A friend was really mad at herself for purchasing 'faulty' speakers. A few days of owning the speakers and yet they weren't close to how they sounded while she got them tested at the purchasing store.
I tend to think that consumer speakers are often hyped so that anything playing through them sounds good. It is a sales gimmick which doesn't necessarily translating to anyone buying something faulty, IMHO.
gofar99 Messages: 1902 Registered: May 2010 Location: Southern Arizona
Illuminati (5th Degree)
Hi As you friend discovered, speakers in stores are set up to sound good. It is particularly bad with some high price ones. One un-named brand of them (starts with a B) had extensive setups in places like Best Buy for home theater use. Lots of behind the scenes equalization and very precise set up. Once you got them home it was virtually impossible to make them sound that good. Most folks figured it was OK though.
There are some that are quite good. Several brands still try to provide great products. Unfortunately most are not cheap. Specs lie as well. I have seen many with specs like 20HZ to 20KHZ that are horrible. They may respond at those frequencies, but it might be 20db down and useless. Power ratings are also unreliable. I saw one speaker recently that said it could handle 200 watts. Right...it would become incandescent at that power level. If you follow the reviews long enough you can get a feel for brands that are OK. I personally prefer to hear them and preferably on gear that I am familiar with. When I went shopping for the last ones I bought, I took along a pair of power amps, a preamp, cables and my own DVD/CD player. Since I was looking at rather costly speakers I figured that any place that would not let me hear them with my gear, was not going to get my business. There are some companies will let you try speakers in your own home. Beware of return charges and such. If you don't like them then what is their policy on returns.
And couldn't you just take pictures with your cell phone of where the settings are on the system you want to buy? Front and back, and then replicate the settings when you get it home?
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