It's actually worse than that. The electronic noise becomes part and parcel of the signal. Like John said it modulates, which is a one word way of saying that it changes the proportionate voltage swings. Like Frantz said, equipment isn't sentient. A speaker driver only goes forward and backward as a direct result of the voltage (and mechanical impedance too actually) applied. Think of electrical noise as something akin to your band mate bleeding excessively into your guitar mic. Once he's in there, there's no scrubbing him out without affecting your own playing. The problem is, different noises are perceived differently. Some sound like an overlay or a bed like 50/60Hz hum or groove noise because when music starts playing, it's easily masked mainly because the noise is in a frequency range that we are not sensitive to. Some distortions like RFI audibly affect HF transient behavior. I'm not much of a digital guy but those that are well versed in the subject consider things like pre/post ringing, foldback and jitter artifacts as that kind of distortion mainly because these distortions fall into a frequency range we are more sensitive to. Both however are part of the signal.
More trivia
Underdamped tonearms can saturate the core of a cartridge with excessive LF resonance and the effect is a loss in dynamic range. You won't hear the 8 or 10 Hz rumble but you will hear compression. My pet peeve. Oops I said that already. Hum can likewise saturate a voice coil causing it to heat up. Heat lowers efficiency, lower efficiency causes a decrees in dynamic range, chase it by upping the voltage with the volume contol and DAMN IT! Thermal compression! It happens to amps and voltage rails too. This doesn't mean reducing these noises will avoid all of these effects. All of these happen to equipment with only musical material. That was my constant disagreement with Frankie. Stresses are stresses, musical material can stress too. Beware of burn-in discs by the way, some sweeps can fry circuits and tweeters.
Personally, I don't think too many things change once things are set up. In my experience, sound only seems to really suck if I've been on a long trip and the equipment is unused. A few hours of constant play at moderate levels usually does the trick. Shipping speakers by air typically causes a need for the same. It's cold in the cargo hold and driver surrounds sometimes stiffen up. Once in a while, I do come across some really vexing problems. A client called me over because there was a buzz coming from his left speaker. I'll be a monkey's uncle if I didn't think it was coming from his midrange driver. I went through the routine but still couldn't figure out what it was. I did notice that he went from the short wall to the long wall meaning he had had to dismantle his speakers and reassemble them. So, I dismantled them and reassembled them. It turned out that he had a loose spike on his mid and treble module. Problem solved. Two years later, he called me in again. He was back in the short wall. He had forgotten what the buzz sounded like but I didn't forget. Problem fixed in two minutes. I make house calls because he makes mean burgers. I will work for food. LOL. Strange and random things happen I guess and the more parts there are the bigger the probability is that something will happen. I don't think of it as vigilance, I mean if it will happen it will right? It's like the saying goes about guys with lots of bodyguards. If someone wants to kill you bad enough, they'll find a way. Best not to make enemies instead!
Ooo. One last thing. In my case, I don't change gear around much anymore since I'm pretty much locked in to my current preference sound wise. I guess that's one way of saying that I'm "synergized". If I were to change a preamp, amp or speakers however. It's almost back to square one. If I changed location it would really be back to square one! My limited experience tells me that what's flat on the bench is rarely flat in the field when the equipment is fitted into a system and they see dynamic loads be they succeeding gain stages or drivers. My goal however is always to hit an acoustic curve. Some like B&K (fairly constant slope), I like DIN 4 (Bass lift, flat in the middle, downward slope in the highs) as a reference point with an RTA. If I can manage to hit it on the head fantastic, close is still pretty good. It tells me the gear is not the problem, it's probably me! THEN I dumb it down a tad to be more forgiving
I use The Stones for that!
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