[purk]

Guys,
I was just checking out Fixup's website, and was amazed by the inflation (increase in price) of the Mini and Super Mini amp!!
The price is now 124.99 dollars! Wow! The price is quite expensive!

The new price is here.

Purk

 

[Jeff Guidry]

I think that Fix-up may have effectively priced himself out of reasonable DIY competition. Hell, even Headroom will sell you an Airhead for less, and their amp comes with crossfeed.

It would be nice to find out exactly why he has made this pricing choice. For my part, there is absolutely no way I would pay that much money for a portable DIY amp.

 

[purk]

Jeff Guidry,

It is very tough to justify a jump in price from 59.99 to 124.99 dollars in less than a month. I know he did some upgrade and such ( I have no clue on how to), but my Meta 42 with AD845 op-amps is less than 140 dollars shipped. This price includes AC power socket and 15.00 dollars op-amp (AD823 is only 8 dollars). My Meta42 with AD845 actually walks all over my super mini. Well, tough choice, but I really think for 124.99 dollars, that is too expensive. I would choose the real Meta42 over the Super Mini anyday.

Purk

 

[eric343]

I think it's because he was getting too many orders. At $60/ea, even I was thinking of getting myself one, and I'm the last person to need one

This way he gets some time to finish up his current crop and the orders will drop down to a nice 'easy as pie' level so he can take a bit of a break, then he might drop the price down a bit until he's hit a point that he likes...

Just my theory

purk: I daresay that definitely JMT and probably Tangent don't like their prices getting published... I know I don't.

But for that amount, Damn! do they charge *anything* for labor at all?!

Oi, if only I had enough time that I could do that...

 

[lextek]

So much for a good deal. I'm going to pass on those Mini's now. I'm not that curious.

 

[BDA_ABAT]

What Eric343 said...

Sounded like Fixup was getting hammered with orders, even after he bumped the price to $80. The above reaction is likely expected and desired.

BTW: I just got my modified SuperMini with the additional feedback loops. Sounds pretty darn good so far (not yet fully burned in)!

Bruce

 

[jpelg]

I'd imagine that someone could do a marketing dissertation on this thread alone.

Congrats to the early adopters!

 

[kelly]

Am I the only one irritated by this?

During the multiple discourses on whether his prior threads were or were not ads and whether he intended them to be and whether the staff at Head-Fi handled them approriately or not, FixUp publicly said "I've only raised the price from $60 to $80 once and only because the demand was so high!" FixUp went on to I'm sure seriously injure his arm and shoulder muscles patting himself on the back for being such a great asset to the community for always offering the best prices on... on and on. Now his price is over double the introductory price and somehow I am not surprised.

I firmly support FixUp's right to charge whatever price he wishes in his business and while undoubtedly many of you may view this as simply matching price to market, I also think this was a disasterous PR decision. As someone who tries my best to contribute cost-relative reviews of products for the benefit of many people who don't even post to Head-Fi, I feel that my fellow Head-Fi'ers who have gone out of their way to review his amps, post about them and recommend them based on them being such awesome values have been betrayed. To raise the price this drastically in such a short period of time is to take advantage of the hype and recent controversy this forum has generated for him.

 

[Zanth]

Well, I am miffed. I was seriously considering one to go with a minidisc player and some etys while at work. I was thinking of a pdac as well, but with this price...sorry, no way. Although, if he has the business he won't care about losing mine...but at this price...people will remember, I will remember...I won't purchase from him again...unless he is using pure gold and platinum in those amps...there is no justification in such a short time.

 

[antness]

I think that all along Fixup intended the cost of his mini amp to be $125, but offered it at an extremely low price initially to get many buyers to purchase it and review it as a way to get interested generated in the amp and interest more potential buyers. Once that job was accomplished, he raised the price to what it probably should be for the amount of labor involved. Does that mean it's worth the cost? No, it's not. However, Fixup's method of building the amp requires a lot more labor than for Headroom to simply assemble an entirely board mounted device on professionally made circuit boards. Therefore, Fixup shouldn't expect buyers to pay for his unnecessary labor costs.

 

[kelly]

antness
That's a valid point about his choice in not using a printed circuit board. To be clear, though, my response doesn't address whether his amp is worth $125 on an absolute scale. It may well be. It could sound as good as the RKV for all I know--I've never heard it. My complaint is only about his method of attaining business which is what the first half of your response addressed.

I understand when companies need to re-evaluate pricing and expenses after a year or so of production. This, on the other hand, is the equivalence of a bait-and-switch advertisement.

 

[eric343]

Well, I think Antness definitely has a point... it's really NOT fair to the builder to get paid that little for a protoboard amp. Protoboard is VERY time consuming, compared with PCBs.

Perhaps Fixup will order some PCBs for the Mini/Super Mini and lower the price then, when it's economical to do so.

 

[puppyslugg]

Perhaps it's time to compile a list of alternatives.

 

[erix]

So What?

I don't know about other builders-for-hire but for me my time is valuable.

I don't know how JMT, Eric, Tangent, Antness, and others find time for all the building they do for others. My list of things to do is continually growing and building an amp for someone takes time away from things like family and recreation.

Perhaps Fixup calculated what he was really making with each of those amps sold.

Perhaps he found out he was making $1.98 / hr?

Isn't someone's time and workmanship worth SOMETHING?

So you can buy an Airhead for <$100. You get an amp that is AC-coupled with tiny little caps in the signal path. You get a crossfeed and a green LED in a case made for a radar detector.

Congratulations - it's just like everybody else's Airhead.

Double that amount with the Total Airhead and you get better caps in the signal path as well as some better resistors. Does it sound twice as good?

They were both made by machines. They both contain parts purchased in large quanity with substantial cost savings. They are both marketed and sold by a very fine company formed especially for the purpose of providing amps to the masses.

I don't want to get into the concept of worth - especially in an audiophile setting.

No one in this house should throw stones...

You paid how much for that hospital-grade duplex outlet?

Those little pointy feet do what?

If it sounds good to you, fine, buy it. If you feel it costs too much for what it sounds like, don't buy it.

Just don't come here and devalue a persons skills and product simply because you don't like the price.

I don't want this to sound like support or endorsement for Fixup because it is not. I find his commercial posts in this forum a bit troubling - especially when other members have been reprimanded for doing so.

I don't support them either.

[/rant]

ok,
erix

 

[antness]

My point was....

while Fixup DESERVES to be paid for his LONG HOURS OF LABOR in assembling the amp, it's HIS CHOICE to not assemble the amp on a *CHEAP* printed circuit board. If I remember correctly, the Mini amp just uses a small strip of board. Fixup could even get 3 mini boards for $62 at ExpressPCB, and probably cut it up into 10-20 amp boards. That's just $3-$5 per amp.

THEREFORE, the buyer should only be paying $3-$5 plus no more than several minutes labor for the cost of the board and assembling it.

If Fixup says "I have time, I'd rather charge $50 for the cost of the board and labor and spend 5 hours on it" that's not the customer's responsibility to pay that $50 extra for a product that in the long run is inferior and less professional