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Blame the new guy

Paul's Posts — 21 November 2011

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Blame the new guy

Being on the front lines as a manufacturer gives me an interesting perspective most of you reading these posts don’t have.

One of the continuing themes I see, from this bird’s eye view, is the tendency to blame the new guy: regardless of any facts to the contrary.

If we add a new phono preamplifier and the system now has hum, we blame the new piece of gear.  Add a new Power Plant to the system and if something goes wrong, blame the new guy.  Add a new cable and the system sounds bright.  The list is endless.

In many cases folks are right – but in perhaps half the situations, they are wrong.  It’s an interesting phenomena, one that fascinates me.

What happens in many of these situations is we notice something that’s been with us all along, for the first time, when we add a new piece of kit.  This is because we’ve gone from autopilot mode to critical listener mode.

I first noticed this in myself when I got a car back from the body shop.  The rear fender had been bapped pretty badly and it took several weeks of major body work to repair.  When I got the car back, my first reaction was to be hyper critical about how it drove – after all, the best anyone at a body shop can do is get it back to original.  It’ll never be better.  Funny thing is, I noticed that the car pulled to the left consistently.  It hadn’t done that before; take it back.

Turns out they never touched anything in the front and they kindly pointed out the problem (obviously from before) and fixed it anyway.

Point is, I never tested the car before the work.

Next time you get a new piece of kit in your system, take the time to really evaluate its benefits or downfalls – but first – give a critical listen to what you have before you make any changes.

It really helps.

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About Author

Paul McGowan

Paul McGowan is the CEO and co-founder of PS Audio Inc. a Boulder Colorado design and manufacturing company of high-end audio products and services. McGowan has been designing and building high-end products for nearly 40 years. Hobbies include skiing, music, hiking, artisan bread baking, kick boxing and cooking. He lives in Boulder Colorado with his wife Terri and his 4 sons.

(4) Readers Comments

  1. DavidL

    November 21, 2011 at 2:45 am

    I’ve found a good strategy for assessing the effect of components new to my hi-fi system is to put the old component back in the system after having listened extensively to the new component. In several instances this has changed my conclusions as to the relative merits of old and new components.
    David

  2. Gannon

    November 21, 2011 at 3:24 am

    Oh My Gosh, Paul. You’ve got this one right. Most of us are largely unaware of the gradual drift of our alignments over time. I don’t care if it is with our hifis, vehicles, or waistlines.

    But this awakeing goes for tweaking and calibrating, too.

    My worst ISF calibration story…had a fellow roughly an hour and half west of town hire me to setup his 3-gun CRT back in the day. He had it mounted and actually watched it unconverged for a while before I could get to him, his selling dealer could only do the mechanical mounting.

    I got it perfect, the image was one of the best I’d ever seen. He complained after a few days, and in good faith I made the drive out to warranty my work. There was NOTHING wrong, but he rather forcefully accused me of stealing his money and messing up his projector. After THREE more visits, I finally determined his issue.

    I made him a critical video viewer. Gave him the clearest image he’d ever had at home.

    He kept complaining about seeing ‘motion trails’ lingering behind fast motion…something the press (which by then I’d become a very visible part of with the Stereophile group in their Guide to Home Theater) had kept harping about with those horrible early single-chip DLP and LCD projectors. He insisted he had the same problem with his CRT set.

    On that last visit, on my last nerves (and unable to bill for all the damn time driving and babysitting this prima dona), I determined that he WAS able to see the very faint phosphor lag. I finally asked him what HE did for work. Turned out he was one of the lead tenors in the Detroit Opera.

    I asked him if he had perfect pitch. With the air of a trained professional ‘star’, he straightened to his full height and immediately replied, “Of COURSE!”

    I then informed him that his perception was clearly above the average human, and he should go to the nearest big box store to see if any other CRT set showed anything similar…IF he could view ‘em in a darkened room. I also asked him how he reacted to flourescent lighting flicker, and saw some hint of recognition in his eyes.

    After a week or so, he called to sheepishly admit I was right. I never heard from him again.

    Cheers,
    John

  3. ron

    November 21, 2011 at 6:36 am

    Interesting comment. In my own latest experience as an individual upgrades I think what often happens is the new components are out-classing so to speak the existing system. Here I think is where pride gets in the way, I’ve struggled with this exact scenereo for the last 6 months in that with several better pieces in my system they have revealed weakness in the rest of the system. Sometimes if one wants “change/improvement” look at the whole system not individual pieces. No singular component or speaker should be “guaranteed a spot in the roster”

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