I heard back from the repair shop (Thermal Repair Design). They’ve been in business for 40 years. They were incredibly nice and it’s a mom/pop shop. The wife runs the business and the husband is the head tech. They repair about 50 brands. The wife spent 45 minutes on the phone with me discussing the business and the industry and my amplifier. It appears my op-amps went out and they’re expecting it to be about a 350-400 dollar repair bill since the warranty is out. SPL provides (according to them) a 2 year warranty and then after repairs, a 6 month warranty on parts.
She also said there’s a brand they deal with who recently got sold (wouldn’t name the brand — probably Sound United tho) that can’t get the repair shop parts, so the units have been sitting in the warehouse for 2 years. She said this is pretty common among brands, that they are still having issues getting repair parts and have slashed the warranty periods.
So the head tech husband will call me back and discuss the situation with me in the next couple of days and go over the exact cost of repair. So I’m very happy with them but again, I’d think twice about buying SPL if you’re in the market. SPL did send a new faceplate but to my address instead of the repair shop. So I have to receive the faceplate and 2 day ship it to the repair shop so they can add it. So that’s an additional cost I have to spend.
Either way, I’ll update when I get the thing back or if I hear any interesting information from the head tech guy.