Let the holy war begin ;) Lukasz on caps

[Westerp]

http://www.lampizator.eu/UPGRADE/CAP.../captest1.html

There was NO DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER. Nil. Niente. Nada. Zadnej. Nikakoj. Nihuja

[Geek]

Love it!

[analog_sa]

His choice of capacitors for the test and particularly the reference are more telling than his conclusions. Guess the rest of the chain is similar.

[bequerel]

"Now I can imagine the audiophile forums being triggered. I will be called a moron, an idiot, ignorant, loonatic, vinoholic, Third Kaczynski, Artur Boruc of Audio, etc. OK. go ahead, I don't read forums anyway."

[jitter]

Well, I'll be the first one to agree with Lukasz, then... I'm neither proud nor ashamed to say this.
I did some substitutions of decoupling caps a while ago (replacement of 22 uF Roederstein electrolytics with 4.7 uF Wima MKTs, the rest of the chain remained untouched). If there were any differences, they were so small that I couldn't detect them reliably. I'm not afraid to admit this was something I had not expected!

Of course everyone likes to quote the part they like or dislike most, and I'm no different. So, I will quote the part that agrees with something that I already discovered myself a while ago:

Originally written by Lukasz
I mean - you may THINK or at least EXPECT that there should be a difference, but I KNOW it because I actually tried. There is so much self suggestion when we want to believe there should be a difference, for Christ's sake - MUST BE, but our sense of hearing can't possibly have a memory long enough to compare in between soldering of different caps.

Even when I listen to one cap and I cough in the middle - I can't compare the sound pre-cough to post - cough. The subtle differences are all a product of our imagination, and OUR NEED TO JUSTIFY the effort and cost to import and install premium caps over the standard ones.

I could not describe my experiences any better. There's nothing in here that's not agreeing with my own.

You could accuse me of bad hearing, but that would be unjustified. I can hear differences, if they're there. But I've (partially) shed the effects of self suggestion after becoming aware of them. Then you really start hearing with your ears and not your mind...

But.... whatever works for you is fine with me, as long as you accept the fact that it may not work for me (or others) and it's futile trying to convince me (or them) otherwise. "Wrong" or "right" are relative, not absolute.

[analog_sa]

Originally posted by jitter

I did some substitutions of decoupling caps

Apart from the fact that MKT are quite poor and can't decouple anything your test is very different from the one Lukasz performed. Not all PS configurations benefit from decoupling and some caps contribute little or nothing. Is it so hard to listen to coupling caps? Preferably not connected immediately after lousy electrolytics in a cheap cd player. And at least MKP.

[gainphile]

One more myth busted !...

[Luke]

Hi Jitter,

If you cant hear the difference in caps, then your system is not capable of portraying the difference. Its really that simple.

[impsick]

its so obvious what he did wrong. he wired the A-B switch wrong. Simple mistake.

lol, j/k

[lowtherdream]

You have to put the capacitors close to your ears to feel the difference. You will hear them sing