Rick Stout has done something AMAZING!!!!
- Thread starter laatsch55
- Start date
I find this utterly fascinating. It blows my mind that anybody could so completely misunderstand what was clearly stated and extremely completely explained.
It is NOT 6 thumb drives. It is ONE (meaning... 1) 64GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive /Thumb Drive.
It is NOT 13,000+ distinct, non-duplicated documents.
Last night I had to make a few edits to the Pioneer PDF Library page to correct a few errors. But anyway... This is what it is.
*****************************************
13,150+ Pioneer Model /Items, consisting of...
9475+ Pioneer Model /Items User and/or Service Manuals
5900+ actual Pioneer User and/or Service Manuals PDF manuals /FILES with NEARLY ZERO DUPLICATE FILES
550+ of those Pioneer PDF manuals /FILES are actually 2 to 9 separate manuals /files combined together which adds an additional 925+ actual Pioneer manuals.
6825+ Total actual Pioneer User and/or Service Manuals
PLUS:
550+ Pioneer Sales Brochures, Product Line Catalogs, Ads, Misc Items
PLUS:
3025+ Pioneer Individual Tech Bulletin files
PLUS:
18 Pioneer text files with hundreds and hundreds of Pioneer Tech Site Troubleshooting Repair Tips
PLUS:
80+ Pioneer Tech-Training files
Total Pioneer File Sizes = 34 GigaBytes (approximate)
It is NOT 6 thumb drives. It is ONE (meaning... 1) 64GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive /Thumb Drive.
It is NOT 13,000+ distinct, non-duplicated documents.
Last night I had to make a few edits to the Pioneer PDF Library page to correct a few errors. But anyway... This is what it is.
*****************************************
13,150+ Pioneer Model /Items, consisting of...
9475+ Pioneer Model /Items User and/or Service Manuals
5900+ actual Pioneer User and/or Service Manuals PDF manuals /FILES with NEARLY ZERO DUPLICATE FILES
550+ of those Pioneer PDF manuals /FILES are actually 2 to 9 separate manuals /files combined together which adds an additional 925+ actual Pioneer manuals.
6825+ Total actual Pioneer User and/or Service Manuals
PLUS:
550+ Pioneer Sales Brochures, Product Line Catalogs, Ads, Misc Items
PLUS:
3025+ Pioneer Individual Tech Bulletin files
PLUS:
18 Pioneer text files with hundreds and hundreds of Pioneer Tech Site Troubleshooting Repair Tips
PLUS:
80+ Pioneer Tech-Training files
Total Pioneer File Sizes = 34 GigaBytes (approximate)
Many of the files one can download from HiFi Engine are precisely the same as can be found any number of places. One of the things I was "trying" to explain in my Pioneer PDL Library "novel"... is that MOST of the pdf files from MOST of the major companies were produced BY THOSE COMPANIES.... not HiFi Engine, not Elektrotanya, etc. etc.
The crooked pages and such were errors made by the folks working for Pioneer when they originally scanned their paper manuals. They were mass scanned by machines with tractor feeds and done at high speed. I KNOW this because about 10 years ago, I gained access directly into Pioneer, Sony, Hitachi, Panasonic (and others) authorized technicians service site. At that time (and over months of time), I mass downloaded everything I could find.
Those PRECISE SAME FILES are what you now find all over the internet on many various sites.
HiFi Engine DOES very often do things to the file on the site that is different that other sites. Sometimes it results in some files being easier to read/use and sometimes makes them worse. I will post another message here in this thread that I wrote to one of the yahoo audio groups that will explain the HiFi Engine problems better (as I see it).
The crooked pages and such were errors made by the folks working for Pioneer when they originally scanned their paper manuals. They were mass scanned by machines with tractor feeds and done at high speed. I KNOW this because about 10 years ago, I gained access directly into Pioneer, Sony, Hitachi, Panasonic (and others) authorized technicians service site. At that time (and over months of time), I mass downloaded everything I could find.
Those PRECISE SAME FILES are what you now find all over the internet on many various sites.
HiFi Engine DOES very often do things to the file on the site that is different that other sites. Sometimes it results in some files being easier to read/use and sometimes makes them worse. I will post another message here in this thread that I wrote to one of the yahoo audio groups that will explain the HiFi Engine problems better (as I see it).
StereoManuals.com posted this Pioneer PDF Library page on 8-6-2014…
http://www.stereomanuals.com/man/pdf/pioneer/StereoManuals.com_Pioneer-PDF-Library.txt
Notice was sent to some friends, some techs, some yahoo groups. Mike, the moderator on the vintageclassicaudio yahoo group responded (bottom of this message) about some things and mentioned “quality free service manual downloads” and an example of HiFi Engine having a huge database of manuals, etc. This prompted Rick to respond at length about particular issues regarding HiFi Engine files.
Mike,
I basically agree with your assessment. It’s many things including aging demographics, bad economy (and it's really bad for a lot of folks), less folks interested in vintage audio gear and being satisfied with mp3 files, steaming audio/video on their phones, etc. There are long term trends about many things that is causing huge numbers of folks being satisfied with "good enough" and are not so much interested in Very Good and Excellent. Regarding printed repro manuals. From the beginning in 2001, I did of course want to make money. But also important was the desire to produce something for fans of vintage audio that would really please them. That's still important to me. But due to various factors, it has increasingly become something that looks to be on a downhill slide with little hope of improvement.
The single biggest factor has been the rise of pdf files being fairly easy to find for almost all the "popularly" sold vintage audio models. I completely understand that and do NOT fault people for going for free as opposed to spending any money at all. That is just human nature, particularly in a bad economy. But the result is that I no longer have most sales for printed repro manuals be for the popularly sold equipment. Much of it now is for things that can't be found as a free pdf somewhere, such as an oddball Yorx mini system, a GE clock radio, a Tascam microphone, etc.
******************************
"There are many sites offering quality free service manual downloads.
One example is Hi Fi engine has a huge data base of stereo manuals"
******************************
Generic statements such as above are just fine and dandy for the casual person who wants to find a manual now and then. I mean, free is free and it's tough to justify bitching by anybody who is getting something for free. I would certainly not agree with the statement that most of them are "quality" such as you did. Some are of course, but much more of them are "adequate" at best and almost all are a far cry from what I would call "quality". Many are just horrible.
HOWEVER, the issue I was addressing about the huge Pioneer library I put together was targeted at the person who for whatever reason has the need or the desire to have a very large library of manuals., For that person it's a whole different story. One will almost immediately begin to get very very frustrated in trying to locate the files, get access to them faster than 2 per day, or 15 per day, or on a site that is in a language they can understand, or from a site that requires you to post messages in a forum, make donations, earn "points", upload files according to some upload /download ration, and many other myriad "gates". To acquire a really large library, one might end up spending hundreds or thousands of hours of their time.
Let me tell you some stuff about HiFi Engine. Some reading this may interpret it as bitching and complaining. I DON'T because that's not what is it. The guy who runs it provides a valuable service that benefits a lot of people and it's free. So bitching hardly seems appropriate. I will note that he probably makes more money from Google ads than perhaps 75% of the remaining "manuals vendors" sites are producing.
But here are some facts. First, he does not have a HUGE data base of manuals. The site says he has less than 20,000 "documents". When you look deeper and realize that many many of the Service Manuals are intentionally broken up into separate files, the real total is much much less.
I have half a million files… although I have not done much of anything over the years to distribute them.
It seems like a lot to most people who are casual observers because most of them are for equipment models that sold in large quantities and are the common equipment that most folks have. So it seems like they have "everything". Next, virtually everything there was sent to him by someone instead of locating them himself. So that's an easy thing to do. Next, almost all files are processed in some fashion that usually results in reduced file size and often reduced readability. Sometimes it improves readability. I assume the purpose is often geared toward reducing bandwidth costs for the downloads.
Next, almost all files have the first page being an added advertisement page so you can't see the manual cover. Some have footers added. The vast majority have been PASSWORD LOCKED and have stupid initial view settings that cause your pdf reader program to jump to the middle of your screen whether that is what you want or not and usually some other stupid "zoom" setting so that you can only see a partial page. You can not extract a page, add a page, rearrange pages, fix rotation errors, etc. and there is nothing you can do to fix it unless you have the ability to remove the pass word locking. In addition to that, many of the manuals are intentionally broken up into separate files. I have no idea the thinking behind that unless it's just to make it appear that there is more "documents" being offered. Unless password locking can be removed one can't put the manual back together as designed by the companies. Oh, and one final thing, that is the site that often crops off the bottom of the front cover of some Pioneer manuals so the company information, dates, and copyright information is not visible. Then on his FAQ page, he claims to own the copyrights on all the manuals. Sorry, but that is a crock of shit.
Just before replying to this message, I decided to go to the HiFiEngine Pioneer page and pick a random late 70's receiver service manual. I picked SX-1280. Pioneer made the manual with pages numbered from 1 to 88, plus they added large poster-size schematics. Inside the original manual are pages 81 - 88 which they called "additional manual" although it is printed right into the entire manual.
The HiFiEngine site owner has broken the file up into 3 separate files for no understandable reason. The file called "service manual" abruptly stops at page 40 for no understandable reason. The separate file called "schematics" (but is also PCB and Parts Lists) begins the manual again starting with page 41 and goes to page 80 where it stops again for no understandable reason. The file called "additional" starts again at page 81 and goes to page 89, then the manual’s back cover.
The total size of the 3 "manuals" is about 12MB. Since the 3 files are pass word locked, you can't recombine them. Why would he do that on a consistent and regular basis? The only thing I can figure is like the example I gave in my long Pioneer PDF Library story... Not only do you get the car frame, you also get the body, and the engine, and the wheels... with tires.
So then these various mangled files from his site and many others get picked up and redistributed around on other sites and often with new and different file names. Fairly soon, about all folks can find are these frequently mangled and misnamed files. These are just A FEW of the issues I decided to address for the person who for whatever reason wants a huge Pioneer PDF library.
My Pioneer SX-1280 PDF service manual file is 40.3MB and is one single file and has all pages in order from beginning to end. It is NOT password locked. It has no ridiculous initial page view settings. It is 123 screen pages. It includes extra different page size versions for several of the larger foldout pages. It includes numerous high resolution full-color scanned pages the PCB pages as Pioneer produced it, instead of b/w. It includes additional scan versions, resolutions, and sizes for the various schematics pages. It also includes high resolution scans of the original extra poster-size schematics Pioneer originally delivered with the physical manual.
I decided to make this long post because while free is great, it's often not the best solution... but it very well may be adequate for most average folks.
This has taken a long time to write. I'm tired. I'm outta here.
Best regards,
Rick
http://www.stereomanuals.com
From: vintageclassicstereo@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, August 06, 2014 5:25 PM
Subject: Re: StereoManuals Pioneer PDF Library
There are a few factors regarding service manual sales. The demand for service manuals is down in part do the nation wide service centers closing. There are less people doing service work these days. Many are in other work fields. TV/Electronic services business is very unprofitable and thus shops are closing in massive numbers nation wide here in the USA and I am sure in other parts of the world. Also many owners are retiring and there are no replacement technicians entering the Field.
The second issue.
There are many sites offering quality free service manual downloads.
One example is Hi Fi engine has a huge data base of stereo manuals
That said I have converted my TV shop to vintage audio repair. There is a growing demand for vintage audio repair including stereo receivers and turntables. Console stereo is very popular now with a whole new generation of people into vinyl. So give it time and thing may turn around especially with hard to find manuals.
Mike
Vinatgeclassicstereos Yahoo Groups
http://www.stereomanuals.com/man/pdf/pioneer/StereoManuals.com_Pioneer-PDF-Library.txt
Notice was sent to some friends, some techs, some yahoo groups. Mike, the moderator on the vintageclassicaudio yahoo group responded (bottom of this message) about some things and mentioned “quality free service manual downloads” and an example of HiFi Engine having a huge database of manuals, etc. This prompted Rick to respond at length about particular issues regarding HiFi Engine files.
Mike,
I basically agree with your assessment. It’s many things including aging demographics, bad economy (and it's really bad for a lot of folks), less folks interested in vintage audio gear and being satisfied with mp3 files, steaming audio/video on their phones, etc. There are long term trends about many things that is causing huge numbers of folks being satisfied with "good enough" and are not so much interested in Very Good and Excellent. Regarding printed repro manuals. From the beginning in 2001, I did of course want to make money. But also important was the desire to produce something for fans of vintage audio that would really please them. That's still important to me. But due to various factors, it has increasingly become something that looks to be on a downhill slide with little hope of improvement.
The single biggest factor has been the rise of pdf files being fairly easy to find for almost all the "popularly" sold vintage audio models. I completely understand that and do NOT fault people for going for free as opposed to spending any money at all. That is just human nature, particularly in a bad economy. But the result is that I no longer have most sales for printed repro manuals be for the popularly sold equipment. Much of it now is for things that can't be found as a free pdf somewhere, such as an oddball Yorx mini system, a GE clock radio, a Tascam microphone, etc.
******************************
"There are many sites offering quality free service manual downloads.
One example is Hi Fi engine has a huge data base of stereo manuals"
******************************
Generic statements such as above are just fine and dandy for the casual person who wants to find a manual now and then. I mean, free is free and it's tough to justify bitching by anybody who is getting something for free. I would certainly not agree with the statement that most of them are "quality" such as you did. Some are of course, but much more of them are "adequate" at best and almost all are a far cry from what I would call "quality". Many are just horrible.
HOWEVER, the issue I was addressing about the huge Pioneer library I put together was targeted at the person who for whatever reason has the need or the desire to have a very large library of manuals., For that person it's a whole different story. One will almost immediately begin to get very very frustrated in trying to locate the files, get access to them faster than 2 per day, or 15 per day, or on a site that is in a language they can understand, or from a site that requires you to post messages in a forum, make donations, earn "points", upload files according to some upload /download ration, and many other myriad "gates". To acquire a really large library, one might end up spending hundreds or thousands of hours of their time.
Let me tell you some stuff about HiFi Engine. Some reading this may interpret it as bitching and complaining. I DON'T because that's not what is it. The guy who runs it provides a valuable service that benefits a lot of people and it's free. So bitching hardly seems appropriate. I will note that he probably makes more money from Google ads than perhaps 75% of the remaining "manuals vendors" sites are producing.
But here are some facts. First, he does not have a HUGE data base of manuals. The site says he has less than 20,000 "documents". When you look deeper and realize that many many of the Service Manuals are intentionally broken up into separate files, the real total is much much less.
I have half a million files… although I have not done much of anything over the years to distribute them.
It seems like a lot to most people who are casual observers because most of them are for equipment models that sold in large quantities and are the common equipment that most folks have. So it seems like they have "everything". Next, virtually everything there was sent to him by someone instead of locating them himself. So that's an easy thing to do. Next, almost all files are processed in some fashion that usually results in reduced file size and often reduced readability. Sometimes it improves readability. I assume the purpose is often geared toward reducing bandwidth costs for the downloads.
Next, almost all files have the first page being an added advertisement page so you can't see the manual cover. Some have footers added. The vast majority have been PASSWORD LOCKED and have stupid initial view settings that cause your pdf reader program to jump to the middle of your screen whether that is what you want or not and usually some other stupid "zoom" setting so that you can only see a partial page. You can not extract a page, add a page, rearrange pages, fix rotation errors, etc. and there is nothing you can do to fix it unless you have the ability to remove the pass word locking. In addition to that, many of the manuals are intentionally broken up into separate files. I have no idea the thinking behind that unless it's just to make it appear that there is more "documents" being offered. Unless password locking can be removed one can't put the manual back together as designed by the companies. Oh, and one final thing, that is the site that often crops off the bottom of the front cover of some Pioneer manuals so the company information, dates, and copyright information is not visible. Then on his FAQ page, he claims to own the copyrights on all the manuals. Sorry, but that is a crock of shit.
Just before replying to this message, I decided to go to the HiFiEngine Pioneer page and pick a random late 70's receiver service manual. I picked SX-1280. Pioneer made the manual with pages numbered from 1 to 88, plus they added large poster-size schematics. Inside the original manual are pages 81 - 88 which they called "additional manual" although it is printed right into the entire manual.
The HiFiEngine site owner has broken the file up into 3 separate files for no understandable reason. The file called "service manual" abruptly stops at page 40 for no understandable reason. The separate file called "schematics" (but is also PCB and Parts Lists) begins the manual again starting with page 41 and goes to page 80 where it stops again for no understandable reason. The file called "additional" starts again at page 81 and goes to page 89, then the manual’s back cover.
The total size of the 3 "manuals" is about 12MB. Since the 3 files are pass word locked, you can't recombine them. Why would he do that on a consistent and regular basis? The only thing I can figure is like the example I gave in my long Pioneer PDF Library story... Not only do you get the car frame, you also get the body, and the engine, and the wheels... with tires.
So then these various mangled files from his site and many others get picked up and redistributed around on other sites and often with new and different file names. Fairly soon, about all folks can find are these frequently mangled and misnamed files. These are just A FEW of the issues I decided to address for the person who for whatever reason wants a huge Pioneer PDF library.
My Pioneer SX-1280 PDF service manual file is 40.3MB and is one single file and has all pages in order from beginning to end. It is NOT password locked. It has no ridiculous initial page view settings. It is 123 screen pages. It includes extra different page size versions for several of the larger foldout pages. It includes numerous high resolution full-color scanned pages the PCB pages as Pioneer produced it, instead of b/w. It includes additional scan versions, resolutions, and sizes for the various schematics pages. It also includes high resolution scans of the original extra poster-size schematics Pioneer originally delivered with the physical manual.
I decided to make this long post because while free is great, it's often not the best solution... but it very well may be adequate for most average folks.
This has taken a long time to write. I'm tired. I'm outta here.
Best regards,
Rick
http://www.stereomanuals.com
From: vintageclassicstereo@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, August 06, 2014 5:25 PM
Subject: Re: StereoManuals Pioneer PDF Library
There are a few factors regarding service manual sales. The demand for service manuals is down in part do the nation wide service centers closing. There are less people doing service work these days. Many are in other work fields. TV/Electronic services business is very unprofitable and thus shops are closing in massive numbers nation wide here in the USA and I am sure in other parts of the world. Also many owners are retiring and there are no replacement technicians entering the Field.
The second issue.
There are many sites offering quality free service manual downloads.
One example is Hi Fi engine has a huge data base of stereo manuals
That said I have converted my TV shop to vintage audio repair. There is a growing demand for vintage audio repair including stereo receivers and turntables. Console stereo is very popular now with a whole new generation of people into vinyl. So give it time and thing may turn around especially with hard to find manuals.
Mike
Vinatgeclassicstereos Yahoo Groups
Last edited:
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- Joined
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- Messages
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- Tagline
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- Joined
- Jan 14, 2011
- Messages
- 74,244
- Location
- Gillette, Wyo.
- Tagline
- Halfbiass...Electron Herder and Backass Woof
NOT trying to sound nasty... "could be" isn't in the equation. But I'm sure that your impression is the same that is believed by most folks. i.e. some nice guy scanning their paper manual and sharing it with the world. Yes that certainly does happen and it is a great thing for them to have done it.
But the simple truth is that the vast majority of the files that can be found for the major companies were produced by the companies themselves. Pulling a figure out of my ass... I'd say that of all the Pioneer pdf files that you can find anywhere in the world... probably 95% were produced by Pioneer.
As an aside, if whatever you uploaded was better than what I may have already had, or they had some portions that were better, then "your work" is probably incorporated into my files.
But the simple truth is that the vast majority of the files that can be found for the major companies were produced by the companies themselves. Pulling a figure out of my ass... I'd say that of all the Pioneer pdf files that you can find anywhere in the world... probably 95% were produced by Pioneer.
As an aside, if whatever you uploaded was better than what I may have already had, or they had some portions that were better, then "your work" is probably incorporated into my files.
I have to add my three cents here as an experienced service technician.
I have downloaded manuals on Hi Fi Crengengine but if you say a negative word about their junk scans made by obvious morons their answer is to kick you off.
Well after a couple of tries they got me pissed and it is war.
Yes, they are free but if you are going to do the job at least do it somewhat right- they are a lot of times total crap.
Stereomanuals has always provided me with outstanding manuals and I will be the last customer. I do not want to see that place go away and I have often directed people to get manuals from that site.
The problem is now the World is filling with Boneheads and I see this evidence every day as I see messed up machines from all directions- you never know what kind of crap you are going to get in when you might think it is a simple fix. I get tricked often.
At least when you order a manual from Rick at Stereomanuals you are assured that you will get the right and quality product to work with. Only guys like me can truly appreciate that. Yes there are lots of Boneheads that think they can work on a tape deck- let them pass my tests to see.
The one thing I can say is LONG LIVE STEREOMANUALS.COM
I have downloaded manuals on Hi Fi Crengengine but if you say a negative word about their junk scans made by obvious morons their answer is to kick you off.
Well after a couple of tries they got me pissed and it is war.
Yes, they are free but if you are going to do the job at least do it somewhat right- they are a lot of times total crap.
Stereomanuals has always provided me with outstanding manuals and I will be the last customer. I do not want to see that place go away and I have often directed people to get manuals from that site.
The problem is now the World is filling with Boneheads and I see this evidence every day as I see messed up machines from all directions- you never know what kind of crap you are going to get in when you might think it is a simple fix. I get tricked often.
At least when you order a manual from Rick at Stereomanuals you are assured that you will get the right and quality product to work with. Only guys like me can truly appreciate that. Yes there are lots of Boneheads that think they can work on a tape deck- let them pass my tests to see.
The one thing I can say is LONG LIVE STEREOMANUALS.COM
Have you looked at the scans of some of this stuff as in Pdf files? Hi Fi Engine is a perfect example of how not to scan a manual and say you have it there when you can not even read the component numbers or values. It is total crap and not worth the time to download it not to mention their stupid first page on manuals. If you complain about their manuals instead of getting a good scan they kick you off. This again is a perfect example of running a business improperly.
I rather get my manuals on clear paper and forget the free load junk they shovel out. I get my manuals from Stereomanuals.
I rather get my manuals on clear paper and forget the free load junk they shovel out. I get my manuals from Stereomanuals.