Stereomanuals.com? Legit? Safe?

[Rick]

My experience was not so good. Print quality was good but manual was obviously reproduced from a scan of a photocopy, and some parts listed were not legible. Felt a bit misled after all the claims of high quality reproduction, and pricing to match that claim. Maybe it was an unusual case from what others are saying here. So yes, legit and safe, but i was disappointed.

Smuffer77,

I just ran across your message tonight. Since it has ALWAYS been my guarantee that the delivered item will match the individual item's description, I am much interested in you emailing me at:
rick.stereomanuals@gmail.com
and letting me know who you are and what you purchased. If I have screwed you with some manual that failed to meet it's individually-assigned quality rating, I will do whatever is necessary to make it right.

I have to tell you that I do not appreciate seeing remarks about me such as you made. Reason? I assume that you did not contact me directly with any compliant because if you did, I would have responded as a responsible vendor.

As someone who grew up in a family owned and operated face-to-face retail store, it has always been my philosophy that selling something sight-unseen on the internet is a "less-than-ideal" proposition for the customer and for me as an honest person.

And THAT is why since 2001, I have never accepted a single $ from anybody without first knowing that they have seen an accurate description which includes an individually-assigned quality rating. I am not aware of any other manuals vendor that has done that. The vast majority offer a model number and a price, not even an idea if it is 10 pages or 200 pages.

FYI... 99.999% of the time I do NOT produce any printed manuals from pdf files or other scanned images. 2 or 3 times over the past 15 years I have printed a pdf file for someone but it was by their request. 99.999% of the time, what I ship is produced directly from printed material in my 45 filing cabinets of printed literature. "Some" of them are copies, but most are originals. And for any copies that are going to produce something that is of degraded quality, that "copy" source material is almost always mentioned in the item description along with further details if necessary to explain the deficiency.

2nd FYI... I have NEVER represented that every manual I have is a high quality reproduction. Some (not large numbers) are BAD or possibly very difficult to read, BUT every such item has a description that PLAINLY says that.

3rd FYI... "pricing to match that claim" is NOT a consideration in my pricing. Pricing is based on number of pages only. It takes basically the same amount of processing, materials, and effort to produce a manual of great quality or shitty quality. I have thousands of manuals priced below $10.00 with many items at around $5.00. Generalizations are not a good idea to make about my pricing.

4th FYI... In case some people do not know, a surprising number of original manuals by various manufacturers contain pages or sections of the manual that were basically unreadable because of 2pt font type size or perhaps pale pink voltage values printed on grey backgrounds or other ridiculous designs.

Looking forward to receiving your email.

 

[ferninando]

are the reproductions any good, clear, readable schematics, all orig pgs included in copy? ie: KA7100 Kenwood svc mnl?

 

[whoaru99]

Just saw this post tonight. Since I am not normally in the habit of giving "snarky replies", would you please email me at:
rick.stereomanuals@gmail.com
and let me know approximately when you contacted me so I can see your original email and my reply? If somebody asks me about a pdf file, I answer about a pdf file. If just a general question, I often do not reply about whether I have a pdf file or not. The information on my site about pdf manuals is inquire about "pdf manuals".

Done/sent.

 

[Blue Shadow]

are the reproductions any good, clear, readable schematics, all orig pgs included in copy? ie: KA7100 Kenwood svc mnl?

What exactly are you asking? Rick has said that he provides information about poor quality originals/copies that he would make available in those instances. If you look at the KA-7100 SM on his site you would see what he says about it.

"26 total pages (2 intentionally blank), constructed as the original including 11in x 17in folded /trimmed pullout pages, card stock covers, neatly assembled with 5 staples and fiber reinforced taped spine. Overall quality is Very Good to Excellent."

Since StereoManuals.com seems to be the best purveyor of vintage stereo manuals and with what has been written in this post, his reproductions contain readable schematics and have all original pages. It has been discussed that originals reproductions means large 11x17 pages are 11x17 pages in the repops. None of that second half of schematic is on the next page crap from an online pdf dl.

 

[Rick]

are the reproductions any good, clear, readable schematics, all orig pgs included in copy? ie: KA7100 Kenwood svc mnl?

Ferninandno,

Not trying to sound nasty, but I have no interest in trying to conduct business transactions in an audio forum. Also, AK does not want me or others doing so.

I have around 50 pages of listings for Kenwood. This one has the KA-7100...

http://www.stereomanuals.com/man/rep/kenwood/kenwood_manuals_ka-1000_xx.htm

Please check it, then if you have questions, click the Contact Us link in the top menu and send me an email.

 

[Northwinds]

Rick is great people and he has helped innumerable people with his manuals!!!!!!! The Phoenix Audio Forum endorses him fully!

 

[luvvinvinyl]

Ferninando, fwiw I have purchased manuals from Rick, for all the gear that has passed through my hands. For the ones that have moved on, the buyers were always impressed with the quality of Rick's work. Notwithstanding, I am not a tech. On the other hand, EchoWars is a staunch supporter of Rick's manuals. That was enough to send me there, when I needed a manual. Many of our techs, here, swear by Rick Stout and Stereomanuals.com

http://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/stereomanuals.521627/#post-6794744

 

[Rick]

Ferninando, fwiw I have purchased manuals from Rick, for all the gear that has passed through my hands. For the ones that have moved on, the buyers were always impressed with the quality of Rick's work. Notwithstanding, I am not a tech. On the other hand, EchoWars is a staunch supporter of Rick's manuals. That was enough to send me there, when I needed a manual. Many of our techs, here, swear by Rick Stout and Stereomanuals.com

http://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/stereomanuals.521627/#post-6794744

Thanks Ernie. As admin, it is very nice of you to post that when you clearly did not need to do so. As you personally know, I try my best to stay out of here because it seems so easy for some to get agitated at any manuals vendor.

As an update, I received email from and have replied to whoaru99. While his reason for saying I was snarky to him seemed strange to me, hopefully that issue is put to bed. Hoping to hear from and resolve smurfer77 issues. Then perhaps this thread about whether I'm legit, safe, misleading, snarky, etc. can also be resolved.

 

[luvvinvinyl]

You are welcome, Rick. It is nothing less than what you have earned. I have always been completely satisfied with our transactions, and your work has impressed my buyers.

I appreciate your courtesy.

Thank you.

 

[Blue Shadow]

Rick, To let someone know by an alert that you are mentioning them in a thread, precede the screen name with @ and in @Rick as this notified you.

maybe @smurfer77 will see this and contact you.

 

[goat67]

The manuals I have ordered have met or exceeded my expectations. I will continue to recommend Rick and the manuals and services he provides.

 

[whoaru99]

Rick, To let someone know by an alert that you are mentioning them in a thread, precede the screen name with @ and in @Rick as this notified you.

maybe @smurfer77 will see this and contact you.

FWIW, I received an alert because my post was quoted by Rick, as was smurfer77s.

 

[Blue Shadow]

FWIW, I received an alert because my post was quoted by Rick, as was smurfer77s.

I missed that it was quoted. Another in a long list of errors of mine. Why anyone reads my posts is beyond me. Or something like that.

 

[whoaru99]

No biggie, just thought it worth mentioning I got an alert so smurfer should have received one too. Whether it's acted upon is another matter...or maybe has alerts turned off. Hard to say.

 

[smurfer77]

My experience was not so good. Print quality was good but manual was obviously reproduced from a scan of a photocopy, and some parts listed were not legible. Felt a bit misled after all the claims of high quality reproduction, and pricing to match that claim. Maybe it was an unusual case from what others are saying here. So yes, legit and safe, but i was disappointed.

Hi,

I considered my remarks above very carefully before posting. I still find my comments to be fair and balanced and I stand by them 100%.

I feel I should be free to express my opinions and experience on this forum as long as I do so in a reasonable and fair manner, which I have endeavored to do. In your post as well as your message to me you ask me to identify myself; I am sincerely sorry I will not pass my identify to you, or the specific manual (since that could also identify me as many of the manuals are quite unique/rare) - I know this is disappointing as it would help verify the situation, but I am not obliged to share my identity before (or after) expressing my (IMO) fair and balanced opinions on this forum. That said, I understand how damaging & upsetting untrue comments can be, so I've reread my original post and sorry; I still think it's fair. I recall when I wrote that I held back on additional negative comments regarding 'attitude' in the emails and website as I considered them to be unnecessary and unhelpful, so as to stick to the OPs original question and to show some consideration and kindness towards you, a responsible seller.

Please note that I've even said in my post that (1) maybe my bad experience is not the norm based on other peoples comments and (2) I've also said that I think the site is safe and legit (even if I was personally disappointed with my 1 transaction).

So to summarize for others reading this and thinking of using the site, I reiterate my original stance and comments that my personal experience was disappointing to me (price vs quality of what I got let me down), but that my experience might have been the 'odd one out' and that the site is legit and safe. Look, you can't win them all!

 

[goat67]

I am sincerely sorry I will not pass my identify to you, or the specific manual (since that could also identify me as many of the manuals are quite unique/rare) - I know this is disappointing as it would help verify the situation, but I am not obliged to share my identity before (or after) expressing my (IMO) fair and balanced opinions on this forum.

If I am understanding the reasoning to identifying yourself or the manual it is to correct the listing if it is not representing what you received and to make things right with you.
Also you do not need to identify yourself here in this thread, anyway sorry you were not happy with your purchase. Just curious could you purchase it elsewhere?

 

[totem]

I can see forum anonymity but leaving a vendor with no way to look into the publicly posted issue seems at odds with fair play.

 

[Blue Shadow]

It seems that if you received less than what you expected, the vendor would like to know so that he can check the quality of that product. If you received defective goods, I'm sure they would be replaced. If you received less than usable and that is all that is available, there would probably be some kind of compensation. That Rick wants to know what manual he supplied that did not meet expectations is only expected so that he can either modify his description of the item or replace the item if the quality you received was not what he is capable of from that particular source.

I understand your desire to stay on the sidelines but that will not provide you with satisfaction (something Stereomanuals would most likely want to make happen). They also can't improve their system for your particular purchase without knowing what that purchase was. I can only say that I wish you would reconsider your position to discuss this with Rick outside of the forum for benefit of you, his business and future purchasers of the same product you deem less than equal to your expectations.

 

[JustinasK]

Hello guys, perhaps you know some information regarding stereomanuals.com
Perhaps something has happened to Rick? I am still waiting for the order, it has been already 5 weeks, and Rick is not replying to any emails.
As I understand we have him here as a member @Rick

 

[nj pheonix]

Hasn't been on AK since Jan 31, '21
Hope he's alright