moving cables

dcathro said:
Well I notice the effect!

If I move either of my speaker cables even slightly, I get a percieved shift in the tonal balance. I do not believe it to be due to crystal structures, etc, but due to microphony. The major issue I have had in the last few years, has been to balance out different mechanical bourne resonances that have a perceived effect on the tonality of the system. I have found it interesting that Vertex AQ has come out with their products, aimed at this very effect.

Oh, my cables are Wireworld Eclipse on a wooden floor.

Dave
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Hi Dave.
That's very interesting. I managed to get to the Heathrow show and met Steve from Vertex. He did a very convincing demo using a stethoscope showing the effects of mechanical noise being transmitted through interconnets. He was in the Lyngdorf room which had a digital room corrected system wired with Vertex cables. Lyngdorf obviously take isolation very seriously as they were also using a Stillpoints ESS rack and component stand.
I must say that it was by far the best sound I have ever heard at a show. I stayed for a good hour and listened to a wide range of music and I would have liked to stay longer. How much influence the Vertex cables had on the over all sound is hard to say. Only downside is the look of the boxes on the cables. I know they are needed, but they could be a bit neater.

Have you tried the Vertex cables yet?
 
andybillet said:
Hi Dave.
That's very interesting. I managed to get to the Heathrow show and met Steve from Vertex. He did a very convincing demo using a stethoscope showing the effects of mechanical noise being transmitted through interconnets. He was in the Lyngdorf room which had a digital room corrected system wired with Vertex cables. Lyngdorf obviously take isolation very seriously as they were also using a Stillpoints ESS rack and component stand.
I must say that it was by far the best sound I have ever heard at a show. I stayed for a good hour and listened to a wide range of music and I would have liked to stay longer. How much influence the Vertex cables had on the over all sound is hard to say. Only downside is the look of the boxes on the cables. I know they are needed, but they could be a bit neater.

Have you tried the Vertex cables yet?
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Hi Andy,

No I have not tried their stuff yet. I have talked to them over the phone, and at some point I will try them.

I have been experimenting with this for a while. My studio is acoustically treated, with no primary reflections, so you tend to be able to hear subtle effects more accutely.

I tried (on someones recommendation) putting my speaker cables on top of supports to raise them off the floor. I made my own out of paper coffee cups. Now the ineresting thing, was not that this made a sonic difference, but that it made my system unstable. Moving these cups around even by a millimeter was like moving controls on a graphic equalizer. I would spend hours trying to get the sound right, then it would all fall apart. My cables now rest on the floor.

Another thing I have experimented with is using blue tac to stick cables to the wooden floor, for some cables, this works a treat, whilst for others it is a disaster.

Of course non of this has been verified double blind :D

Unfortunately I missed the Vertex room at the show, so I did not get to see their cables. Can you tell me what their boxes look like, and any idea what is in them. What I want to know, is whether something can be designed and built that can be applied to other cables?

Dave
 
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ErikfH said:
:moony:
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I like a man who gets to the bottom of things! Now, if you could come up with an audiophile horse, perhaps I could get a refill:
CLAVERING+HORSE+MANURE2.png

P.S. I just noticed that this stuff comes from Salisbury! Anything in that, do you think?
 
The more they can get people believing in this sort of thing the better for them because it makes the more central cable assumptions seem normal and thus believable and accepted as fact. In other words, better that this sort of fringe argument become contentious rather than the main issue of whether cables make a difference.

My own view and experience is that cables make a difference. However I have taken part in cable rants before myself. I also believe there is a lot of bullshit about the subject and I also think cable rants focus on the wrong thing. I think we need to focus not so much on whether they make a difference as how the hell the prices can be justified. All speacialist hifi is overpriced. Its just that cables are among the worst examples and we need to say NO ! We also need to avoid being distracted by shite like the above.
 
Tones, still not really explained work harddening of copper (irrespective of any cable debate). I dont think for one minute that bending a cable will change its sonic character.
Surely if copper is bent easily at first, then gets gradually harder to bend until its breaks, something is changeing?

Have to agree, the horse poop joke is getting a tad boring now.
 
dcathro said:
Moving these cups around even by a millimeter was like moving controls on a graphic equalizer.
Click to expand...
I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Makes some of the other rubbish spouted by cable believers seem quite reasonable by comparison.

Michael.
 
dcathro said:
Unfortunately I missed the Vertex room at the show, so I did not get to see their cables. Can you tell me what their boxes look like, and any idea what is in them. What I want to know, is whether something can be designed and built that can be applied to other cables?

Dave
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http://www.vertexaq.com/
Looks like the site is under construction, but you can look at the HF+ award pdf. Interesting that Paul Messenger liked them as he is not into cables.
I have no idea what is in the boxes, but no doubt someone will be along soon to tell us it's foo foo dust or something similar :D
 
tones said:
I like a man who gets to the bottom of things! Now, if you could come up with an audiophile horse, perhaps I could get a refill:
CLAVERING+HORSE+MANURE2.png

P.S. I just noticed that this stuff comes from Salisbury! Anything in that, do you think?
Click to expand...

Arguing on the internet is like wrestling with a pig in
mud... After a while you figure out that the pig enjoys it...
:D

Oink Oink.
 
penance said:
Surely if copper is bent easily at first, then gets gradually harder to bend until its breaks, something is changeing?.
Click to expand...

It depends on what you mean. I take it that you're talking about a single bend/break session, not the difference between fresh and aged copper, that, at the start it's relatively easily bent but later it's harder to do? I've never tried it, so I can't comment. I don't know why this should be, but it could be (and this is only my idea) a result of flow properties. In the case of liquids, some liquids under shear will actually become stiffer and harder to shear (it's called dilatancy). Perhaps the grain boundaries of the copper (formed when the metal solidifies from the melt) move easily at first but then lock in some way under stress. Must look into it for interest.

I like my horse poop! (If you see what I mean). It's become an old friend,as it were. And now that I've discovered that it comes from Salisbury (falls on knees, pointing in the direction of The Holy City), I shall cling to it (if you see what I mean).
 
Yes tones, i mean a single session. It can be demonstrated by hammering copper aswell, at first it is very malliable but quickly becomes less so and need anealing to carry on shapping with a hammer. So this is not age related, it happens by being worked. I would be interested to know how this happens, if you do find out.

I like horse poop aswell mate, but i prefer it in my veg plot, works wonders with me brassica's!
 
tones, I hope you never stop pointing out the manure infested nature of our hobby.

Theres a silent group of people who agree with you entirely!
 
michaelab said:
I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Makes some of the other rubbish spouted by cable believers seem quite reasonable by comparison.

Michael.
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You can laugh, but I was Crying!

The last thing that I want is to have to fiddle with my system to get it to work, or more importantly to keep it working. I have in the past pursued sonic improvements with some zeal, mainly through DIY modifications. However, I stopped doing this about a year ago, as it became apparent that system setup and tuning were becoming hyper critical. It took me quite a bit of effort to find ways of keeping my system stable, and without the need of constant tuning.

I don't particularly care, whether most people hear think that I am talking sh*t. If laughing at people like me gives you a rush then go ahead.

Dave
 
Andy, I'm no scientist, but a lot of metals and plastics behave in this way, if you take a piece of plastic and keep bending it eventually it will snap, is this what you are describing. I always thought that was down to stress and materials all suffered from that. Isn't there something called a plasticity index? I'm digging into very old learning here so could well be wrong. It sounds to me that that is what you are describing.
Alternatively as Copper ages it oxidises, this is a change of condition as a new compound is formed.
I could of course be barking up completely the wrong tree:)
 
OK, I found this --

In general, when metals are deformed at room temperature, the deformation is
accommodated by layers of atoms sliding over one another within the crystal grains of the metal.
As this sliding occurs, the metal grains become distorted, the atom layers buckle, and there is a
rapid increase of small regions of atomic misfit (known as dislocations) within the grains.
Because of the distortion and increase in dislocation content, further deformation becomes more
difficult; in other words, the metal becomes harder and its strength rises whilst the ductility
drops. If this deformation, or cold working is continued sufficiently, even ductile metals such as
copper or aluminium may become brittle and crack during the deformation. This increase in
hardness of metals when they are deformed is a very important property and is known as work
hardening.
The distorted grains of a work-hardened metal are metastable because they have normally a
high degree of internal stress and there is therefore potentially a driving force present to for new
stress-free undistorted grains. However, for most metals, the atoms are not sufficiently mobile at
ambient temperatures for new grains to form, and so the metal will remain hardened (Lead is the
exception to this rule, and therefore does not work harden when deformed at room temperature).
In order for most metals to form new stress-free grains (i.e. to recrystallize) it is necessary to heat
the metal above a certain temperature, known as the recrystallization temperature. This
temperature varies widely from metal to metal; iron recrystallizes at about 450 °C, copper at 200
°C, aluminium at about 150 °C, and lead and tin at roughly room temperature. If a metal is
deformed above its recrystallization temperature (i.e. so that no work hardening takes place) it is
said to be hot worked. Similarly, if it is deformed below its recrystallization temperature, it is
said to be cold worked. Thus the terms ââ'¬Å"hotââ'¬Â and ââ'¬Å"coldââ'¬Â working are purely relative; iron may
be cold worked above the melting point of lead.
The production of a new strain free lattice is only one aspect of recrystallization; the size of
the newly formed grains has an important bearing on the mechanical properties of the metal. If
the temperature is raised above the critical value, the first formed strain free grains, which may
be quite small, tend to grow in size by merging into one another. This effect is known as grain
growth and has to be taken into account in all heat treatment of metals. The degree to which it
occurs depends to some extent on the initial degree of deformation of the steal. It may give rise
to harmful effects (since a small grain size is usually mechanically preferable), especially when
steels are heated too high in the austenite range during the heat treatment.
Grain growth is due to surface tension effects at the boundaries between the crystal grains; a
similar effect may be observed quite easily in the froth remaining in an empty beer bottle, where
growth of the larger bubbles generally occurs at the expense of the smaller ones.
The recrystallized grain structure in a metal will depend on the temperature at which
recrystallization is carried out, the time allowed for recrystallization, and also on the initial
degree of deformation of the metal. High initial deformation tends to produce a small
recrystallized grain size; high temperatures and long times for recrystallization tend to produce a
large grain size.
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Taken from http://www.unb.ca/che/Undergrad/lab/deformation.pdf

It talks about recrystalising of metals when heated, so does that not mean there is a change to its structure when worked?
 
penance said:
I guess it is along the same lines, I know its off topic now, but surely something must change within the material for it to become brittle?
Click to expand...
Lordsummit mentions plastics. When you submit a plastic sample to something like an Instron tensile tester (it gradually pulls the sample apart), you can stretch the material just so far until its elastic limit is reached - beyond that, it is permanently deformed and won't return to its original shape. There then follows a period of non-elastic deformation until break. In this form, it is more brittle.

The elastic limit of copper is very low (it doesn't take much of a bend to be permanent), but perhaps in the area between permanent deformation and break there is a similar decrease in elasticity that allows it to break.

However, to return to the point of departure, I can't see anyone accidentally torturing their beloved cable to such an extent that the sound changes!
 

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