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Two in a week;
#1. Customer has a Taylor guitar. A local guitar tech replaced the OEM socket with a Switchcraft unit and soldered it to the output PCB. Except the battery -ve was connected directly to ground, meaning it was switched on all the time and ran the battery down in under 2 days. The hot preamp output was connected to ring, and the tip grounded. So no output possible. Except, the owner claimed to have done two gigs with the guitar like it was, then it suddenly stopped working. I suggested maybe it could have worked if the plug was inserted just enough to engage with the socket 'ring' connection, but he said no, it was plugged in all the way and worked fine.
#2. A desk fault burnt out the ground tracks on a Sansamp RB1 rackmount preamp, used with an SVT4 Pro. Preamp repaired and tested and returned to the customer. He did one gig and said it didn't work. I apologised and took it back for a second look. Worked perfectly, but I opened it up and checked the signal path, connections, socket contacts and pots to be certain I hadn't missed anything. Rang the customer and asked him how he connected it and he said; bass plugged into SVT, SVT Pre out into RB1 return, RB1 send into SVT Power Amp In. This allows him to blend the straight amp sound with the RB1. I said it can't work this way - the only way a processed signal can output from the RB1 send is if there's something plugged into the RB1 input. He wasn't having any of this and insisted that it had been running like this for three years. I suggested he bought his rig round and we set it up as he though. It didn't work but he still maintained that it always did. Anyhow, I connected it up as I though it should be; bass into SVT, SVT FX send into RB1 rear input, RB1 'Sansamp' output into SVT FX return. Now everything worked as it should. He still wasn't having it. He did a gig two days later and rang me to say it worked perfectly and couldn't understand how it worked before.
The answer is simple; it didn't. I said it was like taking a car with no engine to a garage and saying you'd been driving it round fine like it was.
#1. Customer has a Taylor guitar. A local guitar tech replaced the OEM socket with a Switchcraft unit and soldered it to the output PCB. Except the battery -ve was connected directly to ground, meaning it was switched on all the time and ran the battery down in under 2 days. The hot preamp output was connected to ring, and the tip grounded. So no output possible. Except, the owner claimed to have done two gigs with the guitar like it was, then it suddenly stopped working. I suggested maybe it could have worked if the plug was inserted just enough to engage with the socket 'ring' connection, but he said no, it was plugged in all the way and worked fine.
#2. A desk fault burnt out the ground tracks on a Sansamp RB1 rackmount preamp, used with an SVT4 Pro. Preamp repaired and tested and returned to the customer. He did one gig and said it didn't work. I apologised and took it back for a second look. Worked perfectly, but I opened it up and checked the signal path, connections, socket contacts and pots to be certain I hadn't missed anything. Rang the customer and asked him how he connected it and he said; bass plugged into SVT, SVT Pre out into RB1 return, RB1 send into SVT Power Amp In. This allows him to blend the straight amp sound with the RB1. I said it can't work this way - the only way a processed signal can output from the RB1 send is if there's something plugged into the RB1 input. He wasn't having any of this and insisted that it had been running like this for three years. I suggested he bought his rig round and we set it up as he though. It didn't work but he still maintained that it always did. Anyhow, I connected it up as I though it should be; bass into SVT, SVT FX send into RB1 rear input, RB1 'Sansamp' output into SVT FX return. Now everything worked as it should. He still wasn't having it. He did a gig two days later and rang me to say it worked perfectly and couldn't understand how it worked before.
The answer is simple; it didn't. I said it was like taking a car with no engine to a garage and saying you'd been driving it round fine like it was.
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You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him think.
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