably not very happy with Rega.
Dare I say this unit sounds no better than the Marantz CD5001 I have.
I think people fall into a where it is made must make it better trap. And it costs this much so it must be good.
And any laser oriented product is common used, yeah. But quality stuff is not. The Marantz, and a Yamaha DVD C961, the Magnovox CDB 650, and a 1990ish Rotel are the only quality units I have found in ten years. Compared to a multitude of speakers, and amps/receivers. Even TT's that are mid, highish end are super tough.

It's difficult to say why the cable worked loose. Perhaps your Apollo suffered some rough handling during shipping/ownership.

The CD transport is suspended from the framework and incorporates an elastomer bumper to help isolate the transport from vibrations. But that elasicity may contribute to things working loose. With my Apollo, one of the hanger bolts came loose during shipping. I just popped the case and reattached the bolt and bumper. Never had another problem other than the occasional read errors on certain discs.

Regards,
Tom

That last sentence is telling. Again, if I paid $$$ for this I would not be happy. I consider at my price point there will never be buyers remorse.

PS Audiogon: I hate that I can't edit my title. Or my posts. I am a lousy typist, and was completely beat when I posted this. Let me edit the title!

Buyers remorse was never something I considered. Mild irritation at times, but I don't regret purchasing the Apollo. I've just come to accept that a few CDs will have to be rippped and burned to a CDR in order to play them. I'm more irritated at the music industry for using copyright protection on CDs; that's where the Apollo has most of its read problems. It will read and interpret the discs just fine when feeding the analog output but when using the digital outputs it chokes on certain protected CDs.

There have been a few CDs (out of hundreds) that would cause problems for the Apollo even in analog mode. But again, I just rip and burn to a CDR.

Tom

Oddly no problem mostly. It works great. If anything it likes to completely skip the first track, but this malfunction is very rare. I just restart the disc.
Still a grand and it can't play certain discs?
For what I paid I have had zero complaints. But for $500+?

I never did mention my very modest, but I think excellent kit. A Yamaha CR 2040, and pair of NS 1000's.
And I have a Sansui AU 919. Both great Amps in my book, and the speakers are excellent, and best of all I have less than $130 in all three.

Not working now. I bought the wrong laser replacement. Need the one that allows the disc to snap onto the spindle. Might need a new cable. I have no idea where to get the cable.