Dead Equipment Thread.

[Knuckledragger]

This is an idea I've had for years.  I have a lot of audio equipment and other gear (but still a tiny fraction compared to many HCers).  Much of it is in less than 100% working order.  Some of it is "door stop" or "paperweight" status.  There are bits I'd like to get working again and things I'd do better to throw out.  I am sure I am not the only one.

In no particular order:

HeadRoom Milllet(t) Hybrid serial #1.  Pete's name misspelled on the front panel.  Class A circuitry.  I bought it from one HighLife 10 years ago.  I strongly suspect it's got bad caps.  This is among the top pieces of gear I wish to restore.  It's got real history to it.  Also it sounds amazing when it works.  The logistics of repairing are complex.  I have to find someone who is willing to work on it.  I've looked at the HeadRoom site and I hardly recognize it these days.  I get the strong impression that they do NOT service old HR gear (or even acknowledge that it exists.)  After I find someone to fix the amp, I have to send it and the PSU to that person and wait however long.  The problem is I only have one HeadRoom DPS, which is currently being used by my HR Balanced Desktop (now my most used headphone amp.)

 

Tascam 122 Mk III.  The greatest cassette deck ever made, full stop.  Bests Revox and Nakamichi units.  (Tapes recorded on a Nak and played back on another Nak might sound better, but that's a severely limited prospect.)  Mine has at minimum bad belts and possibly a bad gear.  A clever friend of mine bought one and restored it himself.  He said it was nontrivial, but not impossible.

A pair of Unisound AU265 speakers.  Way back in 2010, a website with the silly name ThingFling listed these for $100 or $200 shipped  They were like $1200 new in the 00s.  One of mine rattles like a bastard when any amount of bass goes through it.  I genuinely do not know if it's one of the drivers or an issue with the cabinet.  I'd love to get this pair working again because the Unisounds look like proper pieces of furniture and are the big burly battered black boxes that my NS-1000s are:

My (sainted, octogenarian) mother would much prefer the Unisounds to these things.  The NS1Ks are so imposing that the contractor we had in the house to fix some electrical problems talked about the speakers almost as much as he did the actual work he had to do.  I thought it was hilarious.  My mother was less amused.

 

Symetrix 528E voice processor.  Not an audiophile thing at all.  For a good 15 years it was THE preamp to mate with an Electro-Voice RE20 microphone for speech purposes.  As someone who has spent entirely too long pontificating about ...all sorts of things on the mic, I love the combo.  There's actually a company that refurbs and even improves 528Es as a cottage industry.  I was going to pursue this route ...then covid hit and life got complicated.  I still have plans to pick up that thread. 

 

Audio Research LS-9.  Very solid preamp with mixed balanced and SE I/O.  It's a totally solid state design, which is unusual for the manufacturer.  I found it to be very neutral.  Whatever I put into it came out of it the same.  Mine has ...issues.  One of the switches is missing a bat after a wire got caught on it.  Also there's some internal problems.  I suspect bad caps.  TBH I should really restore this thing but I'm not sure I can be arsed any time quickly.  It really is a great pre.

 

California Audio Labs tube DAC.  I bought it from an HCr years ago.  It needed a new chip and a tube.  This is trivially easy to do, but I felt like a big boy when I got it working.  It was actually one of my favorite secondary DACs.  It was great for lo-fi content like streaming audio.  Unfortunately, I used some idiot Monster Cable interconnects on it and those things grip like their life defends on it.  One the DAC's RCA jacks came out with the stupid cable and I have never attempted a fix.

Canon EF-S 17-85mm F/4-5.6 IS USM.  The "better" kit lens I got with my EOS 30D in the summer of 2006.  I used it extensively until it stopped working after I took this shot in 2009:

TBH I don't think I'd pay to fix it.  It's crap at the wide end and I'm done with EF-S until further notice. 

Canon EF 35mm F/2.  It's had a broken AF motor since 2009 when some idiot club goer knocked my lens on to the floor.  I've used it as a manual focus lens for 14 years now.  It's still a great lens.  I'm probably going to buy the newish 35mm F/2 IS at some point.  As I have said many times in the photo thread, 35mm F/2 is the best lens for APS-C or full frame in my estimation.

That's all the broken kit I can think of off the top of my head.  I'm sure there's more, both here and still on the mainland.  So HC, what broken bits of kit are YOU avoiding dealing with today?

[swt61]

Great idea for a thread.

[n_maher]

Alright, I'll bite on the Millet(t) since it was the amp that I reviewed years and years ago and actually owned for a little while after I bought it from Tyll.  Full disclosure, I'd hope to repair it and return it to you Knucks. 

[sejsel]

5 hours ago, swt61 said:

Great idea for a thread.

+1 on this. 
Much needed thread, and not only at head-case (pun intended to some (several) other places). 

Edited November 10, 2023 by sejsel