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Anybody have any experience with the Counterpoint SA-20 Amplifier. I have heard other models and loved them but I am unfamiliar with this product. I have a chance to purchase a newly refurbished model, by the designer, for around 600 dollars. What do you guys think?
Follow Ups:
When they were new they were excellent units. They went through several model changes. We were a dealer for Counterpoint from 1983 unitl they went out of business (it had nothing to do with reliability issues) and the SA-20 was as reliable as any product. If Mike Elliott has had his hands on it lately it will be a good unit. $600 would be a good price. Email Mike at altavista.com. I will bet he can give you some idea of the condition of the unit
I call them like I see them. I had the units mentioned and they were a friggin headache! IMHO I would never put up that kind of money for an upgrade on a unit that almost burned my house down. Sorry.
I don't have the amp, but I do own his Counterpoint SA3000 preamp. Sounds great, no problems yet. He did the line stage upgrade and I'll have him do the phono stage and power supplies whenever I pay down my credit cards.The only drawback to owning this is that they really should be upgraded/updated by Mike and he ain't cheap. So, you should figure that $600 for the unit plus, over time, another $600-800 investment in the upgrades. Not bad for a keeper, but you need to make that decision.
You can go to Mike's website (altavistaaudio.com) and check out your model and what upgrades he recommends. I'd do that before buying the unit.
Stephen
Counterpoint made some great sounding stuff. I had an SA 20
and a 5.1 Pre. The Amp spent 3 trips to Cal. for repairs. One of the times all the output Trans in the left channel blew and created quite the light show. It's a good thing I didn't leave it on all the time. The Pre was repaired
once. All under warranty. This is in the 2 years I had them. got them fixed and sold them immediately. Certain models had reliabilty issues due to design flaws I was told. I was told by a dealer this was also the cause of their demise. You may want to look into another used unit for the price of $600. Just my opinion
of course.
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