Horrible experience with Q Acoustics 2020i

[davedotco]

@ davedotco

What would you do if someone bought a set of speakers from you and now the speakers don't work anymore because the owner didn't treat the speaker like they should be treated (read ; drove them far too loud).

Of course you don't know what the owner did (because most people won't be telling you what they did..........they just want replacement speakers).

How do you handle these kind of situations ?

Did this ever happen when you were a dealer ?

Sure, it would happen ocasionally. We would talk to the customer and try and find out what happened, usually it was pretty obvious and the customer knew exactly what happened. We would always speak to the manufacturer and and get the customer up and running as quickly and as cheaply as possible, for all concerned.

We, as the dealer, would often stand the costs, often with the help of the manufacturer, particularly if we had supplied the complete system.

In most cases the customer understood what had happened, and would be happy to have everything sorted quickly and at minimal or no cost (to them), usually he would amend the way he used the system and very, very occasionally make a change.

It was very rarely a problem, most of our customers were sensible and many more honest than you might think.

On the other hand I can recall one occasion where a chap we knew pretty well and to whom we sold a very decent mid priced system, came in with his pair of ES14, with blown bass units. We were pretty shocked by this, the amplifier we had sold him was totally stable into ES14s and we really did not understand how he had blown them, we were also pretty sure that this was not a party situation.

Anyway, I got rebuilt drivers from Epos and fitted them at my cost (minimal, we had a great relationship with Epos) and offered to take the repaired speakers to the customer and check out his system. The customer was unusually reluctant to let us do that, strange we thought.

It turned out that the chap had replaced his amplifier with a new model that was 'all the rage' and very, very well reviewed despite the fact that we warned against it. Unfortunately (according to the industry buzz) production models were 'not quite the same' as review and demo models and were blowing up speakers all over the country.

We sent him a bill.......

 

[Vladimir]

Which amp was the killer. The suspense is killing me.

 

[davedotco]

Which amp was the killer. The suspense is killing me.

It's a well known Britsh brand that is still in the marketplace. One that I rarely if ever comment on.

Everyone in the industry 'knew' the score, Review samples and some demonstrators sent to key dealers were completely different internally from product supplied to customers, there were photos and eye witness account. This was the amplifier that prompted one reviewer to comment that, after taking a look inside his review sample. "I don't know how they can make it for the price".

Customers returned to their dealers with the phrase, "it doesn't sound like the one in the shop", the dealers quickly found out why and the product was 'revised' very quickly.

I have no evidence to show, so will not be nameing names, but it was well (although quite cautiously) documented at the time.

 

[Vladimir]

I am unaware of this 'scandal' so I have no idea which amp model it might be. It feels like huge chunk of Hi-Fi history is missing in my head. I will never sleep again!

 

[namefail]

Dave look what you've done now, Vlads all discombobulated and comfort eating. :rofl:

 

[Vladimir]

Hi-Fi is stressful dude.

 

[namefail]

You work on the whole Mindfulness thing and I’ll handle the one hand clapping.

 

[gasolin]

Still reading around post 50, so i havn't read everything.

The amp goes only to 100, 80, 60, 40 20,0 NOT 5 or 10

Don't know if the amp can handle 0db without any distortion, but a traditionel amp with a volume *** reaches max volume without distortion at 12' 0clock or 1 depending on the recorded level of the music, but it is actually possible to turn the volume much higher then the point before distortion, sometimes the max level is at 11 'o clock but the volume *** goes to about 5'o clock so more distortion is possible with a traditional amp with a volume *** then a nad d3020.

A nad D3020 (i own one) only goes up to 0db i guess that is max power and it can't go higher so theres less distortion with a Nad D3020 then a tradtional amp with the volume *** all the way, if the nad went higher then 0db it would without any doubt have distortion.

A speaker can often handle more power then it's rated to as long as it is 100% clean watt (no distortion), distortion from a small amp can easily damage a big speaker only by distortion, not because the amp exceds the power limiteds of the speakers

 

[chebby]

It's a well known Britsh brand that is still in the marketplace. One that I rarely if ever comment on.

Audiolab 8000a (original in 1983) ?

 

[davedotco]

It's a well known Britsh brand that is still in the marketplace. One that I rarely if ever comment on.

Audiolab 8000a (original in 1983) ?

No.

As far as I know the 8000a was an honest amplifier though one that I found myself disliking somewhat, primarily due to it's ability to sound both boring and clinical. Not a brand I have ever warmed too since either, though, according to other dealers and some owners I knew, a decent well run organisation.

This is prior to the whole Tag Mclaran fiasco of course. Modern Audiolab is a completely different outfit and part of IAG.