Worst gear purchase?

[cominginsecond]

MOTU 828 FW interface.

Two words: only two channels of no-latency monitoring

OK, that's a lot more than two words.

This thread is every gear manufacturer's worst nightmare lol- the massive outpouring of anger from shafted customers

Keep it comin

[AnalogBob]

Beringer 16 channel mixing board.......was my first board....and that was a quick lesson on getting what you pay for....and man was it awfull.... luckily for me I got it cheap enuff I was able to flip it.......

[Confusionator]

Subscriptions to Electronic Musician and their ilk. It's their cowardice that keeps us from buying all this s**t in the first place!

[Dragonfly]

Blue Baby Bottle - returned and exchanged for a Royer 121.

Sennheiser E604 mics - bought em when I was 15, never sounded good. Now I know why.

Phillips CDR765 - needed special discs made by Phillips which cost $5/cdr, $20/cdrw.


For the most part I've been pretty lucky with my purchases, did my research or just got lucky. For the most part I've sold more than I wish I had. I never should have funded another guitar purchase with my Shilke X3 Trumpet. Dammit, dammit, dammit!

Dante

[theblue1]

Originally Posted by cominginsecond

MOTU 828 FW interface.

Two words: only two channels of no-latency monitoring

OK, that's a lot more than two words.

Is that the first 828?

I have a MOTU 828mkII and while no digital mixer has 'zero latency' monitoring, the mkII's DSPCueMix (or whatever it's called) certainly allows you to route either the 2 mic/instrument pres and/or any or all of the 8 line ins through its inboard near-zero latency cue mixer.


[Mind you, I do have a gripe with the mkII -- the sound of the mic pres is very dark. I guess they were going for warm... I wouldn't say they got there... kinda smooth, but dark.]

[moeses]

digi 002
and yamaha 4416

[the-oger]

Early 90’s… upgrading from 16 trk ½” reel-to-reel… toss up between 3 new ADATs & BRC, or a used JH24. Went with ADATs because I’m “way up” in northern Ontario – no techs to keep the JH going… and ADAT are “maintenance free” (I was told again & again)…. Yea right. Had the ADATs for less than 2 years, ended getting a used JH24 after all. ADATs still gathering dust as “rack filler”. Talk about depreciation. Also;

…MOTU 2408, Aphex Aural Exciter, Rode NT2, Marshall Valvestate

[Marlowe]

All those fukkking magazines do it! I was convinced by a pre shootout in Recording (I think) to buy the Aphex 107. I learned my lesson bigtime.

Originally Posted by Confusionator

Subscriptions to Electronic Musician and their ilk. It's their cowardice that keeps us from buying all this s**t in the first place!

[shangoe]

digi 001

tc fireworkx - high end crap with a luxury userinterface, filters, everything sounds so ugly....

[DAWgEAR]

Close to $2500 spent on Emagic products before July 1, 2002.

[BevvyB]

Worst gear purchase I ever had was from an old rasta guy outside a pizza place in Notting Hill. He was trying to sell me a piece of brown bark from the tree he was standing next to.

[henryrobinett]

Let's see. For me it was the Akai 1212MG. The eq really wasn't very good. I'm sure if I was a decent engineer in those days I could have gotten decent sounds. But as time wore on getting those esoteric beta like tapes was a real challenge. From there I went black face Adats. I got use out of 'em but man were they lousey! Then the Mackie 24-8. It wasn't that bad because I never used the pres. It was just a monitor board. I didn't like the eqs either. But my very first bad purchase came from a "friend" at a local music store when I was just starting out. I wanted to buy some mics and asked what I should get. He told me he has a great deal on these mics in his car. Foster. He said they're exactly like SM58s. Useless. Yamaha REV7. Noisey. I still have it because there are a couple of cool things . . . BUT I NEVER USE IT.

Other than those things most of my purchases I've been happy with.

[AnalogUniverse]

Originally Posted by cultureofgreed

The Edirol UA-100. The year was 1998 and I thought that USB audio on my P2 300 would be the greatest thing since liquid soap. Sadly, USB technology wasn't there yet and the thing was terrible!

Yeah man, i thought the same thing when i got my edirol UA-20.. -50dB converter self noise, you could hear that digital harshness even with no audio passing through it

[Tetness]

Liquid Channel

[warhead]

Hmmm...I would have to admit...early 90's and skimping on a DAT machine and going for a cheap MINIDISC. Resulted in some of the grainiest mixes ever known to man.

Yech, death to MINIDISC.

War

[theblue1]

People -- professionals -- are blaming magazines for making them buy stuff.

Yeah, baby.

[Hammer v2]

A cheap "vintage" marti broadcast compressor from ebay. This little gem came complete with stalks of wheat and bugs living in it. The noisiest piece of crap I've ever used. The threshold settings were the killer. Every nanometer you turned the know, the threshold dropped by 12db! Ah the joy.... Vintage yes, good no!
Learned my lesson now - when it comes to analogue outboard...BUY THE BEST YOU CAN GET!!! Cause if you love it now, in 30 years time, you'll still be lovin it - it actually wrks out WAY cheaper than constantly upgrading mediocre gear.
Digital stuff on the other hand..........yikes!! I avoid buying it if I can. Leave that to some other sucker!

H.

[smk]

Originally Posted by cultureofgreed

The Edirol UA-100. The year was 1998 and I thought that USB audio on my P2 300 would be the greatest thing since liquid soap. Sadly, USB technology wasn't there yet and the thing was terrible!

OMG, I guess I wasn't the only fool back then. Luckily I returned it...to to upgrade to the.........Seasound Solo. Then I upgraded again to the dbx 386. Man, if I had a gun I'd have shot myself...

[Gravity8058]

Stedman (N90?) mic --- bought and sold it years ago but boy did that thing sound bad.

AKG 460 mics --- dont take any level at all

Neve 33609C compressor --- they got it right with the JD -- it's class A, but the B, C, and J models dont touch any of the the class A models.

[Mr. Victory]

ditto on the S100

[Glenn Kuras]

My very first 4 track recorder with some kind of radio shack mic. Which lead me to buying thousands of $$$$s of more stuff. Because, hey I had to have more!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Glenn

[spacecaptain]

in the mid 90's i was convinced that minidiscs were the spawns of satan sent to earth to confound and frustrate us all, but then came the ipod...

never owned either though. worst i ever bought was a 3630, which i thankfully traded for an SDE-1000. but i've had to use black-faced ADATs, and i can't imagine how anything could be much worse...

[kevinc]

Not one but TWO adats here. Twice the stupidity. I even bought the second one thinking the first one was a dud and I`d have less problems with the second. No such luck. ERROR ERROR ERROR. Every 2 weeks the pieces of shit needed another repair.


The second would have to be the 414 buls(hit). That thing sounded about half as good as a 57 to me and cost 15 times the price. I know some people like them a lot but they just really didn`t do it for me.

The funny part is I`d been dreaming of buying one since I was a kid and first saw one in a Musicians friend catalog. I think it was the first mic over $1000 they carried and I was like HOLY SHIT ! $1000 for a MIC ??? That thing must sound AWESOME !

Until than the SM58 seemed like the pinnacle of expensive mic quality to me. I was pshyched that day when I hooked a brand new one up to my Porta 2.

Little did I know $1000 is pretty damn cheap for a mic as well.

[Kestral]

The current production Shure SM57's that are made in Mexico. Sounded horrible. Had my running to eBay to buy a USA-made Shure SM57.

I didn't purchase this but I think the UA 1176 sounds horrible compared to a vintage one (I have a rev B model).

[theblue1]

Didn't someone in this thread say "It's not the arrow -- it's the Indian"?


I read some of these posts -- okay, many or most of these posts -- and think a) some of these folks totally didn't do their homework and bought roosters expecting them to be hens; b) a lot of people were looking for "magic arrows"; c) overall, people just don't seem to be getting smarter. They just collect other people's opinions and spout them as though they were based on their own experience and knowledge...


I think I've completed the transition into grumpy old man...

[u b k]

Originally Posted by theblue1

I think I've completed the transition into grumpy old man...

i eagerly await the day when i start screaming "you kids get the hell outta my yard!"

also, i intend to drive really really slowly, while hugging the shoulder, with my left blinker flashing continuously.

MASTER of ambiguity.


gregoire
del ubik

[shamrock]

For me, it's gotta be the Korg X5D synth. Horrible sounding and you needed a degree from M.I.T. to operate the damn thing. Thankfully, it went "bye bye."

Kel

[username]

I can't believe someone hated the 414... maybe you got a dud? not liking it that much I can believe.. but I wouldn't say it was a hateable mic?

[djwayne]

As I've mentioned on the forums before, I did an A/B test between an AKG C-1000 and a 414, as I was seriously considering buying a 414, I was even excited about buying one until the A/B test. I was expecting a huge difference, matched by the difference in price $250 vrs $900, but I didn't hear it. So I passed on the 414....

I know most people on this forum hate the C-1000, but bang for the buck was there on acoustic guitars.

Was the 414 a dud ??? No, the guy who owned it, kept raving about it, and loved it...it sounded okay, but not "great", like I was expecting. Maybe it was just over-hyped, as the C-1000 is over-trashed.