Club Musical Fidelity

[superfly]

HELP!!
My MF X AS100 power amp has shut down in one channel. No light, no sound. Any ideas whats wrong before I go opening it up. Is it fixable? Any info will be appreciated.

Thanx. Superfly

[Briz vegas]

One dead channel, hmmmmm !

My Nakamichi did that. When I opened it up it was quite obvious that something had fried - you could smell it - BBQ output stage. Photo attached. This was fixable for 200 aussie dollars thanks to our local friendly tech. My amp is now fine.

This is the time when it is useful to either have 1. a good relationship with a specialist hifi shop or 2. be a member of an audio club with well connected members. Good affordable techs are hard to find.

I have a friend who had not dissimilar problems but it was some specialised switching gear that only the manufacturer made and it had to go back to europe- so his amp was never fixed.

Moral of the story - it is next to impossible to diagnose faults with a simple "it does not work" statement.

Only open it up if it is out of warrantee and even then be careful. Some hifi dealers will still fix stuff purchased from them long after the warrantee has expired so long as you have not opened it up or misused the amp (my amp is 30 years old so opening it up was never going to effect warrantee etc). It all depends on the dealer and manufacturer - some are pretty ordinary.