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What Gear Has Disappointed You?

While it's clearly not an absolute fact, we tend to have an expectation that a more expensive product should be better.  Within a given brand it really should be a fact, but because there's a wide range of factors in play when it comes to pricing it's not necessarily true when comparing different brands.  I think that it's fair to say that when we purchase a more expensive product we generally have an expectation that it'll perform better.  In the cases where our experience confirms this belief it can be the result of the product actually being better and/or some expectation bias. In a sense, it doesn't really matter which it is.

With this in mind, have you ever purchased a product expecting it to be superior only find that it was clearly inferior in your experience?

 

mceljo
arhgef
52 posts
 

Schiit Gungnir. Just did not have the sound quality for the price. In my comparisons, Chord Qutest and RME ADI2 both better, for different reasons.

Surprisingly, KEF LS50 Meta. Lots of hype,  but for classical music the timbres were just not reproduced well, especially highs. Fine for amplified music like rock and roll. 

audphile1's avatar
audphile1
4,376 posts
 

Dynaudio S5.4

Rogue RP-5 

Bryston BDA-3

Ag insider logo xs@2x
treepmeyer
104 posts
 

Like okhunter and mahler123 with their Brystens, I have a major user interface disappointment only mine is with miniDSP and Volumio.The hardware (SHD Studio) is fine, but the Volumio os/ui is so frustrating that after a year of trying to get comfortable with it I am ready to throw in the towel.  I find my listening time has gone down because the streaming interface is so unpleasant to use. 

Incidentally, I got the SHD because Dirac Live dsp comes integrated with it.  To my great surprise the dsp made little difference in SQ.  Thus, another product that did not meet expectations, but in this case probably not the fault of the product.  Either my room was OK to begin with (I have some tube traps, diffusers, acoustic panels already in place), or maybe it is just plain irremediable.

jonwolfpell
347 posts
 

NAD 7 channel Surround Sound Receiver. I forget the model ( sort of intentionally) but it was the top of the line & pretty expensive. Performed well, sounded quite good for both stereo music listening & for movie watching & had plenty of power. 

After about 4 years of only moderate use, the right channel started to get occasionally noisy for a second or two & then be fine for weeks. Finally, the right channel died. Goodwins High End in Waltham MA where I bought it seemed to have very little interest in helping me, took way too long to get back to me, & quoted about $1000 to get it repaired w/ no guarantee of success!
 

The unit was supposed to be easily upgradable w/ plug in modules as technology changed which also turned out not to be true. Both the equipment & the store left a bad taste in my mouth. I bought a nice Anthem receiver to replace it & been happy ever since. 

brunomarcs's avatar
brunomarcs
240 posts
 

B&W Matrix 802 series 3. I couldn't believe how thin these sounded compared to Infinity kappa 8's. I put them for sale the same day and never had not one call. So I kept them replaced the xovers,  added a sub woofer swarm, they still sound a little thin at times but I'm keeping them for now.  I was told there a collectors speaker whatever that means. 

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