Deception, Salesmanship and Gaming in Stores
Supervij – I don’t like deception, salesmanship, gaming or whatever you want to call it either. It has been a part of the audio hobby at least since I first bought bookshelf loudspeakers as a teenager in the late 1960s. An educated buyer needs to be aware of how he/she may be manipulated in the showroom.
What I wrote about gaming high definition DVD is partly inspired by what I have seen in retail stores lately with a little fill-in-the blank projection. I have not shopped for a high definition DVD player, so some of that part is logical projection based on the general gaming principle of making one product look better than another. What I described is a manner in which this gaming may be done so readers can look for telltale signs.
The part about regular and upscaling DVD players being placed several isles over and out of sight of the high definition DVD players is based on actual observation. The part about there being no displays hooked up to the regular DVD and upscaling DVD players is based on observation. The part about Monster cables being the only cable choice in the store is actual observation. The part about the store only carrying high end HDMI switches for $200 is actual observation. The part about using the best high definition DVDs for demonstration is a logical given. The choice of a high quality HDTV is a logical given.
The hypothetical part is the comparison of high definition DVD to standard TV, using a HDTV with poor standard upscaling, the 1080p optimized seating position and the explanation of why there is no standard DVD and upscaling DVD for comparison.
As far as gaming goes, the auditioning of bookshelf loudspeakers in audio rooms is a good example. Did you ever hear a pair of speakers sound good in one store and bad in another and wonder why? The cursory explanation is that the acoustics are different. That’s actually true but it isn’t just the room acoustics that are different, there is a lot of intentional and possibly accidental gaming going on. I’ve seen a lot of situations where the speaker setup is a large part of the explanation. An audio dealer will push a given speaker or brand because they make more money on that product or product line. They may also have more favorable marketing arrangements with a certain brand. Some also pick up competitor brand speakers that they don’t even sell “just for comparison” and put them in their display for A/B comparison.
First louder generally sounds better so there has to be equal volume levels for a good comparison – this is not always done and more efficient speakers will play louder, thus skewing the comparison. Next there is speaker placement, which all regular Audioholics should know. The speakers being pushed will be set up in optimal room positions while the conpetition will be set up in some sub-optimal position. For subwoofers, optimized room setup has been widely discussed. A subwoofer setting a foot or two away from optimal may sound comparitively crapy. For bookshelf speakers, you need to go back to basic stereo setup. I’ve seen sound rooms with walls full of bookshelf loudspeakers. The speakers above or below ear height put the tweeters off axis vertically and sound comparatively worse than optimal position. If the speakers are facing flat front without proper toe in to the listening position, the placement on the wall forward or back can place tweeter off axis horizontally. Off axis tweeters lose the high end and sound bad in comparison to optimal position. Sub optimal placement also affects the soundstage. When you walk into a sound room and see a 12 foot tall wall of speakers, most of them are going to be in sub-optimal positions and you should be aware of this. I have seen audio stores set up like this. It doesn’t take too long to figure out what the dealer is pushing. About the only thing you can determine is that the brand of speaker being pushed sounds relatively good compared to everything else in the room in that particular setting. You can’t really determine much about the other brands that are set up sub-optimally. So what you really hear in audio stores can be significantly deceiving. The space for optimal speaker placement is not unlimited.
