Dealers and exaggerated treble

Erik,

I haven’t had that particular experience, though I’ve heard plenty of bad sound at dealerships.

I suppose in your cases, the harshness could have been exacerbated by the upstream components or lack of acoustic treatment.

As you well know, many speakers have HF peaks; so do many microphones; and so do MC cartridges. A bad combination could be tough to take.

Mike

When I had my shoppe(early 80’s) in Winter Park, Fl; a customer wondered how my 10", two-ways might sound, compared to the Boston Acoustics, that a local competitor carried. He wondered if he could borrow a pair to take to their location. Came back and said they were terrible. I drove over there(never had, prior) and looked around, finding a graphic EQ, far removed(on another shelf) from the system), but in the tape loop (set to BOOM and SIZZLE . He tried the comparison again, switching off the tape loop, returned and bought a pair of mine, as a kit. Knowledge = power!

Having worked in a Mid Fi store for a period in the late 70s there were all kinds of tricks the salespeople played. 1st of all the salespeople were "spiffed" on certain products management wanted to push. They got payed extra to move these products so of course they made products that were not spiffed sound worse mostly by lowering the treble or hooking the speakers up out of phase not to mention spewing out all kinds of BS. Finally I developed a relationship with the highest of the hi end stores on my area were I can attest none of this crap was done. It was much more fun doing systems that you knew in your heart were the best you could do for the money with the equipment you carried. Then of course there was the equipment you did not carry.......................

In a lot of those cases, the treble was exaggerated, or harsh to me.

ALL of the dealer demos i had recently sounded bad. VERY bad. The problem is dealers dont seem to realise how bad the sound is. They dont seem to know the difference between good and bad sound. I would say a not insignificant number of audiophiles are exactly the same which is why we dont hear many complaints like this.

What speakers were you listening to?

Many of the dealers i went to were selling some of the most expensive speakers on the planet. 

hooking the speakers up out of phase not to mention spewing out
all kinds of BS.

Please explain to me what this is about?

I recently went to an ultra high end store for a demo. It was by apointment so everything had been set up prior to my arrival by the store manager. In other words he must have surely sat down and checked the sound even if briefly. 
When i arrived, i immediately heard and pointed out that the speakers were wired out of phase.
He then corrected the mistake. I was shocked at how this could have happened. 

Either deliberate, or a mistake. Either way its deplorable.