Paul McGowan writes:
It has always struck me as funny that the holy grail of system setup is for the speakers to disappear. We know our system has reached the pinnacle of success when we can close our eyes and fail to point out the location of each speaker. It seems so counter intuitive to what we are asking the speakers to do.
What’s also interesting is the number of people I meet that are unaware this is the goal and that it’s even possible.
I recall years ago back when Stan and I (The P and the S of PS Audio) sold only phono stages – and we sold them with a 100% money back guarantee: you love them or return them. That’s where the term “your living room is our showroom” came from. During those early days we sold thousands of the little phono stages with a really low return rate.
We got one back with a simple short letter attached: “This phono stage has ruined my system and I am returning it for a full refund. Without it in the system, I can close my eyes and clearly point out the exact location of both my left and right loudspeakers. When I play music through this phono preamplifier, the speaker location disappears and I can no longer pinpoint their location. I paid good money for my loudspeakers and want to hear them.”
We wrote the refund check with great glee.
