AMEK is dead! RIP.

[tony dB]

What's wrong with DIY coffee??? :green: :green: :green:

Had a lot of fun with AMEK stuff in the past,
wouldn't mind in buying some overstock components from servicedept of their distributors.

I'm not sure if the prices will go up immediatly, my guess is that it's going to go DOWN before this "vintage"-hype will start...
Some ppl will be scared that there will be no serviceable parts etc...

What's the price for 2nd hand SSL's these days (they're of course still manufactured). Trends are cheaper for top analog gear. Top-studios are closing monthly, if not faster :sad:

Any-one seen this site?
www.prepal.com nice one, we should send them mails with our wannabuy items, could be an eyeopener for lots of us, innit?

Cheers, :guinness:

Tony

 

[SonsOfThunder]

You guys crack me up! And make me feel a lot better about myself. I often feel bad about being so easily distracted from whatever it is I'm doing. But only here can a thread start at Amek, go thru Starbucks and Walmart, and end up at Evil Dead movies!

My comment about Mr. RN "abandoning" Amek was tongue-in-cheek...sorry i gave no indication of that. It seemed like such a preposterous idea at the time I typed it, I didn't think anyone would take it seriously.

Now...for fun, lets all think about how the rise of Walmart has influenced the fall of Amek. Any theories?

For extra credit, make a trip to Wally-World and see how long it takes to find a non-textile, manufactured item, without a "Made in China" label. CDs are not included! This is a game I love to play with my 8yr old son. He finds it amusing.

Peace!
Charlie

 

[Category 5]

Does "made in Taiwan" count as "made in China"?

Shane

 

[SonsOfThunder]

[quote author="Category 5"]Does "made in Taiwan" count as "made in China"?[/quote] For the purposes of this exercise, sure...but I think you'll be very surprised at the small number of those you'll find in comparison.

The reason I find this so amusing is ALL the $ they spent bragging about "Made in USA" and how many jobs they "created" at small American companies, just a few years ago. HA! They're not bragging about how many jobs they are creating in China!

 

[Scodiddly]

The problem with Wal-Mart is that it's not a sustainable economy. Those low prices are the result of low wages, and eventually the people who work at Wal-Mart become too poor to buy enough stuff to keep even Wal-Mart afloat. What's happening is that money from the community is going to owners outside the community.

 

[NewYorkDave]

[quote author="tubejay"] I think it's helped lift a lot of people out of poverty. [/quote]

Hey, I'm glad your brother-n-law is making a good salary and you can buy cheap Chinese crap for pennies, if that's what makes you happy. But when you step back and look at the big picture, Walmart has helped to drive many Americans into poverty. I cringe when I see working-class folks lining up to buy cheap consumer goods at Walmart; they don't seem to realize that they're contributing to the destruction of their own livelihoods.

The ways in which Walmart is causing damage to our society and our economy have been well-covered elsewhere on the web, so I won't try to enumerate them here.

Nothing personal, Jay, I just have strong feelings on this matter.

 

[tony dB]

ok, but what about AMEK? :green:

 

[Rochey]

exactly what i was thinking...

 

[jrmintz]

They made some nice products, like the Angela and the Tac Scorpion lower cost series, but is anyone really going to miss the 'Big'? The 'Langley'? I worked on a Mozart a couple of times and I found it okay, nothing special.

It's a shame when any company goes under, particularly for the people who will be tossed out of work. Unless I'm missing something I don't see this as the end of an important era in audio.

Hmmm....this sounds very unkind and I don't mean to be that way. It doesn't help our industry to have our options narrowed.

 

[bluebird]

Well the green pre will live on......

 

[SSLtech]

I've installed 4 9098i consoles and helped install a fifth up in Nashville. -They're fantastic.

Rupert worked as a sub-contracted designer for the company.

Just about all of the parts are in the hands of Harman service, who will continue to stock most of the service parts needed to maintain the systems out there.

Other sources are Dave Rochester in Nashville, MikeO'Hara in New York. They have loads of Amek parts.

I used to drive to the Amek factory often, and chatted with Greg Hogan, Nick Franks, and Graham Langley, who was the original designer for the company.

I recently bumped into Graham Langley in Las Vegas at a NAB convention, He's a fantastic bloke.

Rupert has been round for a visit, and I had my pic taken with him in front of the first 9098i that we bought... it was good enough for us to buy several more, and we ripped out a Neve to get one of them in... it kicked the Neve's butt. I measured a 131dB dynamic range at the mix bus output... Never seen any other large console get close to that number... and this one had 160 automated inputs! (noise increases with number of channels hanging on the buss...)

I'm sad to see them go, I remember their old factory at Islington mill, then the new factory -still in Salford- which I visited about 2½ years ago... I take pleasure in the fact that most of the schematics in the 9098 manual have my name in the "drawn by" box.

It's sad, but Neve aren't really Neve any more, SSL are struggling to reposition themselves in the marketplace... Harman have so many darned brands that they can't easily reposition Amek without bumping up against another brand that they own.

Bummer, but probably inevitable.

I raise a glass to Graham, Rupert, and all the others who did such great work.

Keith

 

[SonsOfThunder]

Cool stuff Keith, hats off to you...and condolences as well. Thanks for sharing with us.

Peace!
Charlie

 

[tony dB]

Respect Keith! Lots of :thumb:
I love the 9098i too

Cheers,
and may the dynamic range be with you :sam:

Tony

 

[TomWaterman]

Keith you don't know Ken Clegg do you?

He worked at Amek, as a custom modification designer. I know he was there around the time of the mozart not sure about the 9098i.

Its a real shame - I think their PurePath channel in a box is great. I liked it more then the ISA438 when I heard it....

Cheers Tom

 

[Jonathan Hayward]

Well, I shall hold on to my M2000 in the hope that it appreciates :shock:
It has done me proud over the years and has a good warm sound (even if it does have a good warm noise-floor too) that clients have come back for.

Keith, re. Greg Hogan, didn't realise he was a designer, I have all these addendums (to the A0 schematics) with his name all over them and wondered who he was. Old School.

As for Wal-Mart, any company that advises its own employees on how to claim welfare benefits needs a shake-up to say the least.

Tubejay, I will post you my copy of 'Small is Beautiful' by EF Schumaker if you like; it is subtitled 'Economics as if people mattered', I can't think of a better argument against unfettered capitalism.

 

[SSLtech]

There ended up being 3 "Greg Hogans" at Harman! -Amek, Lexicon and I forget who else had a "Greg Hogan" on the payroll. -It made the First-initial-last-name-@-harman-dot-com" email system very confusing to say the least!

I didn't know Ken Clegg. Of all the top-flight analog consoles in the final days of analog large-frams consoles, the SSL sold the best and was the most powerful, the Neve had the best branding and reputation, but the Amek was the king sonically and in terms of measurable -and audible-performance.

The PurePath stuff is fairly good, but the whole console was -as Kev said (and I'm not sure if he's borrowing my own words on the subject, or merely reaching the same conclusion that I've already given several times before!) the console itself was more than the sum of its parts.

Keith