CD player NOT made in China under $1,000?

Newbee is correct. I am the distributor/importer (and in charge of repairs) for all Opera Audio and Consonance high-end audio components in the North American (USA and Canada).

As I have said, they are one of the largest and most respected Chinese manufacturers in the field. I don't want to single them out, as my opinion from "comparing notes" with other industry insiders is that my experience is not out of the ordinary. But, to put a positive spin on things that deserve it, the sonics of their CD players at their respective pricepoints are class leading, and their tube equipment is not only solidly built and reliable, but especially good sounding.

I've always found it interesting that a company like Matsushitas Industries that make the Panasonic and Technics lines never really got going on the hight end. Onkyo at one time tried to begin heading in that direction, and some of their late 70s components (integrated amps) were nicely built with wood sides, quality components, etc. Pioneer sort of became the leader in Japanese high end in the 70s and 80s and then with their Elite series. Sony of course has dabbled along theway, but for preamps and amps, it seems only Accuphase really hit the mark for the high end.

Please correct me if I am wrong about this.

But go into any high end store in Tokyo (I have many times) and you see brands unknown to US consumers of low power single-ended triode stuff for those small city living spaces; 1 watt goes a long way in Tokyo.

But man do they know how to make phone cartridges!

Trelja - Is the high failure rate in the field, or is it on products that are shipped to you? In other words, you get a CD player from the company, take it out of the box and run it for two days without incident. If it gets that far, is it likely to later fail in the field? Or are a majority of the units just DOA when they reach you?

Excellent question, Chayro!

I will answer the "right out of the box" in terms of CD players with the proviso of "First 100 hours of operation". The reason being that when one is dealing with the laser head of a CD player, the danger is in damaging it via ESD (electrostatic discharge), which will often result in the laser initially working, but failing in the first day or two of playing. Following that, I'd say it's about 50/50.

In terms of solid state and hybrid integrated amplifiers, the failures come not right out of the box, but down the road.

As an example, about a month ago, a guy I sent a replacement integrated amplifier (long story, but customer service is important to me, and you have to do what you have to do - which means eating a lot in terms of cost) 2 or 3 months previous to that called to let me know his amplifier just up and quit one day. I had him send it up to me, and it was clear the amplifier wasn't abused in any way or shorted out, it simply kind of melted down in being asked to drive a 4 ohm loudspeaker load. In that the speakers were Totem Arros, about as ubiquitous a loudspeaker as one is ever going to find, this was particularly outrageous to me. Again, this is another case not of workmanship during the assembly, but improper design. If a product cannot easily go 5 - 10 years when partnered with such a mainstream product, what does it really say about what is coming out of that place?

I've worked with the factory in getting him the next amplifier up the food chain, with a bit more in the way of output transistors and power supply. I'm crossing my fingers right now, as I have no idea that the end result won't wind up the same as what we've just seen. Note, this is now costing me twice for a sale the previous importer made, and took all of the profit on, but the customer should be the last one concerned with this.