Pre-owned Hi-grade Audiophile Equipments

I have always dream of owning equipments made from top notch audio equipment manufacturers, but sad to say, with their prices too expensive to even contemplate of touching one! But for resourceful and patient people like me, going into the pre-owned market is one of the ways to get my hands on one.

Rotel, Classe, Theta and etc are just some brands that I need to sell one of my kidneys for me to even hope of owning one brand new, but with pre-owned the gap to actually taking one home is closer to reality.

This past months was a very lucky time for me, I was able to obtain not one but two pieces of award winning equipments to add to my diy audio project and HT room. They are the Rotel RCD-971 HDCD Player and M&K V125 THX Subwoofer. The Rotel cost $600-700 when it was introduced in 1999, while the M&K cost $1,000 when it was launched into the market in 2001 (not sure about the date). But by getting these pre-owned I only paid for them for a fraction of the original cost. Of course there are substantial risks in buying 2nd hand items, but just like buying anything pre-owed, there are certain rules to remember to make these transactions trouble free.

1. Make sure you buy from a reputable person or source. It helps that some of your friends have bought stuff from them in the past, as they can tell you if the owner knows how to take care of his stuff or not.

2. If buying online, make sure the seller has a high positive feedback rate. This at least will give us a sign that the seller has a lot of satisfied customers.

3. Research on the stuff you will buy, so that when you get the item or is in front of the equipment during audition time, you know what to expect from the item operationally.

But following these rules still won't guarantee 100% risk free transaction, as buying pre-owned equipment is really a mix bag of pros and cons, I don't even know how my own acquisitions will fair since its still too early to tell, but by following these general guidelines, it gives me a sense of insurance knowing that the gears I got are from reliable sources hence has a bigger chance of being in good or even in excellent condition. Here are some pictures of what I got....

Rotel RCD-971 HDCD Player



M&K V125THX Subwoofer

My DIY Audio Project!

I decided not to write about my Canon 1000D camera anymore since the new Canon 500D is out. I will now write about my new DIY Audio Project which came so suddenly and was finished in a short amount of time. I am not an audio person, I enjoy watching movies more, and even if I want to hear music, I don't only listen to it but also watch it via my home theater through all the concert videos that is readily available. So having a dedicated audio set up never cross my mind, until....


The picture above is a pair of bookshelf speakers that I bought from a DIY Master I met in Pinoy DVD, he had a chance to make this speaker that he copied from the specification of ProAc Response 1SC. This British brand is known to sound very natural and neutral, which suits audiophiles just right, but the damn thing costs around $1,700 a pair!!! Luckily with this "clones" I paid roughly 10-12% of the original's cost!!! It was an impulse purchase, I could not believe that it would sound so close to the original. But now, I am left with speakers that I don't need for the moment.

I went back to my favorite place on the Net to ask what's next in this audio journey that I just undertaken. In Pinoy DVD, I was advised to go hybrid with regards to getting my pre-amp and amp source, meaning, the pre-amp front end should be tube based, to get the renowned tube openness, warmness and details, then solid state for the amp end for more efficient power handling. But since the price for admission was a bit steep in going separates, I was lucky that another DIY Master of amps in Pinoy DVD offered to make me a Hybrid Tube Gainclone Integrated Amplifier, with its dual 6922 tubes as its front end and a solid state 75 watts per channel RMS driving power, which is more than enough to power the ProAc "clones".


And to round up the entry level system. I also got some other DIY stuff from some other Pinoy DVD DIYers. From powercords, to interconnects and bi-wire speaker cables. So the only stuff that is not DIY will be my sources. For my Ipod dock, I just utilized our old Teac Ipod dock that sounds terrible on its own, but using it with the set-up not only gave me a dock but also a radio tuner! Then for CD listening, since I ran out of moolah, I resurrected my extra Pioneer DV515 DVD player as my cd playing source, not ideal, but will do for the mean time. But a new dedicated entry level CD player in the near future will help complete the set-up.

I set these all up in our bedroom, and the sound that came out was surprisingly pleasing, mids was very clear and natural, highs was not screeching and bass.... bass was admittedly a mixed bag. For instrumentals, jazz and light rock, bass was just right, but for rock and heavy bass music, I felt bass was lacking. Although we can't expect much from bookshelves, I again admittedly still have to break-in the speakers and my placement was less than ideal (atop my cabinet, 7 feet high). But overall, I am very satisfied, I think with some tweaking, breaking in and new source, the set-up should sound wonderful. The sound of music will never be the same again.