From tonysounds@yahoo.com Tue Nov 23 12:04:44 2004
Subject:Re: XK-3 with Speakeasy or not (was: Help mail ordering an XK-3)

Nothing hurts but a "try" my friend. The cost of tubes is of course very cheap, and so is certainly worth investigating. As a guy who likes to save money, I can totally get behind your program. If the tubes alone would give me what you must be getting, I can only imagine how much better the Speakeasy would make things.

Have you ever tried one personally? Or do you just discount its efficacy because it costs more than just a tube?

I find it interesting that you answered the civil servant that her competition was cheaper instead of finding out why she was so much more...um....expensive. Maybe there was something to that "paying more=feels better" thing than met the eye? ;-) I figure if you can reduce the price of a preamp to $5 for a tube and get the same satisfaction, I'm pretty sure I can tell you how to save a whole lot of money where that civil servant is concerned!

Happy Holidaze man!
T


jjmcs49 wrote:

There may be magic in the circuit, who knows, and anyone can do what
they want with their money, but for a relatively few bucks, one gets
to try a variety of tubes and pick the tone they like. And keep five
to seven hundred dollars in their pocket. Back in the eighties, a
group of my co-workers and I were in Las Vegas setting up our
company's booth for a business equipment convention. One evening, we
were in the lounge in Caesar's Palace when a young social worker
offered to provide any of us with a civil service. When we commented
that one of her colleagues had graciously offered the same service
earlier for half that price, she explained that when you pay more it
just feels better.

In reading various posts here and elsewhere, it seems that some
people will refuse to purchase a keyboard until they can get it for
1 to 2 hundred dollars below the already discounted price and then
spend $600 - $900 (in the case of the XK-3, ~30% to 40% of the
instruments' cost) to try to make it sound "better". It just seems
preferable (and more fun) to me to experiment a little and put the
savings toward a 2nd Leslie or something.