Some sense creeping into the hifi press at last?

wadia-miester said:
Now were getting to the meat & potatoes of the issue, now we have 2 cables, that have indentical constructional techniques, they have identical LRC's, the Spectrum Anayliser reads them both as 'close as it gets', same terminations on both cables, no other Quote yourself "
checking that the cables are not messing with the sound ", ie magnets, quantum filters, resistors, caps etc. They are the same length, they are however constructed from completely different materials, and between 78-92db in the same system, no other changes, they give a different sonic presenation, I may be not the only one that has noticed this effect possibly. This is not an uncommon phenomenon strangely enough.
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Asuming I have understood what you have said correctly, if you can prove this to me in a double blind test (with data to show that the two cables are, within tolerances, measurably equal) I will admit I am wrong and further debate will be unnessesary.

If I misinterpreted your tone I apologise, sometimes it is hard to gauge through text.

BTW, long posts are fine but please, paragraphs/blank lines! :)
 
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Paul Ranson said:
... I'm going to offer you a prize for doing something surprising, in this case distinguishing audio cables by ear where there is no physical reason for them to sound different.
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Paul, I believe that there will always be a physical reason for anything to sound different to anything else. However, it may be the case that the parameters that we're currently measuring (in this case R C and L) do not encompass this difference. In other words we may be measuring the wrong things.

At the current state of play the sceptics must lay down the precise measurements that they believe cannot be differentiated, for example L, C and R to within +/- X%. This would then be the challenge for the CBs to take up. It's not enough for the sceptics to say there must be no measurable difference and we'll come up with the measurements within the next few years.
 
TonyL said:
Tests were carried out in a dark room so neither of us had any visual clues, and the listener left the room to allow cable changes. They were random in that it wasn't necessarily A to B to A etc, it could be A to B to B to B etc. The volume was always left untouched, if any attenuation is present then it is[/] IMHO a valid difference!

On many occasions, such as between Naim A5 and Kimber 8TC, I was 100% accurate (and in this instance could actually name the cable, not just say A or B).
Tony.
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Thanks for relating this observation of yours. Would I ever change my mind? Yes certainly. If enough people repeat observation like this under condition that you describe how you have done them and we are satisfied it is blind and there are no other bias. Theory and hypothesis is good. However, there is nothing that could replace well conducted experiments.
 
The argument now goes circular.

Since cables obviously sound different there must be a physical reason and hence no mystery....

I think there is good research determining the threshold of detectibility of frequency response aberrations. So defining 'physically similar' could be done in those terms rather than by specifying LCR tolerances. And if we establish that our cables aren't particularly microphonic or otherwise noisy we'd have the basis for a test.

A less difficult to arrange test would be of cable directionality. I take it every 'cable believer' believes in this too?

Paul
 
Paul Ranson said:
The argument now goes circular.

Since cables obviously sound different there must be a physical reason and hence no mystery....
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Well my position is certainly that all subjective differences have their basis in physical reality. That physical difference is or will be measurable.

Taking loudspeakers, the field in which I have the most expertise, it's clear (and has already been pointed out in this thread) that two speakers with very similar frequency response curves do not necessarily sound alike. However, they may measure very differently in other ways, for instance their 'waterfall' or impedance measurements.

... A less difficult to arrange test would be of cable directionality. I take it every 'cable believer' believes in this too?
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Not necessarily.
 
7_V said:
At the current state of play the sceptics must lay down the precise measurements that they believe cannot be differentiated, for example L, C and R to within +/- X%. This would then be the challenge for the CBs to take up. It's not enough for the sceptics to say there must be no measurable difference and we'll come up with the measurements within the next few years.
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Well, at http://groups.google.com/[email protected]&output=gplain the guy in the UK who is offering the £1000 DBT cable challenge says:

"It's never been denied that we can measure *much* better than we can
hear! The ground rules for speaker cable have always been 'roughly the
same', with a rule-of-thumb of 20% variation in RLC parameters, or the
better (and almost certainly more lenient!) alternative of
level-matching within 0.1dB from 20Hz to 20kHz."

So if cables match to within 0.1dB from 20Hz to 20kHz and if you get 16 or more (I believe) correct identifactions in the DBT, you win £1000. In the US, you win about $5000. Might be even more now, though. Google audio groups has all the info.
 
Paul Ranson said:
I completely agree.

BTW any speaker that doesn't sound like a Quad ESL is obviously wrong...
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Having grown up listening to ESL 57s and IMF Studio Monitors, I agree. However, unsurprisingly, I think that the ESL's bass performance can be easily bettered and that it's possible to go even faster than an ESL.

Surprised? I believe that a high-end speaker designer's goal should be to get the ESL sound but with better bass and higher WAF.

However, we digress ...
 
A less difficult to arrange test would be of cable directionality. I take it every 'cable believer' believes in this too?
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The only cable I have ever listened to at length to figure out directionality is a Deltec Black Slink interconnect (I use it between the phono stage and amp). The only reason I have spent any time on this is that the cable is not marked for direction. It is also constructed in a way that logically directionality may be significant ââ'¬â€œ the screen is taken to a separate earth connector at one end and not connected at the other end (i.e. it is physically different!). Depending which way round I use it I have the choice of connecting the earth connector to the earth post on either the amp or the phono stage.

This cable does definitely sound different dependant on which way it is used. With the earth connector at the amp end it is quite bright and forward, the other way round is smoother and more relaxed. I have opted for the latter as in my system it sounds better that way. The difference is reasonably pronounced and I am certain I could blind test it (I have no idea which way is ââ'¬Å"rightââ'¬Â, nor do I care!).

There is no way I could be arsed listening for direction on anything that was already marked with arrows!

Tony.
 
Interesting - with the Black Slink you *know* you are hearing the effect of the shield.

During it's manufacture, DPA drew the wires off the reel then swapped half the conductors end for end, i.e antiparallel. The idea was to ensure the cable itself, sans shield, was 'non-directional'.
 
Daneel said:
If you want to make them out of multiple stands, single core, copper silver etc as long as FR stays the same within a tolerance it will sound the same

From what you have said then, you do agree that cables which measure the same sound the same but you feel that different construction will alter the FR response and so have a different sound?
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That's how I would view it - I haven't measured the response from my cables, just used my ears. But since different metals have different conductive properties, how do you propose to make equivalent cables out of different materials without altering the design of the construction to compensate for these differences?

Heath
 
michael,
being pedantic there are some cables that carry dc - i have 3 of them linking my psu's to my pre. but then i've got a pre amp powered by this new fangled stuff called electricity ;)
cheers


julian
 
7_V said:
Surprised? I believe that a high-end speaker designer's goal should be to get the ESL sound but with better bass and higher WAF.
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Ahh, Harbeth.
 
OK Julian, I deliberately avoided mentioning DC power cables as they are a compartively rare thing.

Re Black Slink and other "pseudo" balanced cables being directional because of a shield that's only connected at one is quite different from the cable "directionality" that most CBs are on about.

Michael.
 

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