Where should i begin with this review. I would give this wonderful business a "portal to another dimension" rating if I could. It's a store that Hunter S. Thompson might really enjoy while tripping balls.
Thankfully I read the yelps before agreeing to any "work" being done to my m-audio monitors. But I wish i had before entering this suck hole. Red flags went off immediately. I walked into a episode of Hoarders. Red flag #1,the place is a dump, there is crap everywhere, no organization, and no signs of any system an electronics store should have to fix things. Red flag #2, there was radio static being played out of speakers at a deafening volume the entire time I was there. A seemingly normal stereo repair dude first helped me. I told him "Hey man, I have these monitors, one of the tweeters is blown out, can I have it fixed?" He answered rationally, "Sure, ok, we'll get that looked at". Then out of no where the strangest Asian man in LA came out of the back, and AWESOME, he is the owner. He takes over for the sane employee. I explain that the monitor's tweeter is blown from a video shoot's playback being too loud. The logical response would be "We will look at it, order the part and call you with an estimate.", but this MF'r just lets the crazy out, I mean balls to the walls, bat-shit nuts. Pardon my french here, but when a person who is not in the same dimension mentally as you expects money for service, I get heated! Red flag #3 (the worst one), after explaining the problem, he begins to tell me the physics of stereo audio--or what he believes is the hoax of stereo audio, and how it's incorrect to the human / dog ears. This has nothing to do with my situation, nor do I have the time for a lecture on audio theory. A verbal exchange that should have taken 5 minutes turned into a 25 minute nonsensical rant/lecture that went like this ( I didn't record it, but man I wish i did)...
"So what happens, is speakers should be set at the height of what sound is being recorded, if the conga is this height, your speaker should be this height, and bear with me I'm trying to work on my English(his english is perfect), So if Mariah Carey is 5' 9", she is a really tall woman, I mean really tall, the speaker should be that high right? To complete the experience. I was at home one day and I noticed my Chinese dog was making circles around my speakers, and they are really nice ones. (He then draws a diagram on my receipt right in front of me, the piece of paper I am supposed to use as record of payment). He would just walk in circles around the speakers and I was playing Frank Sinatra right, and why was he walking in circles, who doesn't like Frank right? So I really needed closure on this, why was my chinese dog doing this, and then I thought, the speakers shouldn't be evenly apart, one should be here, and one should be there. right? (he draws more scribble on my receipt) But then I did this (he makes a gesture of putting stereo speakers on top on each other, an act that totally negates the idea of stereo sound and basically shits on every music engineer's mixing/panning) and then the dog stopped walking around and just sat in front of them, Poof! And I thought, that's it! Sounds shouldn't be here or there (gesturing the panning of noises from left to right), so I was thinking I needed closure on this, it's like finishing the pizza, its all like a pizza right?..."
And this went on for what felt like an hour. The whole time radio static is blasting in the background, I guess to heighten the crazy factor in this vortex. I just kept looking at my poor girlfriend like WTF?!?!?!?!??! Just give me the fucking receipt and stop drawing your bullshit on it!!!!! Man I should have just took my shit and ran, but I'm too polite. So after he somehow ends his rant, and we just keep saying "right, yeah, uh huh, sure", I ask if he will call me tomorrow with a status report. This jerk says "NO, you call me". Ok sweet customer service, you seem way too busy here in this worm hole of batshittyness building columns of electro junk to call me, the customer? This dude ruined the rest of my day. To top it off, I do call the next day, and he gives me some BS answer about having to repair multiple things on the speaker and that he needs to see the amp used with it. These are self-powered monitors, no amp required, WTF would an amp have to do with it?!!! AND then he says it will cost 140 bucks. These speakers retail brand new for 300 a pair. So you want me to pay the price of one speaker to replace a tweeter? Get the fuck out of here!!!!!!!
My answer: "I'm coming to get them now" ....click.
My advice, don't ever waste a minute of you life in this heck hole, unless you want to listen to the craziest dude ever drop science on the relationship between Mariah, Chinese dogs, the brown tone, closure, and of course pizza. read more