ChrisArmour

Even though I have basically decided on Rotel separates, I just can't shake the notion of buying even higher quality components. So, I have been scouring the internet for premium electronics OEM's. I knew Harman Specialty Group produced several high quality brands, including Proceed. Well, I went to the Proceed website and to my surprise, all that is listed in the products section is discontinued products, everything Proceed makes is discontinued! Does anybody know what happened at Harman? It was my impression that Proceed was a very high quality and respected brand, why would they kill it?http://www.proceedaudio.com

Roger Kaufmann

There were some threads about this a few months back but as I recall the justification was the Proceed line was just getting too close in features and quality to the Mark Levinson line. The decision was made to to drop Proceed and concentrate on the high end, i.e. more profitable Levinson line.

R. Kaufmann
My DVD Profiler Collection

Marty Neudel

Chris,

the Proceed AVP2 (and some other selected Proceed units) is being rewrapped in an m.l. case to be reissued soon (or so ;}).

Marty

Phil A

Madrigal had the doors closed to their Connecticut plant about 3 months or so ago. Everything they had was placed on trailers and moved to Lexicon's (another Harman co.) Massachusetts location. The decision to discontine the Proceed brand name was announced around July. The notice indicated the the AVP2 and HPA series amps would be continued (BPA series amps were discontinued as was the PMDT) as Levinson products (at likely a higher cost). The company (Madrigal) at present is in a learning curve as its employees were let go. They have no new products and are telling dealers about 3 to 4 mos. for new products and any repairs to existing ones.

Madrigal/Proceed made a bunch of marketing blunders over the last few years including marketing things as future proof only to discontinue support for the products, which were not cheap, and did nothing to promote brand loyalty. Their biggest blunder was probably the PMDT (DVD transport) which really killed them. Rather than build everything from scratch on the unit, it was my understanding that they outsourced a portion of the design as they were lacking internal resources. When the unit worked, it was great, but had lots of problems playing certain DVDs. Before closing its doors, I heard that Harman had slashed its advertising budget to virtually nothing and laid off 30% of the Madrigal work force. Several months prior to closing, it is my understanding that they put the president of Lexicon in charge of Madrigal and I guess he was involved in the decision to close the Connecticut plant for good.

So, I would recommend staying away from the PMDT if you are to consider a used piece on Audigon or another website as there is no one to support any software changes that might be needed. I heard a rumor (who knows) that the revamped Levinson AVP2 will be about $2k more for the full-blown version (with 6 channel input). I think the current list is in the mid-$6.5k area. So, if they do in fact start producing new units, getting a used one on Audiogon might turn out to be a bargain if you like the product (e.g. AVP3 or HPA amp).