Ascend Questionable Warranty Inquiry Response (1 Viewer)

I would like to relay my correspondence concerning inquiry of warranty coverage of my Ascend CBM-170s. I’ve owned these speakers going on five years and thoroughly enjoyed their quality. I have never owned speakers that produced such an incredible listening experience.

Unfortunately, I have a tendency to more often than not find myself listening in ‘all channel stereo’ mode of my Onkyo TX-SR700.

http://www.onkyousa.com/model.cfm?m=...class=Receiver

I have my Ascends electronically crossed over at 80hz using the Onkyo crossover. I have an Adire Audio Rava taking the low frequency duties.

I say unfortunately because I have recently experienced two blown main drivers in my Ascends (a total of three blown drivers now) while listening in ‘all channel stereo’ at fairly high volume levels. I’m not an expert in home audio by any means, but I wouldn’t expect that these speakers would see enough of a load to blow out the main drivers when they don’t have low frequency duty.

The specs on these speakers show a maximum *continuous* capability of 200 watts:
http://www.ascendacoustics.com/pages...m170specs.html

Peak power of *400 watts* and a frequency response +/- 3db to 53hz. My Onkyo is rated at a maximum of 170 watts per channel and this was the infamous Onkyo that was dogged for not being able to produce even close to that with all channels driven.

Now, I am within warranty coverage, but I felt compelled to be honest about my listening habits when contacting Ascend. I have to say that I am somewhat astonished at the response. The claim is that listening in ‘all channel stereo’ at 85% volume is “not a good idea at all.” I may have even damaged my receiver in doing so. I would contend that 85% of my receiver’s volume in any mode is going to merely supply a portion of whatever power is available. Not necessarily 85% of some arbitrary performance statistic. I fail to see how this is relevant.

So, set me straight you guys. I realize that I may have contributed or been fully responsible for blowing out these speakers. I felt compelled to be honest. I could have just as easily stated that I was watching a movie above reference level when I believed the speakers blew out. Tell me if what the customer service man relays to me in these emails is correct and honest.

Here are a couple of bad photos of the damage. The speaker cones apparently tore? I’ve never seen that before. You can barely see the small tears in these fuzzy photos:

http://img526.imageshack.us/my.php?i...cbm1701dl1.jpg
http://img246.imageshack.us/my.php?i...cbm1702pt1.jpg


My response from Ascend:

Hi Jason,

You are definitely overdriving your receiver. Multi-channel stereo is
full power into every loudspeaker. You must remember, A/V receivers
like yours have only one power supply, so all the amplifier channels in
the receiver are pulling current from the one power supply. 85% of
"available" volume is not a good idea at all. In fact, it would not
surprise me, given the fact that so many woofers are damaged, if the
receiver itself has damage.

Regardless, you will need to send the defective units back to us for
inspection / warranty evaluation etc.

>I suppose that my concern is if sending these to you for inspection
will cost me in shipping more than it might be worth if they turn out to
be determined to be user fault?

Based on what you described, it is doubtful to be considered warranty
repair. Replacement woofers cost $57.60 each. If we do the repairs in
our factory, there will be a 1 hour labor charge of $55 + return
shipping.

>Please let me know if I would be able to return these for inspection of
warranty replacement and what I might need to do to get them to you.

Simply pack them up and ship them to:

Ascend Acoustics, Inc.
Attn: Service
1842 W 169th St. Ste B
Gardena, CA 90247

Please include a printout of this correspondence and your full contact
information.

Take care!


Good Sound To You!
ASCEND ACOUSTICS, INC.

David Fabrikant
www.ascendacoustics.com

t- 310/719-9786
f- 310/388-1500
Please visit our new community at http://forum.ascendacoustics.com

Do you understand what clipping is? No receiver is designed to be operated at max volume. With the volume at 85%, using all channel stereo, you're way past the limit of what that receiver can cleanly deliver into all channels. I'm with Ascend on this one. Damage like that can only be caused by driving the amp into hard clipping or pushing the driver past its excursion limit. I'd say you're SOL and with good reason.

"My Onkyo is rated at a maximum of 170 watts per channel and this was the infamous Onkyo that was dogged for not being able to produce even close to that with all channels driven."

Clipping is when an under-powered receiver/amp is overdriven and "clips" the signal. This clipped signal is what causes the damage. Most speakers are damaged by too little power rather than by too much.

Sounds like you knew your receiver had power issues and drove it very hard anyway.

Well, I asked for a consensus opinion because I wasn’t so sure myself. I think I made that clear. I appreciate your responses. I wouldn’t say that I knew that my receiver had power issues. I never bought into the stories about the Onkyo being underpowered. Again, I still fail to see how 85% of whatever the Onkyo is capable of is pushing it into clipping territory. In my mind it’s producing 85% (or whatever that representation on the dial reflects) of what it IS capable of producing not 85% of some arbitrary number of watts that it can’t reach – as it was reported to be ‘underpowered.’ I still maintain that it sounded clean to that limit, but I could be wrong. I am aware of what clipping is.

I’ve heard the whole thing about you can never have too much power for a speaker and too little is what blows them, but I’m just not buying that either. I’m not convinced that these same speakers left full range on a separate amp with ample power would have reacted differently, but I don’t intend to experiment.

I might be out the money for new drivers, but I’m a little surprised at the seemingly triumphant sounding responses defending Ascend over it. I asked for your responses though. If I am wrong then let it be an example not to follow for future board members. Personally, I’m still suspicious of the construction of the speakers. I believe they should have been able to handle what I threw at them. I may be alone in this.

What are you basing this 85% on? The available volume range on the receiver? If so, that is where you are dead wrong. Turning the volume to 85% of all the way up does not mean you are at 85% of max clean power. The receiver will start clipping long before the volume control gets anywhere close to max.

Another thing to consider is how that receiver handles bass management for all channel stereo mode. Are you certain it directs all bass below 80Hz only to the sub using this mode? It wouldn't surprise me if it sends a full range signal to the speakers as well as bass to the sub. This would drive the receiver's amp into clipping even earlier and make it really easy to fry the woofers if you're not careful.

Almost any reciever will clip long before you get the volume all the way up. What usually happens is the amp cannot deliver enough power (usually the power supply's fault) and instead of having nice sine wave you end up with chopped waveforms somewhere between a sine wave and a square wave. The worse the clipping the flatter the tops of the waves.

Also, what exactly was the failure on the drivers? Overheated coil? Mechanical failure? That can help diagnose the problem.

I also have 170's and man those things can put out a lot of sound. I can't imagine over powering them to the point of damage in any reasonable sized room without destroying your ears. My guess is you are clipping like crazy.

Well, I think that I’ve stated in one of the posts that I’m specifically not certain what 85% of the volume represents. I’m speaking of 85 out of 100 on the volume control. Logically, that is 85% of maximum volume by my reasoning. I can say that it takes nearly 80 or 80% of volume to reach reference level while dialing the system in with Ratshack spl meter and Avia Home Theatre. 85 would be only slightly over reference level.

Listen, I attest that these speakers are terrific and they have been great sports in accommodating my listening habits. I have to admit that I am fully unaware if my receiver’s crossover functions in ‘all stereo mode.’ If that be the case then I would surely be more willing to cut the Ascends a bit more slack for giving out.

I noted the damage in the op. I took photos. I’m not expert in home audio or home theater, but I have the lowly car stereo experience and I’ve never seen the driver material itself ever tear. That’s a new one. You can barely see it in the photos, but you can get some idea.

The Ascends may have earned their keep and then some by this point. I’ll shell out the $200 for new drivers. I like the speakers. Like I said they are the best speakers that I’ve ever owned. Incredible. They took some abuse as well. I suppose that I just thought that being honest with the Ascend customer service might earn a little good will that would result in a break on a repair if found to be user fault. Not being served some lines about how much it was known to be my fault because of what I described and then shot off some ridiculous repair cost figures. $55 an hour to take four screws out and slap a new driver in? Are you kidding me? That’s insulting and their customer service should be admonished for taking that tone.

It cost $70 for an appliance repair person to just step in the door to my house to look at what's wrong. My auto mechanic get $85 an hour.

Ask if those drivers connections are soldered or clips? If clips it would be very easy to do yourself. Just remember to twist gently when removing the drivers so as not to tear the gasket when breaking that seal.

Thanks, you can be sure that I’m not paying $55 an hour to ANYONE to replace a driver in these speakers.

I don't think they are being unreasonable about the labor cost at all, but it is definitely something you can do yourself. I also don't see anything wrong with their "tone" in their response; if it were my company I would have given you the exact same response.

I charge less than Ascend does for billable hours to my customers, but not too much less. Most mechanics charge between $90 and $105/hr. around here. What does $55/hr work out to for 10 minutes of work?

One issue is, most receivers are rated for 2CH operation, so 170w is when driving stereo ONLY. When you drive your system in all channel, you have just distributed the total demand to all your speakers which means your total available for each of those channels just dropped dramatically. One big peak passage and it is all over, as you have already found.

It wasn’t portrayed as billable hours, fanboys. There is no book to refer to for what the hours might possibly be – it was framed in a tone that $55 an hour was to be expected for repairs and that I might expect to pay something in that neighborhood for these repairs. How else might it be read? I would expect that some estimate of labor hours be given if there was any other tone intended.

You know what I believe? I believe that most of you here are ‘in the industry’ in some capacity if not employed by Ascend directly. I can’t begin to imagine that some of you would take such a fanboy stance otherwise.

Basically, in my opinion, Ascend takes a pretty nasty tone when addressing warranty repair inquiry. The majority of you all backing them up doesn’t make their tone any less objectionable to me. You’re inflaming the situation further at this point.

Just let the record reflect how Ascend addresses these issues. For those with less than some vocational degree in home theater – if you have an issue with your Ascend speakers expect that you will be stuck with less than welcoming customer service for either warranty repair or service.

It would take about 5 minutes per speaker, or less, to change out the drivers.

I do not work for, or have anything to do with, Ascend Acoustics. I have heard and respect their products.

No offense, but you don't like how you were treated, despite the fact that you were treated fairly (IMHO) for something that YOU did. Knowingly or unknowingly, doesn't matter at this point, because the damage is done. What exactly was it that you would have liked them to done? Send you new speakers? Send someone to your house to do the repair for free? If you were in their position, what would your response to an issue like this be? In most cases, I've seen the majority of the internet direct companies bend over backwards to take care of their customers.

I had a friend do almost exactly the same thing - damaging two speakers from two different manufacturers. He contacted his dealer and they gave him the same answer. One manufacturer he had to purchase new drivers and the other covered them under warranty (different dealer), despite it being his fault - a bit of good faith on their part. Is that what you expected, especially when you told them how you thought it occurred?

If you got into an accident in your car, would you expect the dealership to say "No problem, we'll replace the damaged parts under warranty."? I'm not trying to pick on you, but let's be realistic.

You're overthinking this.
You blew up your speakers. That voids your warranty. Issue resolved!

Big words and a long thought process will not cover this up.

Interesting subject. How do you know when your receiver is clipping? Granted I hardly ever play 5 channel stereo. I run a Denon 3802 usually in 2 channel stereo.

I own Ascends myself, but I don't hesitate to talk warranty about anything.

It does sound to me like the amp was clipping badly, and damaged the speakers AVRS do NOT deliver what they claim X 5 channels( some are ATROCIOUS LIARS!!!!) at once..
Some are reasonable.....

I have read about how GREAT Ascend was in regards to warranty(ONE of the reasons I purchased them), the reason I stopped in this thread is because I expected another great experience....... sorry that wasn't the case here.
I actually think, considering the circumstances, that Ascend was correct here.

I personally would just get new drivers and install them myself, it'd save money AND time.
It will be fast, and pretty cheap considering the sound quality.

Sorry your unhappy, and the above is JMO.

m

Yeah, but they will also run tests on that speaker, and maybe even run some MM tests on the XO, which will take a bit more time.

Dave and crew test every speaker B4 it leaves, so you can bet on it that they will check to make SURE that when the speaker leaves, it's as good as new.
Probably better due to newer drivers.

You’re not picking on me. You sound like a fanboy. You’re making strawman arguments to exaggerate my position on all of this and in my opinion it makes you look pretty sad. Why are you so passionate about defending Ascend? Surely you have other things to do. I hope.

If I were them I surely wouldn’t take on a tone that exaggerated what labor should likely cost to repair their speakers. There is a huge difference between ‘sending me new speakers’ and being reasonable in servicing your product.

You turn around and make a statement about how a friend had his speakers replaced in the very same situation? Do you generally take medication for this?

I think I’ve been pretty clear that I thought that I would be given some credit for being honest about my listening circumstances. Not be raked over the coals for telling the truth. I might expect since they are under warranty that they might at least cut some slack on the labor costs or something, but surely not try to nail me with $55 for an hours worth of labor on a repair that should take all of 15 minutes for a professional to complete.

Jason,

I am sorry you are not happy with my response to you regarding your warranty inquiry.

I have read and reread it dozens of times now, you asked me specific questions and I answered them for you.

You stated in your email to me, and I quote: "I know that I have played these speakers in all channel mode of my Onkyo TX-SR700 at high volume levels, but believe the signal to have been very clean. I don't believe that I exceeded 85% of available volume at the highest volume level."

First off, volume controls are not linear with regard to power. A level of 85 out of 100 does not mean 85% of available power. Music has wide dynamic range; it is not a steady state signal. Let's say, for example, you turn the volume to 85 and it does represent 85% of available power, what happens when a loud peak in the music occurs, like a loud vocal or an emphasized kick drum? This could easily be instantaneously 12dB louder than the music behind it. Your Onkyo is rated at 100w per channel, all channels driven. According to your logic, at a volume level of 85/100, you are delivering 85 watts continuous. If that were the case, a 12dB peak would demand 4 times the power from your receiver to reproduce. What do you suspect is going to happen when your receiver is asked to deliver an additional 340 watts for each channel, multiplied by 5 channels? It simply can't do it.

The actual "level" on a volume control is there for your reference, it has little representation of how much power is actually being delivered.

Connect a 2 ohm load to the receiver and you can be at full power with the volume control at 1/4. Connect a 16 ohm load; you might not even reach full power with the volume control turned to max.

Another way to think about it would be to equate a volume control to a car's accelerator pedal. In my car, I am going about 60mph with the pedal pushed down about 1/4 of the way -- does this mean that if I push the accelerator all the way down I will go 240mph? (60mph * 4) Well, definitely not in my vehicle at least -- not even close.

Additionally, regarding your receiver as quoted from the manual:

"Stereo: This mode has all the input sound output from the left and right front speakers. The subwoofer is also used for playback."

In other words, you are delivering a full range signal to the loudspeakers -- deep bass and all. This is especially problematic because you are running a subwoofer which is also reproducing the deep bass signals. At these loud levels, the audible mechanical stress of the loudspeaker's woofers trying to keep up with a subwoofer (which they cannot) will not be heard because the output of the subwoofer will mask it. Your speakers could have been asking you in their own way to "Turn It Down" but you would not hear it...

From your email, you then asked me for advice: " I suppose that my concern is if sending these to you for inspection will cost me in shipping more than it might be worth if they turn out to be determined to be user fault?"

I can't make that decision for you, so I quoted you what non-warranty repair would cost so that you could decide if it were worth it or not to send them in for warranty evaluation.

You then seem to have a problem with our 1 hour labor charge I quoted you. So what would be an appropriate labor charge for a woofer replacement? Let’s examine this a bit.

1. Unpack the loudspeaker you send in and initiate paperwork.

2. Since you mentioned high power-levels, we must evaluate (run tests on) the crossover and tweeter for damage.

3. Assuming the crossover and tweeter are OK, we then install a new woofer.

4. Upon installing the new woofer, we then run a full suite of tests and compare the results to when the speaker first left our factory 4.5 years ago.

5. If all is OK, the speaker is then cleaned up and then boxed in new factory packaging. BTW, the packaging for a single CBM-170 (poly bag, inner and outer box, 8 styro inserts) costs us approximately $8.00.

6. We then generate the invoice and shipper...

So I ask you, now that you know what goes into a repair, what would be a reasonable labor charge? Would $20 labor be reasonable to you?

I do agree with you, $55 would be a rather high labor charge for swapping the woofer in one speaker.

However, Jason, we are not discussing one speaker are we? From your email inquiry: "I have two more 'blown' main drivers for a total now of three out of five.

So, we are really discussing fully repairing 3 speakers. Using my above model of $20 for the one speaker, I certainly think $55 is a very reasonable labor charge.

You asked me about warranty and repair costs and I answered, as I have done for countless other Ascend owners over the years who have never taken issue.

What I find most disturbing is that you made no mention to me that you have a problem with the associated costs. You did not email me back and say something like "Hey, I have a problem with the labor charge and I really can't afford it, I love the speakers and want to repair them, what can you do for me?".

Instead, you decide to take your "issues" to a public venue and ask for public opinion. When you don't get the responses you want from very knowledgeable people, you call them "Fanboys" and even go as far to call them Ascend Employees. You have upset me and needlessly insulted the forum members whose opinions you were asking...

Exactly what have you accomplished?

Jason, if you had a problem with the fees I quoted you, your first step should have been to mention this to me. How am I supposed to know that you found the fees unreasonable? I am pleased that you enjoyed your classic CBM-170s for the past 4.5 years, they have held up quite well if you ask me, considering how hard you have pushed them. I want nothing more then for you to continue to enjoy the speakers. If you would have simply ASKED me to waive the labor charge, I would have (as we have done before). Instead, you try to make my company appear like we have done something wrong, which we have not. You end up insulting completely innocent people for absolutely no reason.

Jason, I can let this incident go and we can proceed with repairing your 3 blown speakerss - even waiving the minimal labor charge which you think is absurd (try taking the speakers to a local repair shop and ask what the labor charge will be) but I think you owe a few people in this thread an apology, especially to John Garcia who is widely respected on many of the audio forums. He does not even own our products and your last posts directed towards him are simply over the top and uncalled for.

I look forward to hearing back from you.

You are being way too nice to a jerk that doesn't deserve the time of day at this point.

Regards,

Tony