MarkBass Does Not Support Customer's Right To Repair

Hey everyone.

I want to start off by saying this is not meant to be a bashing video on Markbass, but simply sharing my experience with them. I fully expect to get some degree of hate, bring it on. If you want to have a constructive conversation in the comments I'm down with that too.

It's clear that Markbass does not support the customer's right to repair. They do not believe in the longevity of their products, only profits.

At the end of the day it is no loss to me not being able to own this amplifier, but after my experience with them I would honestly steer clear of any product they make. there's a lot of people out there that enjoy and like the sound of their amplifiers and cabinets, but I care more about the serviceability. When products are built with exotic hard to find one off components, serviceability goes out the window. Amplifiers and bass cabinets all inevitably need some repair work throughout its life.

If fixing a tube amplifier with a microcontroller inside is this difficult to get repaired and obtain repair information on... can you imagine how it will be on class D amplifiers? Many of those amplifiers have one-off proprietary ICs and we're likely only made for that production run of amplifier. Once you can't find replacement components that are not off the shelf you're screwed. ***To be fair I would put the same level of accountability for this issue specifically on most if not all manufacturers doing this.

As I mentioned in the video the Classic 300 tube bass amplifier I was interested in purchasing. given the age of this amplifier and its low production I found it prudent to request schematics and a parts list so that eventually when the amplifier needed service I would not be completely in the dark. For anyone that owns this amplifier already, none of the authorized service centers are capable of repairing this amplifier when it comes to the microcontroller specifically. This is the main brain that runs the amplifier head and without it it's pretty much a brick. The more straightforward repairs like capacitors, resistors, molex connectors, tube sockets, and other common components are still able to be repaired. The power and output transformers are NLA too, and finding aftermarket replacements would be very difficult.

Apparently the diagnostic port on the back used a very old software that's no longer supported on modern operating systems. Okay so what? It's not hard to find an offline Windows XP computer which was the dominant operating system at the time of this amps production to run whatever software they were using I'm thinking.

Schematics and a BOM, AKA a parts list are integral pieces of information when performing repairs on an amplifier or any piece of gear. Given that this amplifier is out of production discontinued I do not see the issue of why any manufacturer wouldn't provide that to the end consumer. I have asked very nicely and have gotten the cold shoulder from the manufacturer and even a few select service centers that do have access to the schematics but refuse to send them to me.

I'm not expecting to get big views on this video, but at least I put it out there in my opinion on Markbass. I thank you goes out to Marcello, he was simply following the policy of his company.

Thank you for watching!