I've been attempting to discern what the poster meant via discussion. I got slapped upside the head in response.That's what I think the poster means.
Cheers,
jn
I agree. But, the flux has to be good as well, and it can't be too old. I've had my share of out of date flux core's being terrible. The surprise to me was, I never expected the flux core to age out. Yes, perhaps more lead oxide, but I never expected the flux to go belly up.
jn
Your "example" is irrelevant.
"Resistive" cables by definition have resistance high enough to matter.
Soldered joints by definition have infinitesimal resistance, which when compared to the resistance found elsewhere in that signal path, is irrelevant.
Let's put some numbers into it [tm]:
a) a long speaker cable, may have , say, 1 ohm resistance.
When in series with an 8 ohms speaker, it will attenuate signal by less than a dB , which is easily measurable and *maybe* audible, and will kill damping from, say, 100 or 200 to just 8 , which is audible.
2) a soldered resistance in , say, an RCA terminated audio cable will have, say, 0.0017 ohms resistance if made with standard lead solder and maybe 0.0012 ohms if made with silver type.
Absolutely irrelevant if we are feeding the, say, 10K input impedance of a power amp.
Do the same for all other connections in the amp and explain me why that should significantly change sound, make it brighter, more open, etc.
Now if you want to compare 2 RCA connectors, one clean and sprayed with WD40 and another found in the beach after 6 months getting salt water spray, green/brown with a 0.5mm thick crust over its surface, yes, I will believe you hear a difference and that the clean one sounds cleaner.
But on 2 soldered connections .... gimme a break
"Resistive" cables by definition have resistance high enough to matter.
Soldered joints by definition have infinitesimal resistance, which when compared to the resistance found elsewhere in that signal path, is irrelevant.
Let's put some numbers into it [tm]:
a) a long speaker cable, may have , say, 1 ohm resistance.
When in series with an 8 ohms speaker, it will attenuate signal by less than a dB , which is easily measurable and *maybe* audible, and will kill damping from, say, 100 or 200 to just 8 , which is audible.
2) a soldered resistance in , say, an RCA terminated audio cable will have, say, 0.0017 ohms resistance if made with standard lead solder and maybe 0.0012 ohms if made with silver type.
Absolutely irrelevant if we are feeding the, say, 10K input impedance of a power amp.
Do the same for all other connections in the amp and explain me why that should significantly change sound, make it brighter, more open, etc.
Now if you want to compare 2 RCA connectors, one clean and sprayed with WD40 and another found in the beach after 6 months getting salt water spray, green/brown with a 0.5mm thick crust over its surface, yes, I will believe you hear a difference and that the clean one sounds cleaner.
But on 2 soldered connections .... gimme a break
I have some 20+ years old rosin flux core soldering wire which works perfecty well even of test piece of PCB which turned to dark brown.
What are the symptoms of aged flux? Solder not take to metal?
Ok, I was wrong.... I thought I heard something, but it was just my imagination.
On this level there is no more argument from here, rest on your measurable differences.....
I believe that you heard something BUT it is the cause which is not yet clear.
I believe silver tends to sound better for whatever reason (imperfect soldering technique, etc) because in many cases that is what I have experienced, BUT not enough experiment to draw 100% conclusion. In many cases it would be tedious to make a controlled "test" environment. In your case for example, the chance that one channel has higher beta transistor is high if you didn't match everything.
Today I build an amp, and I HAD TO make sure everything the same in both channels except the capacitors at the output (this is very tedious!). Because I'm comparing the best capacitor for that position. What I want to know in my experiment is that when a (boutique) capacitor sounds not so good for coupling, it could sound good for decoupling. So one certain capacitor (which I have plenty and I want to make a good use of it) was inferior than Black Gate in power supply, I want to see if it can outperform BG in this output position.
And in case of soldering, I have many experiences where bending the leg of components properly to PCB before soldering (with regular solder) have better sound. So yes, I think (lead) solder, even small, has effect if it acts as conductor between leg and PCB. But of course my experiments were not fully controlled either so I am open to possibilities, that's the key point, being open minded, understanding the assumptions.
ADD: Oh! And always peel the leg surface with knife (if not shiny) to make sure there is no oxidized material that will make things worse (at least rub with paper or fabric or something).
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My historical experience with solder is this:
1959-1970 60:40 used in dozens of kits, Heathkit and Eico, Dyna, and Fisher tuner. I even made a working oscilloscope. I ALWAYS had to worry about COLD JOINTS. They were commonly discussed and warned against in kit instructions.
1970-1978: SN63 (37) Eutectic solder. Goodby cold joints! It was great and still is.
1978 to today: SN62, 2% silver solder. Lower melting temp than SN63, but also Eutectic. Wonderful flow, shiny joint, minimum heat stress on components that are not similar.
Recommended: SN96 (4% silver) for special occasions, like cable construction, where similar contacts will be repeated over and over. Said to be slightly clearer, but it can potentially damage sensitive components, because of the higher melting point. I recommend only to fanatics! '-)
Indium solder, apparently the best, but $$$$$ expensive. Lower soldering temperature, etc.
This has been my experience, up to now.
1959-1970 60:40 used in dozens of kits, Heathkit and Eico, Dyna, and Fisher tuner. I even made a working oscilloscope. I ALWAYS had to worry about COLD JOINTS. They were commonly discussed and warned against in kit instructions.
1970-1978: SN63 (37) Eutectic solder. Goodby cold joints! It was great and still is.
1978 to today: SN62, 2% silver solder. Lower melting temp than SN63, but also Eutectic. Wonderful flow, shiny joint, minimum heat stress on components that are not similar.
Recommended: SN96 (4% silver) for special occasions, like cable construction, where similar contacts will be repeated over and over. Said to be slightly clearer, but it can potentially damage sensitive components, because of the higher melting point. I recommend only to fanatics! '-)
Indium solder, apparently the best, but $$$$$ expensive. Lower soldering temperature, etc.
This has been my experience, up to now.
I work on some assemblies that are manufactured as both leaded and lead free assemblies, there is no difference in operation due to the differing solders. and the analogue section is a tad more sensitive to signal integrity errors than audio.
Lead free solder harder to get a good joint especially when a non eutectic type is used, I would suspect your joints...the only way to check is micro section and look at the intermetallic layers that are required to form a good solder joint.
Soldering and solder materials is a subject that is studied heavily, there is a wealth of information out there, covering every aspect of soldering.....
Exactly the opposite of what is being claimed here, the lead free solder sounds the best!!!!!
Soldering and solder joints as I said are extremely well documented and researched, for general use the IPC specifications and guides should be used...for more esoteric stuff you have guidelines by NASA, ESA plenty of mil specs. Solder joints and there effects on circuits studied tested at a wide range of conditions, so its nothing new the information is out there. Billions of solder joints are formed each day, they are critical to creating working electronic/electrical assemblies.
I have had the misfortune to have looked at and inspect more solder than I care to remember, its not the most exciting hobby. These days things are a lot better than they were 30 years ago, processes and solders, fluxes PCBs have improved.
Again where are some measurements to support the claimed differences, and how many samples are can be tested, it requires more than one or two.
http://snebulos.mit.edu/projects/reference/NASA-Generic/NASA-STD-8739-3-2.pdf
Soldering Defects Database
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20060013420.pdf
I have had the misfortune to have looked at and inspect more solder than I care to remember, its not the most exciting hobby. These days things are a lot better than they were 30 years ago, processes and solders, fluxes PCBs have improved.
Again where are some measurements to support the claimed differences, and how many samples are can be tested, it requires more than one or two.
http://snebulos.mit.edu/projects/reference/NASA-Generic/NASA-STD-8739-3-2.pdf
Soldering Defects Database
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20060013420.pdf
What? You must be doing something wrong then. All the joints I make with silver solder are as smooth as butter and as bright as freshly polished flatware. I do mostly surface mount work and my iron is set at a blazing 360C.
I've used silver solder exclusively since I started this hobby about 10 years ago. Originally it was just because that was the smallest diameter solder Radio Shack stores carried, but then I got used to working with it and I liked the joints it made, so I stuck with it.
I don't care at all about any possible sonic differences.
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