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Kevin Moll & Jon Ahnen
December 28, 2024

As the year winds to a close, we’d like to thank everyone for supporting Skylabs and helping make 2024 our most successful year ever! 2024 was our first full year with both a retail store in Des Moines, as well as an online store. Your generous support, and that of our entire global community, allowed us to expand both our product offerings and free video content.

Following is a quick look back at some of our highlights for the year:

^{Launched the monthly Skylabs Newsletter including the vintage stereo inventory - Now over 3,100 subscribers}
^{Launched the Skylabs Discord Channel - Now over 1000 subscribers}
^{Reached 89,200 YouTube channel subscribers with over 300 videos now available}
^{Became an authorized dealer for Mobile Fidelity, Advance Paris, Audio Technica, Cambridge Audio, Teac, and Wharfedale}
^{Produced two 2024 YouTube videos that crested the 1 million view threshold - “Most Wanted Vintage Stereo Pieces Today” and “We Used To Love Them! What Changed?”}
^{Designed new Skylabs branded products, including: Pioneer, Sansui, and Crank It Up T-Shirts; Crank-It-Up Hoodies; Premium RCA Audio Cables}

From all of us here at Skylabs, we wish you all a happy and healthy new year!

News from the Bench

As winter has now set in across the U.S., we often get questions about safely keeping vintage equipment in enclosed garage spaces that are not climate controlled. Although climate controled garage space is ideal, we believe that home stereo electronics will fair no worse than car stereo electronics would. More than with your indoor stereo, garage stereos will most likely need more regular cleanings to maintain peak operation. In short don’t deprive yourself (or neighbors) of some good cold weather tunes!

Season changes also remind us of the risks for electrical damage from lightning surges and power outings. We asked our resident technician Rob (pictured above) his opinion on fused power strips vs. uninterrupted power supply (UPS) strips for protecting equipment. Although neither provide guaranteed protection, UPS strips are a far better choice. Why you ask? Rob’s opinion is that UPS strips buffer the stereo equipment from the main electrical current and are always powered directly by a charged battery. The battery, in turn, is charged by the main current. Although direct hit surges could still jump through to your equipment, it remains a better choice for many surge situations than a simple fused power strip. Also, who doesn’t want their tunes to help pass the time during power outages??

We’ve attached a link below to a reasonably priced UPS surge protector on Amazon with 35K reviews and 4.5 stars.

Amazon.com: APC UPS Battery Backup and Surge Protector, 600VA/300 Watts Backup Battery Power Supply, BE600M1 Back-UPS with USB Charger Port : Electronics

Skylabs may receive a small commission from purchases made via this link

amzn.to/4fA4IOL

In general, we are only accepting repairs for receivers, amplifiers, and turntables purchased from Skylabs, or specific units that we had serviced previously.

We will continue to offer deep cleaning and lamp replacement (w/ new LEDs) services, as well as speaker re-foaming. Join our Discord to help find someone in your local market that may offer repair services.

Pre-owned Vintage Inventory

Click the link below to see the latest list of Skylabs’ inventory of pre-owned components. The inventory changes daily, so the product you are interested in may have been sold. Call ahead before making a trip to confirm we still have what you are interested in and confirm its pricing. Also, Skylabs does not ship vintage components.

December Inventory - products_export.pdf

drive.google.com/file/d/1L3WKm8VVjAsU0LI10CexZJOIksOmWqMy/view?usp=drive_link