Uber expensive repair at United Radio

Rich people can afford to pay more than poor people. If you buy a BMW or Mercedes, expect to get ripped off on the service. That’ll be $800 for an oil change, hand over your credit card.

Classé is the same. Upper tier brand, premium price. Expect to get fleeced for the cost of repair because they know you can afford it because after all, you bought it right?

While I agree $2000 is a gut punch, someone who had to get their Denon 8500 AVR probably is paying 25-30% less because of price sensitivity. If they wanted to pay more for the same performance or worse, they woud’ve bought Arcam or Anthem.

Service shops depend on products breaking, no different than your car dealership wanting a piece of the action. This is why electronics these days are built to fail, not in all cases, but in many.

@daveyf

Not in favor of it at all. It’s just the reality of buying an expensive brand. I’m well off compared to a lot of people my age but if you’re going to buy boutique things, well then the service is going to be that much more expensive. It’s like buying a Lexus and Toyota. Same cars aside from the interior or, but the service is twice the price at a Lexus dealership. The people who have a Lexus can afford to pay more and the dealership and every other luxury brand knows this.

if you want to remain rich, .spend like a poor person for most things, but if you’re an audiophile well that’s your spending vice

@clearthink I forgot that people in Europe lost their right to complain. It's called hate speech now if you complain about poor service or the price.

I'm not going to blame the guy for going to an authorized service center. If you've invested in a luxury brand, then you want the repair done right the first time. I just think that service centers overcharge repairs for luxury brands because they can. If you can find a decent electronics shop that won't screw you or experiment on your hardware then that's the cheaper route, but like car mechanics, not many honest people in that business. Everyone likes to eat, no one wants to work for free so we embellish our work or labor.

The guy who runs PS Audio said in one of his YouTubes that he generally would not repair audio components older than 10 years since the technology has advanced so much.  
You could have got a pair of Schiit Aegirs (if you’re speakers are not hard to drive) or Vidars (if they are) and been very happy.

The guy who runs PS Audio has an incentive to sell you new hardware. Of course he's going to say dump your old Marantz receiver and upgrade. Speakers still run on an analog signal, not digital. If you're talking about room correction and DAC's, yes great improvements have been made in those fronts, but just tubes are still popular in driving speakers and that technology has been around 100 years.