End of cable debate - snake oil

For speaker cable that is either 'normal' side-by-side conductors or loose axial twist, inductive and capacitive reactance can be ignored. Both values are simply way to small to have any audible consequence when considered as part of the amplifier / loudspeaker circuit.

Only speaker cables with 'odd' conductor geometries (spaced, woven) will the reactance possibly have some audible effect depending on length of cable used and loudspeaker impedance.

Thus, for most 'normal' speaker cable, provided the loop resistance of the speaker cable is less than 2% of minimum loudspeaker impedance, we have electrical equivalence which translates into sounding the same. Even around 5% to 10%. I believe Peter Walker first suggested the latter figure for Quad equipment.

I did read Paul Millers article. The chapter in the book I linked to (which can be downloaded as a .rar file) is more understood *in my opinion*. The so-called five percent rule, which covers what I've said above in more detail can be read here.

 

My observations

So there are people who can hear differences in cables but they do not understand why.

Then there are people who can't hear a difference but they understand why.

It seems to me that a number of people who can't hear a difference also understand far more about electronics than the people who can.

Ummmm....

 

Not sure what point you are making?

Another observation - There are people on this forum who think they can hear differences and there are others who tell them they are mostly mistaken.
Extrapolating from this. Maybe the question we should be asking is "Do some people have better aural perception"? or "are some systems significantly more sensitive to changes than others"? or even does understanding electronics introduce an anti placebo effect where a no difference hypothesis is unfairly favored?

Andy

 

Or,

Do some people THINK they have a better aural perception ?

I think it would be far more likely that a lack of electronic understanding would lead to the person imagining audible cable differences than someone with an understanding of the interaction between electronics and sound.

It's a bit like seeing the sun come up. If you didn't have an understanding of the factors involved you would find it very easy to convince yourself that the Earth is static and the Sun is moving relative to it. As soon as you have an understanding of the factors involved you dismiss the illusion.

 

If you can't understand why you are hearing the differences between cables...then that is surely an indication of a lack of elecronic understanding??

 

LOL ! I think I need to go to bed.

 

Indeed and it started so well with opportunities to take pops at both the Obnoxious Fremer and the Annoying Randi (that moniker is something I will have to thank Fremer for in future) and a challenge which would have had a delightful result whatever the outcome ie. egg on one of their faces.

I try and stay pretty neutral on this tbh, but the day Murray gets accused of being "electrically illiterate" because he pokes some holes in someones position, its time to call it a day I reckon.

 

Hi Mike,

You'd need to ask MAR why they've developed the particular test equipment they have. I suspect they are simply driven by the demands of their customers.

While some correlation could sometimes be made between the objective & subjective appraisal of certain items like CD players, (one superb sounding and particularly well measuring Sony machine springs to mind) as I recall, those listening panel's qualitative subjective findings often bore little relation to the then best measurement criteria that could be applied to the electronics (particularly amplifiers) under test. I always rather enjoyed that aspect. I think PM found it frustrating sometimes.

I think the equipment they supply to manufacturers for r&d/QC use now helps in minimising the effect of RF on circuit design/layout and also readily highlights problems with consistency (FR, noise, distortion etc) during production but it doesn't actually design the products. Its just a tool, albeit quite a sophisticated one.

With regard to FR plots, I don't know. You'd need to ask him. The format of this publication was as a small supplement to the main magazine. The page size may have limited what could have been included in any detail. I'm sure if he had included them he would have at least labelled them (You'd fail GCSE Physics for that Paul!)

We were asked for subjective impressions after hearing a cycle of 5 or 6 musical excerpts from various genres. I think in total around 8 people took part over a period of 5 days although only 3 perhaps 4 would be listening at one time. As was the way with all the blind listening tests HFC conducted, items would be re-introduced later in the test to check that a consistent subjective appraisal had been reached.

The differences between some of these cables were quite marked and readily apparent to those listening. The facility (as described earlier) to switch between 'cable' and 'no cable' was also very helpful.

In answer to one of your questions Paul, I don't recall being asked to listen for a change in the directionality of NACA5. And I wouldn't. That wasn't how the test was done. We weren't told what we had listened to until the end of the day. If reversed NACA5 was included (on one or more occasions) it would have been appraised like any other sample in that test.

 

Sadly thats Paul's modus operandi. He has 'form' in that regard.

 

I had both of these booklets, one on speaker cables and the other on interconnects until last year when I had a clear out of old hifi mags.

I Wish I had kept them now, would have been useful.

 

Oh well, at least it confirms that such blind listening tests did take place, were published and aren't a figment of my imagination!

 

I've just worked throught the night.......so haven't seen MY bed atall!

could explain a lot!

 

The day Murray actually does that I will grant him his electrical literacy back. But he's failed to demonstrate any in this thread. Instead he has led us on a long side track about a 'blind test' he took part in 16 years ago which eventually he admits is completely irrelevant to the thread. Very impressive.

Paul

 

Yeah, whatever Paul.

Do let us know when you get a response to your 'critique' from Paul Miller though, there's a good chap.

 

If this is aimed at me then I boggle in amazement at you.

Paul

 

apologies, have now noticed the labelling in the corner!


Incidentally, given the flatter frequency response of the 20m Maplin cable, would you say it was better than the 1m Linn cable?

 

I think I might have played 'boggle ' as a child, I think you had to find as many words as possible in 45 seconds, a great game.
Are you 'boggling' now Paul?

 

No, the underlying characteristic of the M-Audio device has the rising top end. It's actually quite mild, if I used this device for 'proper' listening I don't think I'd find a 0.15dB lift at 10k bothersome.

What's more interesting is that two measurements of the same thing taken some hours apart differed by more at the lower frequency end than the three cables show.

Paul

 

Not according the rules. I keep seeing 'poo scoop' in your name...

Paul

 

Raul naps on.