SeanMG
Member
Two years warranty in the US, Ten (yes 10) in Australia, and so it damn-well should be, for AU$8999 RRP!
It is lead free solder, a huge amount of SMD and the entire unit is run under the control of a CPU. None of this bodes well for a two decade lifespan you suggest or hope for.
The AS-3000 has enough issues in terms of poor low impedance capability (due to not enough SOAR and over aggressive current limiting/current brick-walling) and a S/N that is barely above 1970s levels due to a significant PSU ripple finding its way into the front end, to be anything other than a retro-hipster, cum-baby-boomer nostalgia driven aspirational item in my book.
On my bench (not motivated by advertising or vested interests), it was good. I have 1990s amps that obliterated it at a quarter of the original RRP.
If anyone is actually interested in facts, not 'reviews' driven by people with cards in the game, I ran it alongside 6 amplifiers of a similar spec all over 15 years old and it didn't come close, but then again, I was selling gear when the Yamaha and Pioneer reps would roll in with the latest 'rave' review from our friends at Australian HiFi, usually accompanied by a stack of the latest month's magazine to 'give away' to out best customers. That magazine has always been a joke here.
In the time it would take to run reasonably accurate comparisons between seven amplifiers, one could earn enough to buy the A-S3000.