I get it, but pitch and frequency response are not the same thing. You seem to be confounding the two. While you might not care too much about pitch, frequency response can certainly alter the timbre and intelligibility of speech. Sit behind the mixing desk for a little while and you learn that very quickly.
Grab the 3K or 6K PEQ and you can change how a voice sounds, how well it can be understood. Play around in the 125-250 octave and change the overall feel. We would hope that speaker cables aren't causing as much EQ change as the filters on a mixing console, but subtle changes can be heard and noticed. That will change your perception of a voice.
JN, nice constructive experiment proposal.
The same experiment could also be done at a later stage with two cables with completely different specifications.
As Pano mentioned, my experience is also that reproduction of timbre and voice articulation are most critical.
Looking forward for what it brings.
Hans
The same experiment could also be done at a later stage with two cables with completely different specifications.
As Pano mentioned, my experience is also that reproduction of timbre and voice articulation are most critical.
Looking forward for what it brings.
Hans
You are wrong once again. And you seem to be engaging in Whataboutism with your previous post.
FWIW, I last bought an amplifier in 1999, BAT VK-60 to be precise.
But with the change of millenium came the move to diy. I started building amps in 2003. Present amp in the system was built in 2020, one of two in existence - lateral fet output stage and regulated power supply.
And as to dodging questions, you are the ultimate master of that as you never answer the simplest direct question.
Thanks. Using four zip pairs, it is possible to change the RFZ from 30 ohms out to about 500/1000 ohms.
That alters the frequency dependent settling time from roughly nanoseconds out to 20 or 35 microseconds, depending on the driver impedance at a specific frequency. lowest settling time for 30 ohm RFZ and driver impedance near 30, highest with 500 ohm line and 8 ohm driver impedance.
Here is a settling time graph I did years ago. while the x axis is nanoseconds, the right border is 12k, or 12 uSec. Because it scales, you can use the ratio. For example, 100 ohm line and 2 ohm load is a factor of 50, so an 8 ohm speaker with 400 ohm line will do the exact same.
settling_graph - My Photo Gallery
jn
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Pitch is perceived. Frequency is measured. Most commonly when we speak of pitch we are referring to a perceived fundamental, not harmonics. However, a musician might notice that harmonics of a string fundamental are pitched a little sharp.
Also, as always analogies (i.e. listening for words) fail when picked apart. They are only intended to aid an initial level of intuitive understanding. You know, compare something new with something people already have some feel for.
IMHO there are other (new to most people) things to listen for in reproduction systems that most people effectively ignore. The things are audible but the brain tends to ignore them, much like we all tend to do when trying to listen to someone talking to us in a noisy restaurant, or maybe when trying to understanding someone talking to us over a noisy walkie-talkie. Our brains automatically try to filter out the 'noise' so we can better detect whatever signal we are listening for.
Also perhaps worth noting is that restaurant noise and walkie-talkie noise tend to sound distinctly different from each other. So it is with 'noise' in a reproduction system. What if we learn to focus on the 'noise' instead of the music signal, to the point we become expert at hearing the noise for what it is? Then we can learn how to minimize it in our systems.
Another thing to listen for is the perceptual equivalent of RT-60 before recording venue room decays fade away into reproduction system 'noise.' This seems to be an important characteristic for accurate reproduction of the stereo illusion, where room reverberation level and decay time, relative to directly captured musical instrument signal, is one cue for perception of sound stage 'depth.'
When I speak of hearing differences between cables, usually I am talking about hearing a greater/lesser amount and or a different type of background 'noise.'
Again, the foregoing is IMHO ONLY!
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Having had an acoustically amazing and very quiet listening room (my lava cave) I agree that the room tone on a recording is important to the sense of space. I can't swear that cables have anything to do with that, but speakers and rooms certainly do and amplifiers sometimes do.
My point about pitch is it seemed like you were confounding pitch not with frequency but with frequency response. A speaker cable shouldn't change the frequencies (pitch), however it can change frequency response and system Q. That's something you can notice and claim is better or worse.
My point about pitch is it seemed like you were confounding pitch not with frequency but with frequency response. A speaker cable shouldn't change the frequencies (pitch), however it can change frequency response and system Q. That's something you can notice and claim is better or worse.
Ain't that the truth. MIT have more or less made an entire brand out of doing just that. Such as their range-topping $106,599 'ACC 268 Revision 2 Articulation Control Console' [no less] which looks like it would be more at home on the set of Quatermass and the Pit, or recharging the neighbourhood Dalek, rather than connecting a pair of speakers to your amplifier. 😱 I can't say I like the price, but I do like the 1950s laboratory-chic...
To the best of my knowledge (somebody please correct me if I'm wrong) it's essentially a large number of series RC and RLC shunts across the wire you can switch in and out to alter its electrical characteristics and thereby presumably provide some degree of EQ to the ultimate system FR. Apologies for the image with all the magazine awards by the way -I just borrowed it off their site as there aren't many photographs around of this latest version.
To the best of my knowledge (somebody please correct me if I'm wrong) it's essentially a large number of series RC and RLC shunts across the wire you can switch in and out to alter its electrical characteristics and thereby presumably provide some degree of EQ to the ultimate system FR. Apologies for the image with all the magazine awards by the way -I just borrowed it off their site as there aren't many photographs around of this latest version.
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@Pano,
Understood. Getting fooled by frequency response changes is not uncommon for the uninitiated.
That said, changes in perceived brightness and or midrange thinness are not always due to frequency response. In such instances, people can also get fooled into believing it is an issue that can be properly corrected with EQ.
Understood. Getting fooled by frequency response changes is not uncommon for the uninitiated.
That said, changes in perceived brightness and or midrange thinness are not always due to frequency response. In such instances, people can also get fooled into believing it is an issue that can be properly corrected with EQ.
No. I would say that if it doesn't show up on an FFT as nonlinear distortion, then I might suspect signal-correlated noise. It can be measured using FFT too, by looking for small signal related changes in the noise floor. If you can reduce it and the bright/thin sound improves...
IIRC ESS claims that some people can hear it, that people can be trained to hear it, and that he ear is exquisitely sensitive to it.
IIRC ESS claims that some people can hear it, that people can be trained to hear it, and that he ear is exquisitely sensitive to it.
Are you a musician?
You left out the listening position and room mode which cause bigger audible variations than speaker cables can ever do.
I took apart some MIT speaker cable a few years ago, and sure enough there was an inductor and some other stuff in there. The inductor had a ferrite core, so some core saturation was possible as well. These are mostly gimmicks to make people hear a difference when cables are switched. There is a lot of psychology going on here.
My suggestion is that frequency response should be measured AT THE SPEAKER TERMINALS when a given cable is mated with a given loudspeaker, and assuming that the amplifier is a good one. Deviations in small-signal frequency response to me are an indication that the speaker cable is not neutral. I believe that neutral is what we want from a speaker cable.
Of course, as part of such a measurement, where a line level test source is applied to the input of the power amplifier, the frequency response should first be tested at the amplifier output terminals.
Cheers,
Bob
I wish I could say I was surprised, but I'm not -pretty much confirms what I expected...
That's one thing that makes good marketing. 😉
Bob,
There is probably no cable manufacturer having produced so many cable models over the years as MIT, from relative cheap to unaffordably expensive, while they claim to constantly improving their performance.
So without prejudice, I think it’s not fair to say that because one unknown cable model may have had some doubtful components, to generalise all their cables.
Looking at price performance tells a different story.
I can’t imagine why anybody on earth would spend 100k for a set of speaker cables, it’s almost obscene.
Hans
There is probably no cable manufacturer having produced so many cable models over the years as MIT, from relative cheap to unaffordably expensive, while they claim to constantly improving their performance.
So without prejudice, I think it’s not fair to say that because one unknown cable model may have had some doubtful components, to generalise all their cables.
Looking at price performance tells a different story.
I can’t imagine why anybody on earth would spend 100k for a set of speaker cables, it’s almost obscene.
Hans
Good point about price/performance. I must say I am usually tempted to say any speaker cable that has a little box on one end or the other probably has frequency response altering components in it like the MIT cable I opened up.
But, having said that, I must in fairness allow for the possibility that they put only an R-C Zobel network in parallel inside the box, which I support and believe is good practice. Bottom line, one really must do the frequency response test I outlined to weed out the frequency response altering cheaters.
Cheers,
Bob
But, having said that, I must in fairness allow for the possibility that they put only an R-C Zobel network in parallel inside the box, which I support and believe is good practice. Bottom line, one really must do the frequency response test I outlined to weed out the frequency response altering cheaters.
Cheers,
Bob
🙄 You must be joking. Their cheapest cables are $999 for 8' pair of speaker cables and $799 for 3.3' pair of interconnect cables. Those are at least 10 times the price of audibly perfect cables on the market. You don't have to take my word for it, just look around the retail sites for Belden or Canare coax cables and zip cord cables.
Publicity can be a tool of marketing, but the two are not necessarily synonyms.
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Wire, please. 😉
In fairness, I would say very little that is 'doubtful' in the sense that many will make a difference for well-known reasons, but those reasons are not always stated entirely clearly. Which can be one effective marketing technique (amongst many).
Absolutely. But as somebody once asked: 'How can you look at yourself in the mirror?'
'Very easily,' came the answer, 'if the mirror happens to be in my Ferrari.' 😉
I'd say 100 times. Here's one example at 49 cents (USD) per foot (0.305 meter). If you want more than a few feet, you can get a better price elsewhere. I see a 250ft roll of 12/2 for $93.
But don't tell anyone what you're using it for, they'll redirect you to something else.
12/2C Landscape Lighting Cable, 1000ft Spool | WireAndCableYourWay.com
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