Cavalli shutting its doors

Not sure if this has been posted. Sorry if it has.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/cavalli-audio.862917/

 

Unfortunate but glad to hear he has his priorities in order!

 

Jason at Source AV told me about this a few months ago when I stopped by to inquire about the Cavalli hybrid they had in prototype form at Can Jam SoCal. I had hoped he was full of it but since Jason is friends with Alex, I figured it was probably true. Sad to see Cavalli go. They had lots of interesting products and Alex seemed like a really nice guy and a talented designer. I'm happy to see that his designs will live on at Massdrop.

 

I always enjoyed talking to Alex the few times I had the pleasure of meeting him.

 

Aw man, what if he just did promotions here for free instead of dropping 5 figures minimum each time to bring Cavalli to HF meets around the globe. Cash(flow) rules everything around me. At least he's got a new job at HF

 

I asked Warren about Cavalli at RMAF, and he said he left Cavalli quite a long time ago. I think he said over a year ago. I may have misunderstood him. Warren works for HF now.

 

Strange. Warren was definitely working for Cavalli at 2017 Can Jam SoCal.

 

Sad to see a well-respected player in this niche of our niche go. I've had my eye on one or two of his amps for quite some time.

 

You'll just have to sell more stuff to buy the invariably more expensive Cavalli amps down the line. The good news is you won't lose too much when you sell them two weeks later for your next amp.

 

Alex seems like a good guy so I wish him and his family the best.

I had my eye on their high end amps too but they all seem to be limited runs and hard to find. At least from the brief time I’ve been a part of this hobby.

 

Sad news indeed. Good people have a habit of making a comeback. Wishing Alex great success with the Massdrop initiative!

 

Wow.. wonder what will become of the Liquid Tungsten that has been showcased at some meets.

 

I should find time to finally build me an EHHA. If there's one thing I hate Schiit for, it's the decimation of the DIY scene.

 

That’s a real shame, I always liked the look of Cavalli stuff. It’s just their pricing that put me off.

I expect a new CEO coming in and most likely being more business focused viewed this place a little differently. At best SBAF looks a risky proposition PR-wise. At worst it’s an uncontrollable three-headed beast that’ll savage you on a whim, however much it likes you. From the outside looking in it presents much more like the latter. I’m sure you guys have had many in the industry spitting feathers. SBAF is great for the consumer, but in most cases bad for business.

It’s been nice to see some industry people active here, but my impression is that the ones that do are people who first and foremost care about audio in a wider sense, and aren’t too prissy about their designs or business. (I could be talking out of my ass here as I haven't spent time on other forums to have witnessed other vendors' behaviour).

 

Seeing Warren in one of Tyll's videos, saying he was employed by HF now was telling enough for me...

Question to the group. Do you guys feel less secure buying one of Alex's "legacy" amps now? I've had a crush on his Liquid Crimson for quite sometime. I'm thinking I should let that one go now...

 

Some older Stax amps go for more than their MSRP on eBay, and many are so old, there are no parts to repair them. My guess is this news will only increase the value of these amp, and catapult their status to "unicorns"

 

Talking about myself everything stays the same since the only concern I had remains...having to send it to the US, from Europe, if anything goes wrong..
This (crimson) is one of my amps and I would have to receive an amazing offer to part with. It's my favorite amp, by a good margin, from all of those I've tried. Being able to purchase one was something I never expected to happen to be honest.

If the 230v was already kind of an unicorn before this announcement...

 

Many of you know that I have been a good friend of Alex's since before he developed Cavalli Audio and although this is a sad day for me to see Cavalli Audio close shop, I have no doubt that this is the best decision for Alex to have made at this time. He has struggled to keep CA afloat through numerous challenges and was always willing to sacrifice himself in an effort to do what he believed was the right thing to do. This was not an easy decision for him and I can only support his him for doing so.

It would be highly unlikely that one of his high end amps runs into problems but this is always something to be considerate of. He has established a very reliable service option but it will only be US based (as it would have been if he were still supporting the amps himself, the few attempts at trying to find international service vendors did not fare well)

I am going to work with him to figure out how to keep the DIY projects supported as the details have all been pulled down with the official website.

..dB