My hairs not like my neighbours. My eyesight's not like my neighbours. Anyone that thinks my ears are is beyond help.
This means, I can say it's all about how heavy the stuff is, and get a lot of people onboard. I can also say that's not true, and get a lot of people onboard. Different people, with different ears. Someone who can't tell the difference between a bit of flex and something exotic, is going to get the flamethrower out at every opportunity. Arguing with them is futile, because they know what they can hear, and they're right about what they can hear. It's not going to be what I hear though. Or anyone else. It's highly unlikely.
Blind testing isn't really the answer without first testing the reviewers. Electronic testing shows artifacts that may or may not be part of someones memory map. For it's not just our ears at play here, it's our interpretation of the information they offer us. As a crude example, if you hear a new noise, it may not tie in with many memory markers. Meaning you don't know if it's realistic or not. While if the pattern does loosely resemble another noise, you could think it's that. Was that the door? No, I just dropped something. Oh, it sounded like the door. Then it's dropped again.. and doesn't sound like the door this time.
We have all wound the tape back to see what they said. It sounds exactly the same as the first time they said it, yet we may rewind a few times before we get it. That's brain function, not your ears. Perhaps the people who felt insulted by my post before, can now feel their superior brains is why all cables are about equal. Not poor hearing.
I'm no expert on this subject, but thought I would bring it to the table as it's been glossed over.
Now.. more fitting at this point... are plated cables actually a bad idea? Will surface conduction rule, until saturation, when some power will find it easier to travel down the core. Which being a different material will have a different propagation delay. Presumably causing a more forward sound as volume increases. The HF taking the high road with it's silver lining, while the low stuff is pushed deeper into the copper. I mean seriously... I'm loosing sleep over this.
This means, I can say it's all about how heavy the stuff is, and get a lot of people onboard. I can also say that's not true, and get a lot of people onboard. Different people, with different ears. Someone who can't tell the difference between a bit of flex and something exotic, is going to get the flamethrower out at every opportunity. Arguing with them is futile, because they know what they can hear, and they're right about what they can hear. It's not going to be what I hear though. Or anyone else. It's highly unlikely.
Blind testing isn't really the answer without first testing the reviewers. Electronic testing shows artifacts that may or may not be part of someones memory map. For it's not just our ears at play here, it's our interpretation of the information they offer us. As a crude example, if you hear a new noise, it may not tie in with many memory markers. Meaning you don't know if it's realistic or not. While if the pattern does loosely resemble another noise, you could think it's that. Was that the door? No, I just dropped something. Oh, it sounded like the door. Then it's dropped again.. and doesn't sound like the door this time.
We have all wound the tape back to see what they said. It sounds exactly the same as the first time they said it, yet we may rewind a few times before we get it. That's brain function, not your ears. Perhaps the people who felt insulted by my post before, can now feel their superior brains is why all cables are about equal. Not poor hearing.
I'm no expert on this subject, but thought I would bring it to the table as it's been glossed over.
Now.. more fitting at this point... are plated cables actually a bad idea? Will surface conduction rule, until saturation, when some power will find it easier to travel down the core. Which being a different material will have a different propagation delay. Presumably causing a more forward sound as volume increases. The HF taking the high road with it's silver lining, while the low stuff is pushed deeper into the copper. I mean seriously... I'm loosing sleep over this.
Someone who thinks he can tell the difference between a bit of flex and something exotic (usually sighted), is going to get the flamethrower out at every opportunity. Arguing with them is futile, because they know what they believe they can hear, and they're sure they are right about what they believe they can hear. It's highly unlikely to be what they actually hear, because (assuming reasonable cables) any difference will be small and explainable using normal electronic theory.friendly1uk said:
No. Wire doesn't work like that.
No. Wire doesn't work like that. The outer layer and inner layers are strongly coupled via conductivity.
No. Wire is far too linear for this to happen, even if the layers were not coupled (but they are coupled).
The difference between silver and copper becomes relevant (but still small) at VHF frequencies, not audio.
Nothing to gloss over, if you restrict yourself to electrical facts.
I hope you don't loose your hearing. I won't be able to hear sod all. Because obviously nobody can have better hearing than you. That's plain to see.
A friend has some wharfedale valdus. You can't call them hifi. They're party speakers. I did a blind test by using his spare key to change his cables that are run out of sight. His interest in his music collection peaked, and he went through everything again. Then I started with the probing questions, before ultimately his belief that cables did nothing was shattered and he was at the shop upgrading.
Your thoughts on the bimetal wires are interesting, though not entirely accurate. I just got called out (work) but will leave the page open. Hopefully it's not locked by fools with nothing at all except insults to offer.
Actually, he did not mention his own hearing. He was explaining some fundamental aspects of current conduction in wires.
While I may or may not agree on audibility of some specific aspects of wire geometry with him, nothing he posted here would I consider inaccurate.
In my experience with plated wires, clad wires, superconducting wires, I have not come across anything that would lead me to believe that what he said was inaccurate.
If your understanding of skin theory is via anecdotal accounts via the web, you may have to re-think your sources. Many of the "teachings" are blatantly incorrect, and at times difficult for most to discern as bad.
If you have any questions regarding skin theory, proximity effect, current transport, centroid shifting, or any effects of current conduction seen within wires, just ask. There are people here who can answer. Some are very experienced. Some actually do it for a living, some for 4 decades.
Jn
I have carefully read what I said, and I cannot see any claim (good or bad) about my hearing. My hearing was not the basis of what I said; electricity was the basis.friendly1uk said:
Not my thoughts; just accepted knowledge. It would be sad if this thread began to suffer from fools issuing insults. Thus far it has been fairly free from that, although there is always the risk that someone might misinterpret technical correction.
I love cable threads.
I wonder whether there exist a topic that can reach such ultimate BS.
As I said last week second only to Bybee threads. IMO the speaker wire threads are fueled by the fact that certain combinations of cables and speakers are pathological and have easily audible frequency response artifacts that are explained by the simplest EE101 analysis. Instead it turns into BS.
Cable quality is a lot down to the copper quality.
I had to buy in some cable for a CCTV project where there could be long runs.
I was shocked at the difference in resistance per metre of the samples I bought.
So a piece of wire isn't just a piece of wire.
The resistance probably doesn't matter much in short runs and low powers.
In my applications I tend to use speakers that are many hundreds of watts so the wire purity is important.
I had to buy in some cable for a CCTV project where there could be long runs.
I was shocked at the difference in resistance per metre of the samples I bought.
So a piece of wire isn't just a piece of wire.
The resistance probably doesn't matter much in short runs and low powers.
In my applications I tend to use speakers that are many hundreds of watts so the wire purity is important.
The engineer me wants to discuss this in engineering terms; problem is, I'm not an electrical engineer, so it's all Greek. The layman me has nothing to add, because the subject is well beyond the point of being simplistic. So, I'm content to just let it all run, and at some point, find that Eureka! moment, where a tidbit of ********, turns into a tangible bit of evidence that can be a point of entry to actual understanding.
I like the discussion, good, bad, indifferent...
I like the discussion, good, bad, indifferent...
That application relies heavily on the surface finish of the conductors and high quality connections. Purity of the copper is secondary unless it impacts those aspects.
I too deal with power levels slightly above normal, but find that copper purity has no role. We did have to go high strandcount, but that's just so the wiring crew could bend it. We required all runs be twisted pair in the cable trays, and the 373 and 535 kcmil twisted pairs required quite a few guys.
Jn
Those BS are in the same class as the good ones about sound quality ( SQ for a professional touch ) and cables.
Keep on trucking.
A warning to anyone wanting to test CAT5/Cat6 cables as speaker wire: be aware that on today cost-competitive market there are CAT5/CAT6 cables (and small coax cables) made with with copper plated iron conductors. The bulk of the conductor is iron. It is easy to check because is pulled by magnets. I've found iron coax cable on many cheap consumer headphone and microphone extension cables. Iron CAT5/6 cable is even more common now, to the point that I need to specify copper wire or the exact manufacturer/type of cable when I write a specification, otherwise the supplier will usually offer a cheaper copper plated CAT6 cable. Copper plating works for ethernet at short runs (it does pass the HF qualification test), but it does not work well for PoE and definitely iron is a very bad speaker cable.
Another unconventional cable that may be used as speker wire is the ribbon cable. It was more common on older computers, but is still cheap and easy to source. Being flat, it can be run easily under carpets. There is at least one expensive commercial product on the market today that is basically ribbon cable. It is made by many individually insulated parallel small wires, so the capacitance and inductance are peculiar and it is possible to wire the speakers in different ways.
On my experience, it is best to put the amplifiers near to the speakers and have the longest cable span from the amplifiers to the preamp.
Another unconventional cable that may be used as speker wire is the ribbon cable. It was more common on older computers, but is still cheap and easy to source. Being flat, it can be run easily under carpets. There is at least one expensive commercial product on the market today that is basically ribbon cable. It is made by many individually insulated parallel small wires, so the capacitance and inductance are peculiar and it is possible to wire the speakers in different ways.
On my experience, it is best to put the amplifiers near to the speakers and have the longest cable span from the amplifiers to the preamp.
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It's the Halting Problem of audio threads.
As far as betting, I'd as soon buy a lottery ticket, at least the odds are well understood and widely available. On average, I only lose half the money I spend on a ticket, but practically, virtually all the time, I lose ALL the money.
