Do cables make a difference ?

No, what I'm saying is you need to devise a test that is reliable and repeatable, one which can produce verifiable results.

 

Yeah, i was going to say that if you had a placebo condition in there too, then you could compare any differences with the real changes. Yet, thinking about it, this sounds (as many early fMRI studies were) like a case of looking at the pretty pictures.

Need a hypothesis. Stumped again.

 

smoke grass and look at the pictures, bet you could come up with a kick ass hypothesis doing that. Theres two jokes in hypothesis.

 

Active - yes WITHOUT bias.

Anex - Most trials indicate people CANT tell the difference between well designed tube v solid state. Thus if mp3 listeners also cant tell the difference does that mean they are wrong? No ... this illustrates the prejudices you are starting with and which need to be eliminated for rigourous scientific testing. There is no reason to eliminate mp3 listeners for such an arbitrary reason. Acclimisation and practice is just specific to each test - its nothing to do with prior listening habits. When tests of hifi equipment are carried out, professional musisicans are often the least discriminating and least able to point out differences where other groups of listeners find them easily. You have to use a representative sample of the general population. Maybe people who buy hi-end hifi expend so much chasing perfect sound as they have a hearing defect they are trying to counter for without knowing it and hence can never acheive their goal as their hearing is impaired. Therefore if you use these audiophiles then your tests become worthless. Just an example to illustrate my point about subtle selection bias. I know someone who did this test in anechoic conditions on multiple audiphiles and found many had midband hearing deficiences above what would be expected in a random sample of the population. All of them were spending a fortune searching for midband clarity they could never achieve even with perfect equipment...

 

sadly, there's lots of studies that have already looked at the effects of marijuana on neural activity. Some guys in Sheffield have been looking at the neural basis of lying. They found that there was a difference in the circuits activated when men lie compared to when women lie.

 

Even neural networks can lie.

 

perhaps, but not as well as women

 

Amen brother.

 

hmm, think i'm drifting off topic. Will keep mouth shut 'til i have something useful to say.

Supervisor would prefer that too.

 

Get off this thread ......unless your taking part in the survey

 

Whats the point of the bloody survey? Whats it gonna prove, some people believe some don't and others like Paul Ranson do not know.

What is clearly a fact here is that if cables make a difference its very subtle. However the prices tags are anything but subtle. Whilst you are on it, yes to the average jo bloggs CDplayers sound the same and so do amps.

The apparent golden ears you lot seem to think you have is more often than not going to be the love of your hobby and the fact that if you accept cables don't sound different what the heck are you going to upgrade? Its like the twonks that put a lighter gear knob on their corsa and say the car feels faster.

 

Cables do make a subjective difference. But there is not a shred of objective evidence to show that cables really sound different (beyond any manipulation of frequency response etc.).

So the sensible conclusion is that we are psychologically influenced by cables so that we perceive differences in sound that, in all probability, exist only in our minds and not in reality.

 

Hai Notaclue,

There is no objective evidence that god exists. So what is your sensible conclusion?

Personally I believe there are small differences between cables. Compare a Transparant cable with a Siltech. The construction is absolutely different. A sensible conclusion is that it will influence the sound.There are many things you cannot prove today, but there will be tomorrows.

Carl

 

"There is no objective evidence that god exists. So what is your sensible conclusion?"

Pausing only to point out that comparing cables to God is in itself not very sensible, we do not have a simple test to prove the existence of God. We do with cables - a blind test.

"The construction is absolutely different. A sensible conclusion is that it will influence the sound."

Unless you can explain how the different constructions influence the sound then that is not at all a sensible conclusion.

A red cable and a yellow cable look very different. It would not be sensible to conclude that they, therefore, sound different. We need to explain how they are different or, failing that, prove they sound different in a blind test.

I fully accept that people will and do hear differences but there really is no proof that those differences are really real. Really.

 

There really aren't that many other ways to make things sound different other than manipulating the frequency response

 

Changing the dispertion pattern will do it ;-)

 

Hard to do with a cable...

Paul

 

Hi,

> 1.Do cables make a difference ?

under certain circumstances, if Y/N - Y

> 2.Which cables make the most difference?
> IC's/Mains/speaker

Depends on system context, usually speakercables, then interconnects.

> As a percentage what difference does best cable make ?

The best cables make no difference, the worst a big one, a negative one.

> 3.Have cables ever made your system sound worse?

Most of the time.

> 4.Idealogically cables can't make a difference ? yes/no

Ideology is mental muder, I'm not into snuff.

> 5.Have you ever tried any after market cables ?

Yes.

> 6.What IC cables do you use? Out of the box/
> DIY / After market/ Custom made.

DIY/Custom

> 7. If you were to rate your system were would it fall.
> High end................................low fi

Ultra-Fi.

> 8. And an indication of system worth

Monetary value, somewhere between £10,000 to £ 20,000, depending what's in it. Right now somewhere in the opper part, but much of it bis DIY/Prototypes which means at strict retail it's a lot more.

I would suggest that the issues with cables are mainly due to unfortunate choices in implementing interfaces.

For example comparing Pro Audio +20dbu, balanced, low impedance and ideally transformercoupled on the output (and ideally even input) side to -10dbv unbalanced consumer connections makes literally any cable effects AT LEAST 28db more in magnitude.

If we include the effects of impedance, the nature of the unbalanced connection which mixes ground- and signalreturn conductors in one and all the rest we likey get as much as 40db - 50db greater likelyhood of cable effects intruding in consumer systems compare to pro audio.

Anyway, just a sidenote. Cables are a system thing so much more than virtually any thing else, excepting possibly vibration "tweaks".

Ciao T

 

Yes, yes. You're the same bloke who reckons he can hear the effect of stylus drag with the LP12? Yes?

Case rested.