You MUST Demo Speakers at Home

Hello again folks,
This is a psot based upon my thoughts when I was doing a demo of the Teac VRDST1 and the D-T1 at Loud and Clear in Glasgow ( Good Guys ) a few months back and I used my own speakers in the demo room.

To demo the CD kit I took along my own speakers,Mordaunt Short Ms 25i Pearl, and used the same Amp as I bought off my mate the same day (Nad C370).

Anyway the point is,They couldn't have sounded more different than they do in my room (4 x4.5m) I took along my own speakers expecting then to sound not too bad in the listening room which I think was about 7.5m wide by 4.5m long, listening position was on the short axis, speakes 3m apart, 15cm from the wall with the source and the amplifier and source on the far left hand side.

Initial listenings revealed no bass what what-so-ever, but the sound was at least very dynamic, especially during the Gladiator soundtrack. (It does bang very hard at 12 O Clock on the NAD).
Now, in my room they sound fine with more than enough bass, subdued midrange, but fine treble response. This was confirmed by substituting my mates Monitor Audio Silver 8is which, curiously had less bass output. (Still mystified) This was done at my house a few weeks later.

I bought my speakers from Richer Sounds without audition for £100 without listening to them, purely based on the reputation of MS speakers for the price.

If I had listened to my speakers in the dealers demo room I think there is no way I would have bought them, because thay sounde so bass light in the listening room, but sound fine in my living room.

I can also see the situation where one might buy speakers that sound super in the demo room, but when you get them home, they sound like "a transistor radio buried in chicken poo", or even a "chicken thats eaten a transistor radio doing a poo".

I don't think I could trust a demo at the dealers anymore, where the room is of significantly different dimensions from my own.

So, I would advise anyone buying speakers to try to demo at home in order to avoid radical differences in sound reproduction. Like I said, I love my speakers to bits, but as heard in that demo room you couldn't have paid me to take them (Weird).

Has anyone bought speakers that sound radically different from the way they did in the demo room, and do you agree that a home demo is important? Nice to hear your thoughts.



Cheers,
Dex

 

or a transistor radio burying poo with a chicken!!

 

I have never, ever had a dealer demonstration that proved to relate to the sound I later got at home.

For this reason I no longer request one

Darren

 

I find them useful for two things. 1) Getting a general feel for a speaker - it lets you get an overall picture of the speaker's major characteristics, as long as you're using reasonably familiar upstream electronics. And 2) Comparing. It's much easier to listen to a handful of speakers side-by-side in a dem room than it is to bring them all home for a dem! And although the absolute performance in your own room won't be very well highlighted, you can at least compare the relative merits of one speaker to the next. That way you can pick out one or two favourites for home dem.

Other than that, not it's not terribly useful, and can be misleading.

Dunc

 

auditioning is for wimps.

 

Totally agree with the 2 points Dunc made, especially point 2 for comparisons if you have a very long not so shortlist of items you wish to compare.

Buying blind isn't so bad if you're going to be buying a well known model from a well known brand, but if you're buying something a bit more obscure you really have to consider the re-sale value in the event that you really don't get on with it.

 

If you're spending any sort of serious money on speakers you MUST insist on a home demo. The room is the speaker enclosure that your speaker enclosures play in.

 

Very true, a speaker is only a relatively small sized box outputing sound (energy) or SPL into a relatively large sized box (the room), and as such variations in characteristicts of both will have very different effects, sound being very dependent on resonant wavelengths or the room.

Only one truth... Big room volume m2= Big power amplifiers and big power handling speakers (Usually floorstanders) if you want realistic SPLs.

Basically, every speaker will sound different in every room.

 

a picture speaks a thousand words

 

Hmm,
I think that lot would sound quite good in my cupboard stacked up in PA stack style with about 5000w of welly behind it.

Or maybe Not.

I'll start another thread with my thoughts on (Nice Hifi lovey dovey sweet stuff or big loud & aggresive kit).