About The Upgrade Company

Why should you hire The Upgrade Company?

Hire The Upgrade Company only if you want the very best in audio and video.  In general, consumers are unaware of the "For Profit Built" actual condition that characterizes most expensive high end stereo and A/V components.  Far too many high-end audio and video manufacturers, regardless of prestige or retail cost, use cost-cutting techniques and bulk low cost parts to maintain their profitability, especially with costs rising every year.  Top of the line models recommended in audio/video publications still contain an alarming number of generic, low cost capacitors, resistors, op-amps, voltage regulators, diodes and wiring. In short, you’re not getting your money’s worth.  All too frequently, high end products share similar or identical circuit design with entry level models.  This is especially true because just a few companies build the numerous audio and video labels on the market today, The most expensive models typically have an expensive heavy outer case with an expensive remote control and a thick steel bottom plate, adding weight to make a piece feel expensive.

Unless The Upgrade Company has upgraded it, all brands regardless of price or prestige, are manufactured with profits before quality, using low cost generic electronic parts, the cheapest wiring and power supply parts which smear and grain the sound & picture quality, preventing the latest software advances from operating at it's theoretical potential.  This includes the most expensive equipment on the market.  For example, for purposes of maximizing profits, a lot of big name high end audio brands use the bottom of the line Rubycon Elna or Nichicon electrolytic capacitors, not the top of the line or even the middle of the line products.  Examples include McIntosh (all models), Audio Research (all models), Krell (all models), Classe (all models), Mark Levinson (all models), Bryston (all models), Bel Canto (all models), the list goes on and on and on.  There is tremendous performance potential in all high end audio brands.

Hi-Fi salesmen and manufacturers want you to keep buying new equipment.  I don’t blame them—that’s what they are on the sales floor for, but clearly they have no interest in you becoming totally satisfied with what you already own.  That’s not in their interest but it is in yours.  Reviewers and salesman want you to buy whatever they're recommending so they can make a buck instead of making you truly satisfied, because once you like what you have, you'll get off the merry-go-round of buying & selling high end audio and start enjoying yourself listening to music and watching film as if you are there live.

You can trust your own ears and eyes with our 14 Day In Home 100% Buy Back Guarantee.  If you don't like it, return it.

OUR PRIVACY POLICY:  The Upgrade Company LLC does not sell nor distribute customer information.

Our clients love our results.  We're sure that you will too!

Please take a look at our Photo Gallery: http://www.upgradecompany.com/upgrade-company-components/photo-gallery

Top of the line models from the latest magazine recommended manufacturer's contain little if any RFI or EMI shielding inside. This lack of shielding compromises the signal to noise ratio of both analog and digital signals and power supply delivery, which is supposed to be DC zero-hertz, no frequencies or ripple whatsoever on the power supply lines feeding the circuitry.  Unfortunately this is never the case in stock gear even at the higest price levels.  This lack of shielding compromises both the measured and perceived subjective performance even more then the cheap parts do.  The lack of RFI/EMI shielding inside is both measurable and quantifiable. 

Just because you see bright colorful parts in a magazine picture of the inside of a model you're considering, does not mean those parts are expensive or high end at all.  In fact, most of the generic low cost parts are bright and colorful.  Oddly enough that is often how the unit ends up sounding: bright and colored, not smooth and refined with a jet black background.

Increasingly today High-End manufacturer's are employing dirt cheap parts/wiring/design in order to turn a profit and to meet fast paced production demands. 

1. Nearly all major high end audio manufactures today including McIntosh, Esoteric, EMM Labs, Bryston, Wadia, Mark Levinson, Linn, Krell, Marantz, Denon, Integra, B&K etc. unfortunately must rely on automated assembly machines to keep up with production and keep costs down to remain profitable.  Automated machines only install generic electronic parts into the circuit boards, not the high end expensive versions that are "audio grade" which must be installed by a human being by hand.  The automated assembly machines they rely upon and have invested heavily into, only use the same type of parts used in the cheapest CD, DVD, Blu-Ray players, receivers and amplifiers.  This is a fact.  Just look at the photographs below.  The automated assembly machines simply cannot utilize high end audiophile parts in most cases, and the manufacturer's profit margin would be too slim if expensive hand-inserted and hand-soldered parts were installed. This includes the latest big name high end brands.  Open up any one of the latest models and take a look around inside.
2. Many high end brands use cheap unshielded typically skinny aluminum wiring, with push-on aluminum connectors that rapidly corrode instead of gold plated copper contacts or a nice silver-soldered joint with high purity silver/copper/Teflon shielded wiring.  The best wiring and hand soldered connections are almost never found in factory built mass-produced gear.  EMM Labs, McIntosh are two of the biggest skimpers on wiring and proper contacts through out their entire line.  Skinny cheap unshielded wiring with corroded aluminum push-on connectors are used. Denon, Marantz, Onkyo Integra Pioneer Sony and  others do the same thing.  However, we're now after 25+ years of pioneering shielding, starting to see a small amount of shielding being installed at the factory level in some models.  Manufacturer's are aware of the large benefits of foil shielding, but due to the long amount of time it takes to wrap the wiring and flat ribbon type conductors, it is simply not feasible on the production line.

For example, in Esoteric Corp's top of the line transport and dac, the P-01/D-01 series, we can see in the photos that Esoteric took the time and expense to shield only some of the power supply wiring inside the transport, transport power supply and inside the $25,000pr monoblock dacs to prevent the heavy doses of RFI and EMI contamination that occur wherever unshielded wiring is present, wether inside of a component or not. Outside free-air RFI interference and contamination is everywhere these days.  It comes right in on the power cord and interconnects, and right through the top & bottom cover if it is slotted.  Radio and TV stations, any digital clock wether inside the player or outside including alarm clocks, cell phones, computers,  permeate the air with heavy RFI contamination. Other sources of RFI radiation in the home include, pagers, satellite receivers, CD/DVD/Bluray players, home wireless network routers for computers, police & fire  communication radios etc.  RFI cannot be heard directly, it is very high in frequency, however RFI is picked up constantly by any metal wiring anywhere, including your power cords and interconnects and the actual circuits inside your gear.  This RFI contamination robs your system of it's full potential, eliminating black backgrounds, fuzzing up both the sound and picture quality substantially, weakening bass and dynamics, just to name a few of the ill-efffects.  RFI in the power supply drains power supply capacitors, shrinking the available DC power on tap for the circuits to do thier jobs.  We could go on and on in much greater detail.  Unshielded wiring is the single largest source of noise after the parts are upgraded in a high end audio component.  Notice how Esoteric uses non-adhesive aluminum foil shielding over many wiring runs in the P-01/D-01 flagship CD/SACD models, but not in their lower priced models. Some manufacturers will shield 1 or 2 wiring runs but not all due to cost and time constraints. There is so much more performance to be had out of any model with the very best parts throughout, and with properly shielded wiring using adhesive lined foil to prevent vibration and RFI/EMI leakage under the ends.  The ends of the shielding must also be tightly zip-tied shut to prevent RFI and EMI leakage under the foil which measurably defeats the foil and raises S/N ratio and lessens frequency response in analog cables, raises jitter and other errors in digital conductors, and introduces other frequencies of noise into the power supplies that are not supposed to have any noise coming out of them, only zero-hertz DC current to power the circuitry.  Unshielded DC wiring causes power supply ripple as well as RF-band noise to be handed off directly to the DAC chips and analog circuitry making your music.  DC is zero hertz, meaning there is not supposed to be any other frequency on the DC supply lines except stable unvarying amps and volts.  Unfortunately due to EMI and RFI, this is rarely ever achieved unless special attention is given to shield all of the wiring and the voltage regulators themselves.  The effects are immediate, but you have to treat the entire unit, not just part of it, or else the contamination will still pervade.

Whenever you purchase another model wether new or used that's not been upgraded, it is still in it's stock "For Profit Built" condition.  It is severely compromised.  It will be, at best somewhat better then what you had before, but sometimes it's worse, and you'll be stuck with it and later end up selling it at a loss on the used market or take a loss trading it in.  Consumers who've witnessed live A-B comparisons are never satisfied with yet another new or used "For Profit Built" so called "High-End" model the audio press touted.  They are all built "For Profit".   Until you've witnessed a direct side-by-side comparison, you won't really know what you're missing.  This is where our testimonials or live referrals can help you decide. Either way, we back up your purchase with our 100% Buy Back Guarantee.

Our upgrades are the real deal.  You can easily see and hear the improvements right out of the box.  Everything we upgrade will cream it's stock "For Profit Built" version in every way and meet or beat the finest equipment today on the showroom floor or reviewed in a magazine.  100% Buy Back Guaranteed. 

 Other mod shops are limited to parts-only mods or tube additions by law. While they may offer somewhat of an improvement over the stock unit, next to the same unit which we have upgraded, without shielding over the power cord wiring inside and the power supply delivery conductors and the signal conductors, and the parts, they all sound dull, very flat, small and noisy in comparison.  This is because all stock gear and all other modified gear cannot cannot and does not contain any shielding over any of the wiring or conductors, and no shielding over the chipsets or parts themselves.  Consumer electronics manufacturers and our  competitors cannot by law install shielding over wiring or parts at all.