10% ?

An intresting comment was made afew posts back about the Orpheus cable. Now cables can be system dependant, but the cable in question a Shark marketed design and fitted with WTB RCA's, the last I heard. This cable [in my system]not fitted with WBT's, is ok, better than some, but thats all !

Whilst prototying many DIY designsand materials, I used this cable as a standard against which I could measure the performance of IC's I made.

Now the important part, the DIY cables I've put up as recipes on the DIY section out perform the shark cable by various amounts. Even the zerocost is an improvment, the L'Argent at half the material costs outperforms it to such an extent that the shark cable now sits in a box in the shed !

Now don't get me wrong I'm not dis'ing the Orpheus , just the cable from which its made. I do know that the Orpheus has been likened to cables upto £150 and is well recieved....

Just imagine the value of the zerocost or the L'Argent that you can build following my recipes at a fraction of the cost.

Now this is all well and good but the only way you'll find out is to build them yourself!!

 

Cables are a bit like women - you can go through a lot before finding the right one.

 

I have heard the same cable sounding from just a little better to making a large improvement in different systems, my approach was to get the cables that let more info through in my system, excluding garbagge when possible, not the ones that change tone, trying to keep the budget reasonable...

I spent about 10% on signal cables + almost 5% on PCs and other mains related...

 

I've used various cables in my system from Pete's Zerocost to HenryT's Nordost and if there was any improvement, it was very minimal, I remain unconvinced.

 

Hi WM

Thanks for the invite. We must sort that out... and a return trip to chez bottleneck avec mains doodaahs.

As I said, I keep an open mind, and an empty one

 

Chris you have got to appricate that we're not saying all the funds be on cables That is silly, and I certainly will agree with most guys when they say they can't hear much or any difference at all, what we are saying is, that a total package of cables/mains/stands etc, is where to distribute the cash.
I Know the cable that will work pretty well with your gear, however Merlin has it now, but I do have 1 or 2 other 'tried and tested' ones that MAY point you in the right direction Chris
Mo also raised a valid point about a £300 I/c in a system that has a £300 amp and cdp, I feel that the phase sledge hammer to crack a nut are apt here
If i had £300 to spend on that system an I/c is NOT were I spend it, maybe a Townsend seimic sink and olsen sounds fantastic boad plus some silver plated MK plugs, and a switchless socket/de-toxit can or maybe a trichord/Lynwood mains isolation transformer, or maybe even a seperate mains spur to my gear, oh and the obiquitory Lobster sperm and desen demagic, lots to play with for £300 other than Cables
My take, I do use not cheap I/c's, however my system warrents the use of ONE only .
It's about finding the system synergy, and building on it. WM

 

IME, you can approach system upgrading from both angles. Box swap or cables/isolation/tweaky sundries.

I can agree with what Ian is saying by buying the right boxes in the first place, but the problem I have with this approach is that I've come across very very few systems or invidual components for that matter where they have been "right" right from the start. A few of us have heard GrahamN's system as it currently stands, and certainly for my tastes this system sounded very "right" in both hi-fi and musicality sphere as it was, with little in the way of fancy cables or isolation devices. The cable and mains treatments we tried were by and large subtle. I'm sure that such tweakery would be fruitful for maybe the anally rentitive brigade , but for me that magic plateau seemed to have been reached and there was apathetic interest as far as I was concerend to insert cables and just to insert disc after disc of music instead. Maybe living with the system longer term with had produced some dissatisfaction, but over a 2 day period it was still producing a well balanced performance (and I can usually nit pick after less than an hour of the best systems I've yet heard) - not saying it's perfect just that subjectively that plateau had been reached.

IMO though, there will always be those of a certain psychie who will want to play and improve no matter how good. For me, I just want to reach that plateau of never ending disc swapping rather than never ending box or cable swapping.

BTW, for those who that only listen out for "tonal" differences between cables, kit or other upgrades, you guys are only listening to 50% of the changes that are possible to be heard, which IMHO could explain why no differences are being heard. The other 50% are timing related, whether that be rhythmic, dynamic/transient contrasts, etc. Whether these what could be termed as "presentational" attributes are important to you or not is up to you of course.

 

I've never really understood what is meant by timing in this sense. Anyone care to explain?

Tony. Yep, in a system of 1:1:1 (source, amp, spkrs) I think another :1 for all things accessory if fair enough. After all, little point in spending, say £300, on *upgrading* a £300 component.

And as has been stated, these things will probably last a box upgrade too.

 

I explore more the pratical side of this stuff, but here it goes:

My wife detects the slightest timbre change with cables, but doesn't care about the rest, wich is in my experience:

Separation varies a lot with ICs, not only detail, but also staging...

Frequency extension, I noticed with my new PCs that the highs and lows extend a lot more, before I heard the same note, I now hear the "full" scale...

PRAT, or dynamic, improvement was also obvious with my ICs, like removing a courtain between me and the speakers...

Presentation, with some cables it sounds like you have the musicians in the room, with others they are back on the patio, even with PCs and wall plugs...

Then digital ICs can remove digital garbagge that you didn't know was there before... :MILD:

 

I suppose theres a point that its not sensible to go below... But if I had £1200 for source amp and speakers...

it'd be along the lines of...

speakers and stands £200
CDP £250
AMP £600

... and say £5 p/m speaker cable and a £20 interconnect.
.... bosh the amp and the CDP onto the sideboard.

I'd bet my last quid the extra headroom from that £600 amp would nock seven tons of shit out of a 1:1:1:1 split of budget with £1200.

All IMO, but of course
but Im right ner ner ne ner ner.!!


hehe
Chris

 

Wouldn't it be great if we could turn our theoretical systems into reality and put them head to head for a sound off

We could then see who has the best system matching skills

 

:drum: RaT:

 

:laser:

 

And an explination of "timing"?

 

Mo, Puts flame suit on, the ability of bass and rythym sections to keep in time' with the rest of music/ songs, and the ability of a bass guitar/drums to stay 'In time' with the rest. the music has a gel factor, not disjointed a 'Whole' not parts there of. still confused, me too

 

I dont see how this could be a variable? Detail, yes. Dynamics, yes. Various peaks and dips in frequency reponse, yes. Timing.... no.

Don't get this one.

 

Well, ok this is definately a problem for a lot of gear, manly the higher end stuff, The timing issues can relate, to bass being slow, for example 1/2 a beat or so behind, so the bass is 'always' playing catch up, never driving the music alone in it's 'own time', sometimes the phase' confused in the mid range' can be applicable (not always), where the bass and the lower regions, are not to gether as one, but almost seperate, like towing a car on a long rope, fine when there are doing 40 mph, but constant stop starts, give arise to that jerky movement.
The newer M/F struff doesn't time, hence the 'lifeless' tag, primere is along the same vein, both are good at the hifi attrubites, but can't do the 'groove', this is one of the major differences between the 2 earths if you like, along with PRaT.
When you hear a system that does time, you'll know one that deoesn't, however what you prefer is a different matter.
Bounce or rythmic flow is another 'attribute' that is important (to me), again all lot of gear, just doesn't flow, but may give you a huge soundstage and chasmic depth, but 'seems' to stodge (start/stop) never flowing freely and easily (natural and effortless) some equipment has the ability to 'Force' the flow giving a 'un natural' presentation.
Maybe thats's a bit clearer, I'm sure steve toy can give you a more normal and straight ward answer', but thats my take on it. WM

 

And what if said upgraded component sounds better than one costing twice as much

Funnily enough Mo, the perception of the qualities you mention is very much governed by the time domain

Odd I know, but let's say you hear the bass guitar 20ms later than the rest (that equates to about 20ft. Try to stand next to a speaker on train platform and listen to the announcer. The echo you will hear will be from the speaker 20ft down the platform) Now in this extreme example, you will notice how you have to concentrate harder on the voice to get the message.

Now a lot of energy you hear in the bass, will be delayed, indeed a lot of bass drivers have a latency of 20ms in their application. This will lead to smearing in the time domain, making transients less snappy and rythmns less well defined. The warm wooly bass many love This smearing will have the affect of obscuring detail across the full frequency range, along with giving the perception of reduced dynamics due to the lack of transient impact.

In fact music is simply a series of transients connected by tones and if they are indistinct and out of time with each other, the musical message is likely to be lost some what. Then you have the problem of the missing frequencies.......

Basically, a properly designed system should time well, PRAT should be there in balance with all other qualities important to accurate replay. Some systems realise that timing is vital, but then fail to develop the idea to address the problems of bandwidth and accurate timbre. These systems can still be fun to listen to.

Hope that helps.

 

why thank ya kindly

 

My hifi dealer is always stressing time in a system's sound, I have to tell you sometimes a speaker that he says is correct, doesn't sound as good to me as another he doesn't like much, but maybe because I like extended response, and he is "audiophile" and prefers more polite systems, anyway he says my system sounds OK...

One good test, I think, is when I set the sub's xover to 80hz it doesn't sound good, probably a time problem because of the different woofers, but at 60hz or less it sounds perfect... :MILD: