Issue 01 · August 2026 · The Audio Cynic
In this issue
Eight pieces from the bench this issue: the parts cannon, the capacitor problem, a humming receiver that needs a real answer, and why the hi-fi industry quietly hates repair.
Board swapping is often the fastest way to make a repair bill bigger. Component-level work starts by finding the part that actually failed.
Read on the site →A hum is a symptom, not a diagnosis. What it usually means in vintage gear, and how to know whether the repair makes sense before anyone quotes you.
Read on the site →A lot of high-end audio is designed to be thrown away. Not on purpose, mostly. But follow the pattern: potted modules, dealer-only firmware, parts that quietly disappear.
Read on the site →Tj wrote about repair from the bench. I spent decades on the other side of the wall, selling the dream. Nobody sets out to build something unrepairable. It's just that repairability is a line item, and line items get cut.
Read on the site →Repair got framed as a specialist activity you buy access to. The first real bench tool costs about twelve dollars. The actual barriers are information and parts, and those are business decisions.
Read on the site →Electrolytic capacitors age. Here is what that can mean for an amplifier, receiver, DAC, or other older piece of audio gear.
Read on the site →Years around audio support and bench work taught me that a repair is also a trust problem: bring the music back, then explain what happened.
Read on the site →The hardest repair answer is sometimes do not spend the money. A useful decision weighs replacement cost, parts, sentiment, and risk together.
Read on the site →Right to Repair is about whether the device you paid for can remain yours after the first failure, not just a slogan on a poster.
Read on the site →Reply to this email and it lands on Tj's desk. — Tj