Disappointing headfi adventure + warning

[alamak]

Hi guys,

Just few months back, im unlucky enuf to buy a used superdual from a dishonest headfier(Vranswer, he claimed that his SD was working flawlessly). Upon receiving, i notice immediately intermittency in the right channel of the earphone jack. So i send it to Xin for repair, asking him to troubleshoot the amp for me for any other problems coz shipping from SG to US is ex and troublesome. Spent S$75 for shipping to and fro. It then came back with intermittency in the right channel of the input jack. Being damn pissed, i told XIn how disappointed i was with his service as i remember reminding him twice to help me check the amp thoroughly coz i don't wana spend any more $$ sending it back. But as i have no other options left, i sent the amp back to him again, as usual reminding him to check it thoroughly. And he was nice enuf to absorb the return shipping charges. Guess what, the amp reached me last week, everything was working fine until i suddenly hear a series of pop sound and the amp just went dead. That happened last week. So i quickly change the battery. It worked again. But today, only after 5mins of listening, the series of pop sound came back again. Same thing, the amp went dead.. Just fyi, the total amount of audio bliss i get from this purhase since the 1st day it reach me is only 20hours... Imagine, out of 50days, i only get to enjoy the amp for less than a day. The rest of the time, its probably in the plane, in other parts of the world, waiting to be fixed.

Total amt spent on this piece of junk:

S$175(amp) + S$75(1st time shipping) + S$20(2nd time shipping) + S$50(Misc, batt, charger, etc..)

The purpose of me complaining here is i hope i can help create some awareness to all newbies out there who intend to purchase used item overseas. Even if you plan to buy direct from the manufacturer coz if theres any problem with it, you gota spend extra $$ for the shipping charges.. And it might not come back as you thought it would be..

Ok, enuf of my crap, any kind soul out there willing to give me some advise on what to do next with this amp? Spent S$320 to go thru all this trouble is really frustrating. Actually i was planning to sell this amp after Xin repaired it but guess i can really trust no one to do his job well..

Any advise?? Hope this thread won't end up with a few hundred reads and not a single reply.. Then that really suck...

Rgds

 

[chungsoi]

Man, I'm sorry to hear that! That would really piss me off....

I would have sent the amp back to the original seller and demanded a refund for selling a faulty item!

I don't know what more you can do at this stage, have you spoke to Xin about it?

 

[bhd812]

Oh is this going to be hard not to rip on xin for this one...(its a joke)

Anyway the thing I would do is cut your loss now and throw in the garbage or try to diy fix it.

I wouldn't blame xin or the person who sold it to you (or demand a refund cause it was somewhat working on arrival and even after that issue was fixed you still had more).

Sometimes you'll get burned in anything in life man, its like you dated a girl and she cheated on you what do you do then? throw her out and start over.

Sorry to hear your first experience was this bad, But I don't think it was the seller or Xin to be blamed...it just was never meant to be with this amp..

If its worth the shipping back to xin to you one more time then that's up to you, at least he fixed it and paid for the shipping alittle bit..he did his best it sounds like.

it just wasn't meant to be man, Sorry about it and good luck on your next headfi adventure.

btw: I know your pissed but try to leave the sellers name out of this thread, esp if they have good feedback.

 

[alamak]

Hi Chungsoi, thx for reply.. I've sent him an email. Just hope his reply would be different from the 1st time i sent him.... "You can send it back to me for repair".

That would be damn disappointing....

 

[RnB180]

what cable were you using for the amp?

did you make sure it was not the cable connectors causing intermittency?

Somethings the middle segment of the interconnect may be misaligned, and have intermittent contact as the connector spins aroung in the jack.

anyhow, I know how it feels to get something not working,
I was just recently screwed over on an ebay auction for a vintage PCDP

I just cut my losses and moved on.

 

[alamak]

Bhd812:

Thx for the reply... But i still can't accept the fact that the seller did not reveal the actual condition of the amp. Do you think its possible for an amp that is working perfectly at the moment its being sealed up for shipment, to end up having intermittent in one of the channels of 1 of the inputs?? I definitely don't think so, my friend...

As for Xin, i feel that he should be more responsive. I waited for days just to get his short reply to my long question. Another thing is, probably shipping is cheaper in US so he tend to take it lightly on customers sending their faulty amp back for repair.. I can understand that he is a very busy man but if this thing goes on like that, i think he will probably lose some customers especially when competition is getting stronger..

 

[alamak]

RnB180:

I've tried several cables on the amp.. All encounter the same intermittent tingy.. I even went to custom make a canare mini - mini cable with neutrik interconnect on both ends.. Still the same outcome.. Any idea what causes the pop sound which leads to the death of the amp??

 

[RnB180]

edit

I dont know what caused the pop sound, that may be a question better suited for the amp DIYers

go to the DIY forums and post a troubleshoot thread there, Im sure there are amp builders that can figure out what the cause is if, xin hasnt been helpful to you. I know a couple members off the top of my head that are very knowledgable about amplifiers and both reside in the DIY forums.

if you value your headphones I would advise not plugging it back into the amp anymore.

 

[robzy]

[edit]: I was too late, sorry.

Rob.

 

[chungsoi]

Think about it. If someone claims that an item they are selling is working FLAWLESSLY and you buy it in reliance of that statement, then that someone should be held accountable to some extent if the item arrives faulty.

I'm not trying to point fingers here because it's not my position to do so...but I believe you should have sorted it out with the seller in the first place and try to work things out that way.

Anyway I think its too late for that now. I'd agree with bhd812, unless you know someone locally who's good with electronics or DIY, I'd throw it away and start saving up for another amp...

 

[alamak]

I did point out to the seller that the amp was expriencing intermittent in the right channel upon receiving. He still claim that it was ok when he sent them out. I did not press on that time as i like the size of the amp and i thought Xin could easily fix the problem.

Besides, since i like that amp so much, i thought instead of sending it back for refund, might as well use the shipping cost to send back to Xin for repair and still keep that small "wonderful" amp..

But guess that was a foolish move.. It doesn't pays to be kind...

 

[RnB180]

This might be too late to try now, since your amp id fried.

try turning the cable connector around in the jack, if the sound becomes intermittent at a certain angle and comes back as you twist it, it might actually be the connector, inspect the ring on the connector.

Neutrik connectors a very low temp connectors, and if the person that soldered the connector didnt take proper steps in heat sinking or proper iron temp, the ring can easily misalign as the plastic will melt that holds the ring.
the ring is the center segment on the connector pole which is also the right channel signal carrier. if a connector is overheated the right channel segment is what misaligns. another possibility is that the cable maker didnt terminate the connector well and the ground is shorting the right channel.

what cables specifically have you used aside from the neutrik connector? have you tried others? was the person that made the cable for you experienced?

it would be odd for xin to send you back an amp and say the right channel is fine, and you experience the same problem before hand.

the pop and dead amp might be due to him overcompensating or misdiagnosing a problem that he was unable to detect with the amp in the first place.

make sure that all parts on your end is in proper working order.
another thing is the jacks might be a bit larger then what your connector is capable of fitting in, if this is the case, the right channel segment on the connector is the first to lose contact.

 

[chungsoi]

Yeah, its a tough one...I guess as soon as you decided to keep it and send it Xin to get it patched up, all responsibilities the seller had (if any) was then void. By the sounds of things, Xin did what he could to fix the problem, so I don't think you should be blaming him for the misfortunes.

I say pose the problem in the DIY section to see if any members can help you with the problem, otherwise think of it as a sunk cost (and a lesson learnt) and move on.

 

[gordolindsay]

Hey, I just sold a headphone cable (Headphile Senn) to someone here and when I sent it out it was working perfectly. I had never had any problems with it but when he recieved it he said that it was cutting in and out. He sent it back to me, I tried it with my headphones and sure enough there it was!! It turned out that the left plug had a broken cable inside it. Luckily I was able to cut it open, solder it together and get it working again. The guy was very cool about it and I appreciate his patience.

The moral of my story is, things can happen through shipping. My packege went from Michigan to Ohio and got destroyed. Shipping something overseas has a way higher percentage of getting bumped/hit/dropped/thrown/ran over(?) then going 400 miles over land. I'm sure it is possible that the amp was working perfectly when he shipped it out and something could've happened to it during transit.

I hope you can figure something out and have better experiences with this site. It is a great place with some great people, probably the closest knit community online that I've seen. Good Luck!!

 

[vranswer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by alamak Hi guys, Just few months back, im unlucky enuf to buy a used superdual from a dishonest headfier(Vranswer, he claimed that his SD was working flawlessly). Upon receiving, i notice immediately intermittency in the right channel of the earphone jack. So i send it to Xin for repair, asking him to troubleshoot the amp for me for any other problems coz shipping from SG to US is ex and troublesome. Spent S$75 for shipping to and fro. It then came back with intermittency in the right channel of the input jack. Being damn pissed, i told XIn how disappointed i was with his service as i remember reminding him twice to help me check the amp thoroughly coz i don't wana spend any more $$ sending it back. But as i have no other options left, i sent the amp back to him again, as usual reminding him to check it thoroughly. And he was nice enuf to absorb the return shipping charges. Guess what, the amp reached me last week, everything was working fine until i suddenly hear a series of pop sound and the amp just went dead. That happened last week. So i quickly change the battery. It worked again. But today, only after 5mins of listening, the series of pop sound came back again. Same thing, the amp went dead.. Just fyi, the total amount of audio bliss i get from this purhase since the 1st day it reach me is only 20hours... Imagine, out of 50days, i only get to enjoy the amp for less than a day. The rest of the time, its probably in the plane, in other parts of the world, waiting to be fixed. Total amt spent on this piece of junk: S$175(amp) + S$75(1st time shipping) + S$20(2nd time shipping) + S$50(Misc, batt, charger, etc..) The purpose of me complaining here is i hope i can help create some awareness to all newbies out there who intend to purchase used item overseas. Even if you plan to buy direct from the manufacturer coz if theres any problem with it, you gota spend extra $$ for the shipping charges.. And it might not come back as you thought it would be.. Ok, enuf of my crap, any kind soul out there willing to give me some advise on what to do next with this amp? Spent S$320 to go thru all this trouble is really frustrating. Actually i was planning to sell this amp after Xin repaired it but guess i can really trust no one to do his job well.. Any advise?? Hope this thread won't end up with a few hundred reads and not a single reply.. Then that really suck... Rgds

Nice. Check my feedback (other than the multi-post wallpaper you've provided). Did you privately ask for a refund before this public affront on my reputation? No. We'll never know how I would have responded to the request, because you've brought it all out here.

I believe you that the amp doesn't work now. It worked fine for me. It's an electronic device - they can fail. Still, If I had chosen to do so, I could provided you with a refund. You, however, cannot 'unsay' what's been written here.