Your top 3 worst purchases ever



Hopefully none from me!

While many are asking what are the best preamps, best amps, best this or best that, wouldn't it be nice for others to know our worst nightmares with certain products?

:-)

My top 3s are:

1) Kora Eclipse preamp
From an Canadian member, the preamp arrived DOA. SInce it was shipped from Canada, return shipping cost and logistics are typically expensive and brutal. So the preamp was sent to a self-proclaimed Kora fan and expert in VA. Turned out, the repair cost was way more than I bargain for. The seller refused to fund it adequately. Ended up a super overpriced purchase with 2 months down time. Lesson learnt: Just return anything that is DOA even the seller talks sweet and offers to repair it to save you money.

2) Kora Galaxy Reference power amp
From the same Canadian member, this unit arrived with all output tubes mixed up. The amps kept blowing fuses and overheat. Bias pots do not work. Again, I was too nice to have it 'repaired' at seller's expense. Not a single penny was collectible from this seller, however. The unit was sent to the same Kora 'guru' who wasted near a grand of my money to fix it - turned out nothing was fixed, the unit suffered additional shipping damages, and I was labelled as a tube idiot by this repairman who just conned me $1k. Out of total frustration, I hammered the amp into pieces and sold it as scrap for $4 in Audiogon. That's a near $3k loss! Lesson learnt: Take anger management class.

3) Krell PAM-3 dual-mono preamp
Arrived working for first few days with noisy volume pot, then the unit caught on fire - the caps melted with lots of tar inside. Seller refused to take it back obviously since it was not DOA. Sent to Krell for repair, only to be told the repair estimate was near $3k (including $350 return shipping cost from Connecticut to New Jersey - $250 of which is for a Krell shipping box). Made perfect sense to me when I had purchased it for $550.

What are your lemons?
bsimpson

Showing 3 responses by timrhu

Bsimpson, you have had some terrible luck.
I have only had a couple bad buys here on AudioGon, but in both cases the seller made good. One was an Arcam integrated amp that was almost DOA. The seller took it back immediately. Another was a pair of speakers which received some damage to one speaker. The seller refunded half the price of the sale. That was more than reasonable.
There were a few items I've bought that didn't live up to the hype. But that isn't the seller's fault.
My really bad experiences were on ebay. Things like speakers in a box with zero padding. And the seller said "they were well packed" when I complained.
1) Jennifer Warnes "Famous Blue Raincoat". Some good things came out of it though; I learned that many audiophiles are idiots. Horrible music enshrined in early digital sound. She makes Krall, Cole, Monheit, et al sound like Fitzgerald and Washington.
Viridian

Hmmm, I thought it was just me. Lackluster performance of some great music IMO.
"You didn't learn your lesson after the first one?
Or the second one........?
Shakey"

It must've really sounded good.