Poor customer service from Paradigm Electronics

[GMichael]

Well sense this has turned into a car thread, my last car was a 1992 Mazda MX3-GS. Bought it new, drover it hard, sold it with 196K miles still running like new. The Acura I have now has 145K and still going. I've had several GM's Chevy, Old, Pontiac. They were OK. Most I got out of any of them was 130K.

[Eric Z]

Very cool to hear about the positive customer service experiences. I agree that customer service has slipped dramatically in the past 5-7 years- the world is all about making the money up front! I liked the McDo example of the fries- it's pennies to McDonalds, but means tons to the customer. Same with the Tim Horton's experience- the cost of a frickin' bread bowl and chili is next to nothing.

I worked at a large department clothing store in high school and part of the training was, return anything! Even if someone brought in a noticeably worn pair of jeans- return it, or store credit without a receipt- the customers were so darn happy. Did some customers take advantage of it? Of course they did, but a pair of jeans or button down dress shirts once in a while didn't affect their profits too much!

Nice to hear the positive stories of customer service.

[JSE]

Well, hopefully all those people interested in Paradigm "SPEAKER" customer service issues will know to look in the Off-Topic forum? Oy!

JSE

[RGA]

I emailed Paradigm for info on a bass driver for a speaker 13 years old, and their response was they had no idea which driver I should use or what they could supply me.

All I can say is I'm glad it was only a $500 pair of speakers, and that I got 13 years out of them!

Plain and simple, they s@@k when it comes to customer service!

Well like I said before many of these companies are not interested in you or what they sell. OR it may be that the one person you contacted was a chowderhead - I wonder which side of the country paradigm's plant is located at -- I always had a tougher time dealing with people in the Eastern part of the countyr fro some reason.

The strange thing about your situation is that I don't recall Paradigm changing ownership so they should have all the designs of prior models on hand.

My Wharfedale speakers stopped selling in 1993 and the company had been bought and sold twice over the period since. Anyway a couple years back I e-mailed them about my Vanguards. Anyway the guy there sent me in the MAIL from England at their expense the oiginal advertising bochure and the specs of my speakers (photocopied) but not bad. I tried to get the same from Sugden and they were going to charge me 13 GBP or just over $30.00Cdn.

My current speakers keep measurements of all the drivers because all they match by hand and to the computer to very tight tolerance -- so they keep the serial number on file and the measurments of the speaker so if you should poke your finger through the woofer all they need is the serial number and they can tune their woofer so that it will match the driver in the other loudspeaker and they do it for life. Rolls Royce used to do the same thing with their dashboards and other wood trims -- so if half gets wrecked they had the exact cut of wood to match with your wood. this kind of effoprt takes some time and it does get added to the price of the product - but you don;t get the "duh I don;t know what woofer we used in one of our speakers" routine.

[dave123456@mail.com]

I went ahead and got PSB Stratus Minis irrespective of the story because it really was the only story of dissatisfaction with PSB's service I had ever heard--and PSB resolved it well. After all, I had been listening to some very fine speakers by B & W, Dali, Sonus Faber, and others up to four times the price and the Stratus Minis seemed as good as they were and also had an overall balance giving a somewhat more distant perspective which I prefer for most recordings.

I also own the Stratus Mini's, and I also enjoy their dark midrange and mellow ( somewhat cut off) highs. My cd collection has a lot of not so good recordings, lots of pop and rock, so not having everything upfront is a good thing imo. At first I was having a lot of problems with my system, but after some placement and room acoustics changes ive realized these are pretty good speakers. I still havent gotten these speakers to sound exactly how I want them, but im guessing after more work to the room then they will become much more enjoyable.

[Pat D]

I also own the Stratus Mini's, and I also enjoy their dark midrange and mellow ( somewhat cut off) highs. My cd collection has a lot of not so good recordings, lots of pop and rock, so not having everything upfront is a good thing imo. At first I was having a lot of problems with my system, but after some placement and room acoustics changes ive realized these are pretty good speakers. I still havent gotten these speakers to sound exactly how I want them, but im guessing after more work to the room then they will become much more enjoyable.

I particularly was impressed with their smooth performance with massed upper strings, better than most speakers. They sounded very nice on all sorts of music, and still do, whether full orchestra, male and female vocals, mixed chorus, piano, harpsichord, guitar. They really are a first class speaker and seem to have no significant faults, things that one notices while listening to them.

PSB informed me that there has been a minor crossover modification since the review in Stereophile, but I doubt if it changed the highs. In any case, their measurements indicate a very flat response (for a speaker) which declines very gently. The high frequencies are certainly there, but not as prominently as with many.

http://stereophile.com/loudspeakerre...29/index4.html

Yes, the upper treble (triangles, tinkly bells, and so on are not as prominent as with many other good speakers. On some recordings, a somewhat more forward presentation is nice but with others this can sound colored or unnatural. My Quad preamp has its Tilt control rather than conventional bass and treble controls, but I suspect a little touch to the treble control would bring up the extreme highs, if desired for some recordings. Had I wanted a somewhat more forward balance, I could have gotten the B & W 705 (they work well with a subwoofer) or the Paradigm Signature S2 (and might have had I been able to get one in for a direct comparison).

My speakers are placed about 20 inches from the rear wall, which is where the balance with male voices seems best, and about 3 feet from the side walls. The speakers are about 7 feet apart and the center listening position is a bout 9.5 feet from the speakers. They re toed in some but I can still see the "inside" side of the speakers from the center listening position (much as the owners manual suggests!), which seems to give me the smoothest presentation of the massed strings on some recordings. The room set up is a bit peculiar and can't much be helped. The equipment cabinet (open, no glass doors) is on the left side wall but all there is on the right is a large overstuffed chair. A room friendly speaker with a wide and even dispersion, like the Stratus Mini, can take this in stride.

[Eric Z]

i know this isn't the "share your personal car story" section of an automobile forum, but thought i'd share because it goes with what some have talk about before- basic can be better.

my wife's family bought a ford festiva in the mid-80s so all their kids (6 of them) can learn a manual trans and just take short drives to and from work (they paid about $5K for it). it finally died with 280K miles- about 15 years old. the only major repair was the clutch.

talk about getting your money's worth!