Zetajazz44
New member
Ya know, an awful lot of what is being recited as "fact" here is hearsay. It is possible that while Allan believes that Chance is lying, in fact neither Allan nor Chance is knowingly lying.
Alan is telling us what John Ma allegedly told him. Hearsay. John Ma allegedly told Allan that he never got designs from Chance. Is it true? We don't know. Maybe, maybe not. Based on the postings (I've not PM'd Allan and I don't know him), I'd say that Allan believes what John Ma told him and believes that the pres weren't designed by Chance -- and apparently believes they are based on a prior failed PMI venture with 797. While he may be inclined to believe it based on his personal relationship with Ma, we don't really know if it is true. It is entirely possible that Chance sent some design specs to China and got back Allan's pre in return. Chance believes that the pre is based on his tech's work. He said he never popped the hood when he got the sample. Does he know for sure it's based on his tech's work -- perhaps not.
Additionally, why Chance would knowingly construct such an artifice when he clearly isn't making any material profit on the deal (and Allan's quoted figures back that up) suggests, at least to me, that he isn't juking us around. About the only material benefit to Chance would be the opportunity to order some pres for himself at a marginally better bargain rate - and given the work and hassles involved in doing a GB, that doesn't seem like much incentive. It certainly wouldn't be sufficient incentive to induce me to do it.
Sounds like Allan's not too happy about 797's sale of the pres either. Why he's inclined to give John Ma so much credibility, if he also thinks that 797 is ripping PMI for their design, I don't really know. Based on the information they've each received from 797, both Allan and Chance could reasonably believe that they are each correct and that the other party is lying.
I'd say the only person who really knows for sure about the provenance of the pres is John Ma, and he isn't talking to us. We only know what other people say he said. Hearsay.
Me, I bought 6 pres and I personally don't care who designed them as long as they sound good
Finally, a REAL lawyer steps in!
I've even gave thought that something like this could have happened, since a very similar senerio happened to me one time:
Maybe Chance and his tech thought they'd submit "a Neve inspired preamp design" to 797 Audio to see if they could/would build it and what would be the cost... When the guys at 797 Audio saw, as a whole, this design, they might have said, "We already have a stock item very close to this specification. Let's send samples to see if these are close enough." When Chance received the samples, he assumed they were based on the "design that his tech drew up" that were originally sent to 797... afterall, they were N clones...
The reason I'm thinking this 'might' could have happened was several years ago, I "designed" an electronic circuit of my own to have it manufactured... I submitted it the manufacturer, and they sent a sample back to me and although it wasn't built piece-by-piece to my drawing, it worked exactly like I wanted it to... In my mind, this was MY DESIGN, and the company had 'just made a few changes to make it more friendly to manufacture'... Wrong, and very wrong I was... Someone else had beaten me to the punch and designed a similar circuit, to do a similar job, and had this company mass produce them earlier... The sample they sent to me, was one of these, that they had in stock... Several months later when I discovered this other company was using "my design", I was very confused...
Just thinking out loud...
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