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Amusing Hi-Fi stories

Isobarik said:
I remember going to then my local Richer Sounds in Stockport to buy a Yamaha cassette deck I lived in Newcastle Staffordshire! Paid the money jumped on my motorbike and drove back. Unpacked the thing and noticed all the front was marked,so back on my bike and off I went.
Explained it to the salesman, who replied! You haven't removed the protective plastic film that protects it from scratches!:rolleyes:
He gave me a Richer Sounds mug and a lollipop and off I toddled.
I felt like a right p...k.
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I remember pointing out a loose connector under the bonnet of my car. "I think that might be a problem", I said to the old service bloke.

He just slowly turned and pointed to this diagnostic machine. "We plug that lead into the machine over there", he said.

It is hard to make an exit in fool mode ! :)
 
I'm a bit ashamed to confess this, but a few years ago I used a pair of REL Strata subs in my home cinema system, but had a hankering for a pair of considerably more powerful Velodyne DD18s.

Discussed with SWMBO, who was adamant that any new subs shouldn't project any further out into the room. A quick measure confirmed that the Velodynes were considerably deeper than the RELs, the latter being hard against the walls. Having assured my dearly beloved that the Velodynes would not stick out any further, I spent the next few weeks gradually creeping the RELs out.

Once they'd made the necessary journey I showed her the measurements and, miracle of miracles, the Velodynes stuck out the same amount! I felt quite guilty at the time, but the feeling soon passed...
 
Suffolk Tony said:
....
Once they'd made the necessary journey I showed her the measurements and, miracle of miracles, the Velodynes stuck out the same amount! I felt quite guilty at the time, but the feeling soon passed...
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I love it when a plan comes together. :)

A few years back, I sussed that upgrading a piece of hifi was far less noticeable to SWMBO than replacing it with something completely different.

So..things were changed..and she would occasionally walk past. Different platters; sub platters; belts; bearing and oil; feet; mats; arms.
No reaction at all.

Then the cartridge changed to one with a different colour.

"Is that new?" she asked.

"Yes". (A little guilt on a stylus is no bad thing)
 
For no obvious reason other than she has got used to it, my lovely wife likes the industrial chic of olive naim kit. I have found the exact number of olive boxes doesn't interest her, as long as they all fit on the 5 tier rack, they are just stuff, but everytime something that isn't an olive box appears, all hell breaks loose. She complains about the colour of the LEDs, the colour of the box, the size, the works. So I have snuck up from hicap/72/250 to hicap/72/hicap/NAXO/2x250 without much of a problem, but adding a Beresford DAC on top of the CDP was rejected ... and she hates my Mose Hercules too ... but that stays with some black insulation tape over the (blue) LED!
 
Amusing stories can easily turn into a confessional...so best I stop here, in case it is used as evidence in any future divorce case !
 
nobeone said:
For no obvious reason other than she has got used to it, my lovely wife likes the industrial chic of olive naim kit. I have found the exact number of olive boxes doesn't interest her, as long as they all fit on the 5 tier rack, they are just stuff, but everytime something that isn't an olive box appears, all hell breaks loose. She complains about the colour of the LEDs, the colour of the box, the size, the works. So I have snuck up from hicap/72/250 to hicap/72/hicap/NAXO/2x250 without much of a problem, but adding a Beresford DAC on top of the CDP was rejected ... and she hates my Mose Hercules too ... but that stays with some black insulation tape over the (blue) LED!
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I'm building a Raspberry Pi with IQaudIO Pi-Dac+ into a 3D printed sleeve that is designed to slide into a Naim olive Headline or olive NAPSC sleeve. I also have some scrap olive fascia material from an olive slimline. I may 3D print the sleeve as well and paint it matte, or I may stick it in a Headline/NAPSC sleeve. I'll do a DIY thread when I'm finished!

BTW, I have a Beresford 7510 DAC that I modified to slide into a Naim shoebox sleeve. I even converted the source selector from buttons to a rotary knob and stuck a 3D printed CB tractor wheel knob on it. Might be a good approach for you in the future! :)
 
booja30 said:
BTW, I have a Beresford 7510 DAC that I modified to slide into a Naim shoebox sleeve. I even converted the source selector from buttons to a rotary knob and stuck a 3D printed CB tractor wheel knob on it. Might be a good approach for you in the future! :)
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Yes I saw that one, looks fantastic!
 
'Those look like room heaters, even if they do sound good'

<+6months>

'I like these too. Probably more overall. Oh yes.'

And that is how I finally sold the ESL 57s, and kept Impulse H2 horns - 5cu ft each, vs small flat but wide panel on castors. I didn't then, still don't disagree overall... but no space then to keep allcomers. The pair of Impulse H6s went about then too.




These days I mostly use the ESL989s, because actually in place of the H2s they're 'only a little taller, a bit wider, but so much shallower front -back (100 vs 500mm) so - a v acceptable tradeoff in room, ahem. We get all that other space back ... :)

(Still have/will not sell the H2s, obvs. One day, we'll need both, whereas now, I merely need both)
 
My better half prefers QUAD ESLs to conventional speakers, "Because they hide all the cables on the floor behind them", and, of course, sound good. :) Since she worked for years as a technician in a physics dept she isn't bothered by lots of boxes of kit. She just shares my irritation about the way controls (and their legends) on modern items tend to be invisible and hard to find.
 
Not so much amusing but more embarrassing. Still in my studant days I was delivering some equipment and while I was setting it up the lady of the house asked if I wanted some tea to which I replied yes.

I was most surprised when she came back with not only a mug of tea but a full dinner. I finished of, sat down and started to tuck in. Guess you can see where this is going.

Man of the house walks in and shouts "what the hell are you doing eating my dinner!" . Lucky he saw the funny side of it and got another plate for himself.
 
We were delivering back a large TV from the repair shop and the lady of the house already came over as an awkward customer. "Better be fixed now" or words to that effect. We assured her it was but when I switched it on it was obviously still faulty.

The woman went berserk, thought she would burst a blood vessel, shouting at us. With all the noise a girl, probably the daughter, came in wearing a bathrobe. I would say late teen or early twenties. While her mother was ranting at us she stood behind her and gave me and my partner a full frontal flash.

I was so surprised I stepped back a bit and fell over a small coffee table that had a rather nice chess set on it. As you can imagine it did not end well. Woman went even more berserk and threw us out. By the time we got back to the shop she had been on the phone to the manager three times.
 
Minio said:
I had an audiophile uncle who loved his reel to reel, amp and speaker. Back in the sixties when stereo was the latest thing he refused to go that way.

Stereo is just a gimmick, he said, and carried on listening to one speaker for the rest of his life!
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Well into the 1970's famed swedish HiFi guru Stig Carlsson (Sonab brand of omnis) thought mono was the only true way to reproduce music! Of course many swedish audiphiles in those days thought everything he said was true, so they also listened to mono.
 
zekezebra said:
Not so much amusing but more embarrassing. Still in my studant days I was delivering some equipment and while I was setting it up the lady of the house asked if I wanted some tea to which I replied yes.

I was most surprised when she came back with not only a mug of tea but a full dinner. I finished of, sat down and started to tuck in. Guess you can see where this is going....
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snip

I thought you were going to say that she offered you more than "just a cup of tea", if you catch my drift? Alas these things only tend to happen in the movies :(
But then....

zekezebra said:
....With all the noise a girl, probably the daughter, came in wearing a bathrobe. I would say late teen or early twenties. While her mother was ranting at us she stood behind her and gave me and my partner a full frontal flash....
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Now that's a pretty nice bonus for your troubles :)
 
We were tasked with delivering a rather ancient monochrome TV back from repair. When my partner switched it on the picture was probably as good as it could be considering the age of the set. The company had give the lady a much more modern loaner while her TV was away.

She said that the picture was not very good so my partner leaned over the back of the TV and tweaked the vertical hold so the picture started rolling slowly. He told her to pick a picture that was better! She told him to stop after about five rolls and go back to the one before to compare pictures and decided that this one was the best picture!
 
zekezebra said:
We were tasked with delivering a rather ancient monochrome TV back from repair. When my partner switched it on the picture was probably as good as it could be considering the age of the set. The company had give the lady a much more modern loaner while her TV was away.

She said that the picture was not very good so my partner leaned over the back of the TV and tweaked the vertical hold so the picture started rolling slowly. He told her to pick a picture that was better! She told him to stop after about five rolls and go back to the one before to compare pictures and decided that this one was the best picture!
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You lie, you must be lying! :)
 
Although the shop sold some fairly upmarket Hi Fi the best seller was the dreaded Amstrad stack system. It was made to look like a separate amplifier, tuner and twin cassette decks but this was really a false front to an all in one in a shabby chipboard cabinet.

They were notoriously unreliable so kept our audio engineer very busy, especially trying to get the twin cassettes to run at something like the same speed. This was an almost impossible task and even if he succeeded this would last at best a couple of days!

Well were were delivering one back, that had already been in the workshop several times, to a block of flats and as we got back to the van we heard someone shouting to us from the fifth floor. We could not hear what he was saying but suddenly he launched the whole system off the balcony which duly smashed into many pieces in the road! In retrospect he probably did himself a favour.
 
Dowser said:
You lie, you must be lying! :)
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In this day and age, truth doesn't matter much. I have been told that what makes a teacher truly great is his ability to tell his students plenty of tall tales to make them listen to important stuff always with eyes agog and all ears.
 
zekezebra said:
Although the shop sold some fairly upmarket Hi Fi the best seller was the dreaded Amstrad stack system. It was made to look like a separate amplifier, tuner and twin cassette decks but this was really a false front to an all in one in a shabby chipboard cabinet.

They were notoriously unreliable so kept our audio engineer very busy, especially trying to get the twin cassettes to run at something like the same speed. This was an almost impossible task and even if he succeeded this would last at best a couple of days!

Well were were delivering one back, that had already been in the workshop several times, to a block of flats and as we got back to the van we heard someone shouting to us from the fifth floor. We could not hear what he was saying but suddenly he launched the whole system off the balcony which duly smashed into many pieces in the road! In retrospect he probably did himself a favour.
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This brings back a memory.
Our local audio shop ( now long gone ) employed an engineer named Bill, whom I got to know.
He once told me his worst job was arriving at work on a cold, wet Monday in November to find he
had an Amstrad stack system to repair.
When I see that dreaded Sugar on television I reach for the off button.
Very quickly!
 
Guy had bought the biggest speaker of a particular line -then bi-amped -then went to class A amps. This combination would play (cleanly) way louder than any of us ever wanted to experience (customer told us so and we believed him.) Nonetheless -he continued to blow tweeters-five year warranty-so they didn't cost us anything -but odd? One day his lovely wife comes in without him and hands over six tweeters -we give her six replacements and she gives us some idea why he's blowin stuff up -he likes to tune his harley in the living room while crankin "Born to be Wlid" (of course). Unfortunately that marriage didn't last.
 
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