[maxx76]

Hi there-it's actually my first post here in head fi and im hoping to get some information from fellow head fi'ers regarding maintenance and care of a tubed cdp unit. Ive had the chance to own a Shanling SCD-T200C used with a 2 chanel system setup last December and unfortunately within less than a month
the player had problems reading out cd's and sacd; the blue laser light was obviously no longer reading the cd's full data as the audio technician observed. A month after the unit was brought back fully repaired and making things worse after another month's use the unit was only giving sound to the left channel of the speaker-even with a headphone setup. Hence we had to bring it back and have not received any complete explanation as to what happened with the unit. I was given a couple of demo cdp's-all solid state ranging from MF to Marantz to Rotel and none of them gave me the same problem I had with the Shanling-despite the fact that there were times that they could not read cd's with minor scratches on the surface but it never gave out the way my Shanling did. Are tubed cdp's much more sensitive to the quality of the disc media fed on them and are they much more prone to heat/dust/humidity factor compared with solid state? I did recall Shanling was basically a open top loader(i.e. Rega) not the drawer type units we often see in solid state and to some extent tubed units(B.A.T. and Audio Aero cdp's). Im once again a proud owner of another tubed unit; which this time is a drawer type though. Ive already bought a separate and dedicated power strip for it and positioned it at least a foot away from the wall. Ive been scanning audio mags for all other necessary room treatments and accessories i may need to have as well to mantain this unit to it's expected 3-5 year lifespan. But i'd appreciate if i could get any insights and opinions from you guys; who's at least had much more experience in owning audio systems and at least get a analysis from you as to why the previous unit just broke down. I do like sound quality of tubed player's but really if it's gonna be hard to mantain them for the years to come i would not hesitate to replace it with a robust solid state player considering that I have a 6-day work week and could not possibly have all the time to keep checking it and travelling back/forth to the service center. Sorry for the long post, but i do hope to get subjective analysis from you guys and specially those who have been mantaining a tubed system as to what a new owner like me could expect. Thanks.

 

[Zanth]

The Shanling is really an SS player with a tube stage follower. This is how all tube players are implemented, so it is not as if you are getting away from the SS at all.

As for your problems. This would not be typical of all tube players, nor of all T200's. I have had great success with my T100 and WMcManus owns a T100, T200, T100c, T200c and the new T300 (he may have sold his T100 and T200 now because of the new c versions). Anyway, I don't htink he has had any problems. You prehaps just got a dud. It happens even with the best of them.

What do you have now?

 

[maxx76]

A MF A5, not the grandest player out there but hell i like the way it sounds. It's just that my wallet and i have had much trauma with the previous player despite it's outstanding sound quality. Hence im making sure that this time i leave no stone unturned in mantaining this one. I just did not realize mantaining a $2,000 plus sound sytem really does require patience and acquiring as much info from audio mags and audiophiles alike.

 

[Zanth]

Quote:

Originally Posted by maxx76 A MF A5, not the grandest player out there but hell i like the way it sounds. It's just that my wallet and i have had much trauma with the previous player despite it's outstanding sound quality. Hence im making sure that this time i leave no stone unturned in mantaining this one. I just did not realize mantaining a $2,000 plus sound sytem really does require patience and acquiring as much info from audio mags and audiophiles alike.

Well, when equipment goes south, I would hope the dealer/manufacturer would step up to the plate and help out. You have an MF player now, so I assume Roy Hall took care of you.

as for maintaining the gear, yeah seriously this hobby can get expensive fast. This is one reason that I have as of late, been really leaning towards established outfits for gear. Maybe I pay a bit more, but in the end, that should result in at least some added security which I am fine paying for.

Still, it shoudl be all about the music, so if you are happy now, enjoy, don't stress about the gear (hopefully it won't have problems) and just rock out (or veg out of whatever you fancy

)

 

[mikeliao]

Think of the tubed CD player as 2 parts: the SS portion, and the tubed portion. The SS portion doesn't really need any maintainence. Don't run it too hot, keep the dust off, give it a clean power supply, etc. The tubed portion...meaning pretty much just the tubes, require a little more maintainence and more careful use. Tubes need to be warmed up, have a limited life span, bias may need to be adjusted depending on your player, more sensitive to vibration, etc. Adjusting and tweaking will take a while but its worth it in the end. And should the tube fail, just pull it and replace it with another.

The problems in your T100 sounds more like SS problems. Not being able to read a disc has nothing to do with the tube stage. Don't fret the details too much. Just follow the instruction manual and use some common sense.

 

[Old Pa]

When my Super Njoe Tjoeb 4000 (upsampled) developed transport disease a couple of years ago (and still in warranty), Upscale Audio stepped right in to send a new modular transport. Hard to beat good customer service, whether local or on the net like this. The replacement transport installed according to instructions and without incident (although I did pay some attention to electrical contact cleaning/conditioning and tightening not detailed in the notes) and solved all problems immediately. I believe the transport was of Sony manufacture and has worked just fine since, despite what appeared to be all plastic construction.

 

[Wmcmanus]

It's a problem with the Shanling player itself. In the early production runs of both the T100 and especially the T200, they had some quality control issues that didn't surface until the players had been in use for a while. I'm not sure about the details, but it got to the point that it was starting to give Shanling a bad reputation, and almost invariably it had to to with disc reading errors.

I'm not up to speed as to exactly what the problems were or how they were resolved, and I'm not a technical type anyway so it wouldn't mean much to me even if I did have an explanation ready at hand. There was a wee bit of discussion about the issues on some of the other forums (Audiogon and Audio Aslyum) but nothing that pinpointed it.

***

This part is kind of OT, but not really if other people are checking into this thread and thinking about buying a Shanling player in the used market (no worries about the new ones because all of the former problems have now been fixed). Anyway, here was my one negative experience:

I've never had any problems with the Shanling players I've owned except when I sold my T100 to an Audiogon member who then complained about the laser mechanism not working perfectly with the remote control. The problem was exceedingly minor in my opinion, and I hadn't even known about it prior to selling the player I didn't use the remote myself. Effectively, when you skipped tracks using the remote, the player would overshoot the spot it was searching for on the disc and thus you wouldn't hear the first couple of notes on that track; it would join the track 'in progress' which of course is annoying to someone who uses the remote frequently. I never had this verified but just took the guy's word for it, refunded him $200 for the repair that was needed (the laser part was $75 plus labor) and went on with my life. Had I known it would have been a hassle to sell, I would have kept the T100 for my office system where I tend to listen to CD's from beginning to end (in other words, I wouldn't have needed to fix the player for my own use). I guess missing the first two or three notes at the beginning of a song doesn't mean much unless you happen to be cueing up "Satisfaction" to show off your system to a friend who is visiting from out of town. Kind of matters then!

According to the guy who bought my T100, he contacted the only authorized Shanling repairman in the states, a man named Mitch Singleman in California (I think I have his surname correct) who mentioned that this was a common problem with the early T100 and T200 production runs and that he had repaired several of them for the same issue.

 

[arnesto]

I just found this on the web, how does the Njoe Tjoeb 4000 compare to other CD players out there. From looking at the parts, it looks like a pretty nice player.

 

[Old Pa]

Quote:

Originally Posted by arnesto I just found this on the web, how does the Njoe Tjoeb 4000 compare to other CD players out there. From looking at the parts, it looks like a pretty nice player.

It is a nice player, especially in the Super configuration with upsampling. Since the base CD player has pretty light construction, I did some damping mods my the case of mine. My post concerning these mods is here: http://www5.head-fi.org/forums/showt...ght=Njoe+Tjoeb It's no where near my Meridian G08, but it's close to my Arcam FMJ 23T.