Fake Products for Real Money...

[Remoteness]

Ah yes; we are experiencing the BIC lighter era within the history of technology.

Disposable technology, but what happens when you need to dispose of it before it's use?

Will we ever get back to quality components that will last the sands of time?

Confidence is low from where I stand!

How about your prospective on this seriously important subject?

[bishopthomas]

It sounds like you have an example in mind. Do tell... What I find amazing is when you try to get something repaired and it costs as much or more than buying a new one. Cell phones are a prime example. Throw it away, buy a brand new one for $50.

Boil those guitar strings, folks! It's only jazz anyway.

[7rojo7]

Parafin oil costs very little as do wicks, torches made for oil and wicks must be cleaned, the oil must be replaced and so must the wicks. now most people would rather but disposable candles in an aluminum container because they don't want to maintain the oil and wick torch. what do you do with all that leftover aluminum, a liter of oil will fill 5 torches and those torches will burn for 12 hours on its ration of oil (parafin), 60 hrs x liter. A candle will burn for 4 hrs. A liter of oil costs 2 candles, wicks cost next to nothing.
The idea of convenience, the lack of curiosity and greed has ruined our lives, iron age feudalism, pomp and priveledge, jet set media driven nightmare
FU
planned obsolescence is an industry standard from the mid 60's. industry watching its ass

[Jim vanBergen]

You mean like my rack of DA-88 and DA-38s, and all my DAT recorders?

[7rojo7]

Maybe not, if they still work
things designed to break or not designed well enough to last and they're consequential marketing and client support

[big country]

or laws seriously fake products for real money ,
I kinda think they need to make sense


I love my sanity

where do I buy candel wax

GILLIGAN'S ISLAND THEORY,
Mr Howell pays Gilligan 10 coconuts to gather 100 coconuts
Mr Howell pays Gilligan 90 coconuts to build all the huts on Gilligan's island
then Mr.Howell charges everyone on the island 3 coconuts a night including Gilligan
to stay in the huts
OK another math equation
if something is actually worth 10 dollars trade , but overvalued at 15 dollars trade
the economic system equates it as 7.50 cents worth of end trade
monetary system of trade
not monetary system of gambling
not a monetary system of loans

[sameal]

thats why i buy vintage. there built like they should be.

[fifthcircle]

Vintage Digital Man!!! That's where its at!

Seriously, though... Steve brings up a great point and it is the exact reason why my gear purchases have slowed down. Too many pieces of gear have been built to a price point and not to last. Some is digital- some is not. In some cases, I'm fine with it because the gear's single purpose is great and it doesn't cost much (I have a Chinese mic, for example, that is an awesome bass and kick drum mic. I don't expect it to last, but I've certainly gotten my money's worth out of it)

Even the high-end stuff has a shelf-life when it comes to repairs. Try sending stuff to Lexicon that cost several thousand dollars new. Sometimes the shelf life isn't because of intent to make something cheap- it is because technology has moved on and nobody sees fit to support the old (when you can have the new).

The gear I've been buying lately has included things like quality mics (ie Schoeps, Sennheiser, etc...), good preamps and other analog gear. This is the stuff I expect to be using 20 years from now and will [hopefully] never have to rebuy. With the quality stuff, it makes my wallet smaller, but long-term, it is fatter as I don't have to rebuy. My investments in my business are largely permanent.

--Ben

[boojum]

Quality is cheaper in the long run. The cheap stuff will work and work fine for a while. Then the little parts start to break or become loose. The unit starts small failures in the field. Failures which can be worked around. They are the prelude to a major disaster. The disaster that leaves one wishing there was a backup.

The extra money paid for quality gear is insurance against these failures and disappointments. And, there is the basic pleasure which comes from working with first class equipment. With good gear you win twice. There is more to the story than the spec sheets.

[sameal]

well, from my perspective, even if my quality products break down and i have to get it fixed by a tech, im still getting that same quality product that i know like the back of my hand back in my enviorment and still probably coming out less then buying something new.

thus far, (knock on wood) everything ive had repaired hasnt needed another repair. maybe im just lucky. i also dont push my gear very hard. it makes me uncomfortable.

if im given a choice id rather buy an old broken product and get it fixed then go with most of the new stuff out there. i dont really trust most of it. theres a few names out there i respect from previous ownership of other products, but not too many. its kinda like making friends, do you want 30 friends you dont know so well or 5 that know like you know like a family member.

also alot of those new products i trust are from old names in the buisness, that never went under and came back as a "reissue" company.

part of this has too do with my ability to repair some problems encountered in the audio electronics field. if its too extensive i need somebody to work on it but if its something not so bad i can do it myself.

[joelpatterson]

Maybe this just happens to the gifted few... but I've had "cheap-esque" new stuff fix itself! To wit: an Alesis 12R rackmount mixer I use for a monitor lost its channel 4. No huge surprise, given the outlandishly extensive feature set you get for $300.

So, I started using one of the stereo ins for listening to 3 & 4 (these are the outs from my HD24), I am almost always setting up stereo pairs anyway. Not even almost always-- absolutely completely always.

I decided to see if I could use the channel for an extra mic pre, when the pre's on the rack are all in use. Where exactly did the flaw lie, exactly? Just because the signal wasn't making it to the L & R bus, maybe it was still at the insert?

Lo & behold... it was working once again! Signal to the main mix bus, like nothing had ever been amiss!

[sameal]

Originally Posted by joelpatterson

Maybe this just happens to the gifted few... but I've had "cheap-esque" new stuff fix itself! To wit: an Alesis 12R rackmount mixer I use for a monitor lost its channel 4. No huge surprise, given the outlandishly extensive feature set you get for $300.

So, I started using one of the stereo ins for listening to 3 & 4 (these are the outs from my HD24), I am almost always setting up stereo pairs anyway. Not even almost always-- absolutely completely always.

I decided to see if I could use the channel for an extra mic pre, when the pre's on the rack are all in use. Where exactly did the flaw lie, exactly? Just because the signal wasn't making it to the L & R bus, maybe it was still at the insert?

Lo & behold... it was working once again! Signal to the main mix bus, like nothing had ever been amiss!

oh, thats the gear fairy. once every year she comes out and "touches" one piece of gear, thus reversing the evil that hast been bestowed upon it.

its in the gear bible.

[joelpatterson]

Well, praise... whoever the patron saint of recording gear is....

[7rojo7]

I absolutely hate it when things fix themselves. leaves me always om the edge...

[sameal]

Originally Posted by 7rojo7

I absolutely hate it when things fix themselves. leaves me always om the edge...

does make me question the dependability of said unit.

[sameal]

Originally Posted by joelpatterson

Well, praise... whoever the patron saint of recording gear is....

its bill putnam. im sure of it.

[joelpatterson]

I thought saints had to always perish in some gruesome way... so I'm wondering if it's Joe Meek?

[sameal]

i need to start praying to ol' joe for my soundcraft 500.

its showing signs of the possessed.

[edwinhurwitz]

I'm experiencing that my Metric Halo units, a 2882 2d +DSP and a ULN-8 are both real products for real money. They hold their value as time goes on and they don't seem like the were built on the premise of make as much cash as possible as quickly as possible.

Just 02c.
Edwin

[7rojo7]

Lots of Shelby Cobras still on the road

[LX3]

Strangely, I have "cheap" preamps that are far better built and designed - at least from a mechanical point of view - than my "expensive" preamps. Although I still only really use the "expensive" ones.

But I try to take each piece of kit on its own merits. There is some good affordable gear around, and some notorious crap at the same price. While it's true that they generally "don't make gear like they used to", it doesn't cost nearly as much as it used to either. And let's not forget, there was some terrible gear back in the early 80s, which is when I started out.

(Brennell. Most Soundcraft 2" tape machines. Most if not all Seck mixers. Most "affordable" mixers for that matter. Emu Emulator I. Premier drums in the late 70s.)

One place I think where you truly seem to get what you pay for is cables, especially snakes. Probably the item most prone to failure, yet in many cases the item most poorly made.

Which is why I make my own cables, almost without exception.

[gareth.h.rees]

Originally Posted by LX3

One place I think where you truly seem to get what you pay for is cables, especially snakes. Probably the item most prone to failure, yet in many cases the item most poorly made.

Which is why I make my own cables, almost without exception.

Indeed! I've bought a fair share of cheap cable, and its not so much that it breaks, but its a bitch to coil properly! I find Thomann's Cordial is okay providing its around 5 meters. Any more and it can get itself in a mess.

I like Sommer, its really nice and flexible - unlike Cordial which is a little plastic-y (though far better than the really cheap stuff). Sommer is more expensive though. Van Damme is also pretty good but more expensive than Sommer.

Apparently, Canford's multicore is pretty good and very reasonably priced, though I've never used it myself.

[LX3]

Originally Posted by gareth.h.rees

Indeed! I've bought a fair share of cheap cable, and its not so much that it breaks, but its a bitch to coil properly!.

I was primarily talking about the standard of the construction and soldering on pre-made snakes. For instance, Studiospares are quite a good company, but you buy their snakes at your peril. Be ready to replace all the XLRs. They're not built by people that understand how to make a snake that will keep working for years. But they are cheap.

I agree, as far as raw cable goes, Sommer excellent, Cordial a bit rubbish, Canford... interesting variety of cable you won't find elsewhere. The big names from the past like Belden, Mogami, Klotz and Canare are nearly impossible to find in the UK these days. Not sure why.

[sameal]

compact disks = disposable.

they last like, a few months at best still in the origional case before they get fubar, the first compact disks and even some of the newest ones get disk-rot and are unplayable, the media players they get played on are good for a few years then they start to not be able to read brand-spanking-new disks no matter how many times you clean both the disk and the eye appropriately. the cases they make for compact disks scratch the shit out of the reading surface......


maybe i just got back luck, but ive gone back to vinyl. screw cd.

[LX3]

My Denon 1420 CD player that I bought in 1989 is still going strong. It had one replacement laser assembly about 9 years ago, (it's true that the laser on these things does have a limited lifespan). But it still sounds beautiful. Working great, even with discs that I bought in the eighties. I think out of my entire CD collection spanning 23 years I have two discs that don't play reliably - and they were unreliable pretty much from the day I got them.

I get a bit nostalgic even looking at pictures of someone else's!

Photo: denon dcd1420 | Denon DCD1420 album | Audiovit | Fotki.com

The Denon also sounds great with CD-Rs that I make now, on a Yamaha CDR-F1 that I bought in 2003. Mind you, that's a CD-RW drive that I think cost about $300 back in the day, for the drive mechanism alone. They certainly don't make 'em like that any more.

I think CD is a good thing. It's modern-day mastering that makes it sound like crap.

[d1rtynyc]

I think that the manufactures look to the customers to be repeat customers. Sell them a cheap product to do "the trick" untill it breaks down, then sell it to them again in a new box.
Also with digital technology standards changing, perhaps they think it will be obsolete soon enough. So built to last doesn't come into play. Example: A prestine ADAT machine is worth $100 now.

[EstateMatt]

you don't think it was a function of what materials were available at what price?

I'm just taking a wild guess here but I bet the companies that made the gear your talking about would have gladly traded their materials for cheaper if they were available.

I hope we go to a place in technology are so disposable that we dont have to worry about being ecological idiots when we throw them out be it 80 years from purchase or two.

[LX3]

I suppose there was a lot more steel used in the 60s-70s and to a degree 80s, and far less plastics. My Dad's old Vortexion reel-to-reel machine!

Is it cheaper to machine small runs of steel components than to set up to injection mold plastic parts?

If so, maybe the "democratization" of the music-making process means that suddenly, music gear has mass-market interest. Which might mean that the economics of mass production can be applied, leading to different manufacturing techniques.

Therefore, more plastics, less steel = lower prices, lower shipping weights...

Not that there's necessarily anything wrong with modern industrial plastics. My old EOS 5D was a moderately high-end camera in it's day, but has essentially a plastic body. But plastics definitely give audio gear a subtly disappointing feel.

[sameal]

maybe i just got the wrong disc player's or something. it seemed no matter what i spent and no matter how i took care of them they just fell apart.

im starting to see these little dots where the backing on the cd's, real manufactured cd's, not cdr's, has peeled. on the older disks ive seen big chunks of the backing peel up. a friend of mines pretty peticular about his cd's being in the origional case, and he had a few that peeled from just sitting in the case.

i might be alone in this.

[boojum]

I've many old CD's, from ~'84 and up and they are fine. I store them vertically, in the shade and a moderate temp range. I've packed them and relocated a few times with them and they still work fine. I might just be lucky, but I do exercise care with the. The same kind of care we used to exercise with LP's.

I am also cheap and do not want to have to replace them.