Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Accessories4Less or Refurb Opinions

Hey all - anyone have any experience ordering receivers (or anything else for that matter) from Accessories4Less? They have some sweet deals on refurbished Onkyos. I'm interested in one of the 608s but a bity wary of the whole refurb route.

It's been many years since I hung out here but I always got the best advice from the Axiom forums so I figured I'd check out here first.

I have purchased refurbs directly from shoponkyo with great success.

Since A4L is an authorized refurb reseller, I would expect them to be good, too.

Inspired by some recent changes to the setup of my 706, I spent some time this past weekend reading over the official owners thread over on the AVS forum, and based on the comments posted by other refurb purchasers, I'd have a hard time recommending those bargains. Mostly problems with upscaling and Audyssey setup, though I'm not even halfway through reading all of the posts in the thread.

FWIW, I bought mine new at the tail end of the model year once the bugs had been worked out, and the only problems have been user error.

I've bought cable and the like from them, and CS is very good. They messed up my order, but correct it without any fuss.

Picked up an Onkyo 707 from them, no complaints.

For your info, what you will find in this case is that it would seem primarily Onkyo, is very protective of their Canadian distributor so as a result authorized resellers like A4L don't sell their refurb/recond. product in to Canada or beyond the US in general. Same goes for Amazon, One Call etc. etc. If you don't have a US address to ship to or someone to bring it back for you, you are out of luck.

Last year I purchased a Marantz unit from A4L and it is fine with no issues.

Birdman, I've dealt with both A4L and ShopOnkyo, and my experience with their factory refurbished units has been entirely satisfactory. ShopOnkyo is, of course, their in-house outlet. A4L I'd think would be especially careful in handling those sales so as not to lose their status as a factory authorized refurb dealer. It's been said that the return rate on factory refurbs is lower than on brand-new units. While I haven't seen any statistics on this, I'd be inclined to think it has merit, since the refurb process should include a thorough check.

I must say that the opinions and related experiences with refurbs expressed here, so far at least, are quite encouraging. Personally, I won't be in the market again for some time (hopefully), but I'll keep it mind - especially the shoponkyo route - for when the time comes.

A friend and I both got 805's from ShopOnkyo a couple years ago - completely satisfied.

I've never purchased anything from A4L. But in all of the online discussions I've ever run across, they are the most recommended place to get great deals on refurb'd Onkyo gear. I don't recall ever reading of a bad experience with them. At least, nothing systemic.

If A4L had something I wanted, I wouldn't hesitate to order from them.