Cables - measurement and listening

[mountainman bob]

For unbalanced interconnects the two conductors are required to be different; the ground return must have low impedance and enclose the signal conductor (whose resistance is not very important)

So is that the difference in higher quality (round wire)interconnects vs the just plain cheap 2 wire rca ?

 

[Charles Darwin]

If one closes one eyes, the sound stage won't be as clear or well defined when eyes opened.

My experience is the exact opposite to the extent that with eyes open the 'sound stage' effectively disappears while with eyes close it can be extremely well defined.

Which makes sense because as primates vision is our dominant sense and whenever visual input disagrees with auditory input our brain will always go with visual cues over aural ones.

 

[mountainman bob]

My experience is the exact opposite to the extent that with eyes open the 'sound stage' effectively disappears while with eyes close it can be extremely well defined.

Which makes sense because as primates vision is our dominant sense and whenever visual input disagrees with auditory input our brain will always go with visual cues over aural ones.

Yup....

 

[Galu]

. . . as primates vision is our dominant sense and whenever visual input disagrees with auditory input our brain will always go with visual cues over aural ones.

I once sat a non-working speaker inbetween a working stereo pair and found that the visual clue helped sharpen up the central image.

 

[cbdb]

Not to mention movie dialogue out of a speaker 6' from the tv seems to come right from the actors mouth.

 

[cbdb]

Since the title is about measurement and listening, has anyone done the listening test outlined by Jn, or planning to?

The title has nothing to do with this thread. Iconoclast has spent a lot of money developing these cables,but couldnt afford one ABx listening test? BS. They either tried but it failed, or more likely didnt even try because after 25 years of making cable they new it would be inaudible next to there cheapest speaker cable.

 

[PMA]

"I heard it" is a mantra. BTW, everyone of us has ears.

 

[Galu]

Since the title is about measurement and listening, has anyone done the listening test outlined by Jn, or planning to?

I had a go at it last night!

 

[simon7000]

".... BTW, everyone of us has ears.

I find that hard to believe having read some of the threads here!

 

[tapestryofsound]

No. Electrical theory says that if the wires are sufficiently different then you need the same arrangement for each channel; there is no requirement whatsoever for the send and return cables on one channel to be the same as each other. However, there is no particular reason (for speaker cables) why they should be different apart from ease of getting the phasing right at the two ends.

For unbalanced interconnects the two conductors are required to be different; the ground return must have low impedance and enclose the signal conductor (whose resistance is not very important). For balanced interconnects the two conductors should be as similar as possible.

This is all based on electrical theory; "logic" unconstrained by knowledge might give a different answer.

You did not read my post correctly.

May I reiterate:- If pigments in plastic wire sleeving have an effect upon a audio signal, it would be logical to have identical wiring for both the positive and the negative wires - as in the same colour for the sleeving, and the same gauge or thickness for the wiring. Taken further, it would be logical to eliminate all coloured wiring throughout the entire signal chain. Might be a tad difficult for troubleshooting or repairs, but hey - this is high end audio, and if I may be frank, where is your sense of humour?

As PMA has (quite rightly!) said, this is a childish debate, and for some of us a bit of a larf at a time when the world is going completely apeshit. You need to lighten up a bit.

 

[chrisb]

Why would you do that for? I don't see WTF it would change the sound.

Just chumming the waters of this delightful conversation, with apparently some interesting results.
Somewhat OT, or perhaps not, I’m reminded of one of the topics of debate back in the day - the audibility of “absolute phase” . Ladies and gents, start your engines.

 

[JMFahey]

I admire your patience, DF96. I usually resign, when the debate gets stupid.

Same here.

In any case, typical carbon black particles in the amount used as pigment do not touch each other, so they do not create a resistive path, so in practice they can NOT make any difference in cable behaviour when used to connect an amplifier to speaker.
So any vague ramblings about what they *might* do are stupid, since there is no physical effect to begin with.

Cable manufacturars rate wires they make with an definite **VOLTS** insulation , say 300V DC , 600V DC, 300V AC, whatever, so IF carbon pigment load compromised that they would simply back down until it met published specs, period.

Thinking commercial cable manufacturers would shoot their own foot by making insulation conductive is stupid, there is no other word to call it. Sorry.

That said, MAYBE some audiophool cable manufaturer MIGHT load insulation with conductive particles ... those do not count.
They are always searching for ways to make consumers pay $2400 for $20 cost products ... even if they are worse performers,

 

[chrisb]

Indeed, reaping mark-ups of thousands of percents in the egophile market is like shooting fish in a barrel of koolaid.

 

[andy2]

... the topics of debate back in the day - the audibility of “absolute phase” . Ladies and gents, start your engines.

For some reasons, I always equate Ms. Kate Upton to first order filter speakers. Still don't know why I would think that's how she sounds. Maybe because first order filters are difficult but it you get it right, it sounds amazing … ummm sweet.

 

[wayne]

I know of one cable maker playing with doping insulation. It actually makes sense for audio since you can get the effect you want from the monster size cables by bringing G into the LCR. It isn't cheap to do so I suspect that may be why it isn't done.

 

[Tromperie]

I am actually an neurologist and does research on human psychology with respect to how one perceives sound.

Physician, heal thyself.

 

[benb]

...
To make a long story short, his conclusion is that, yes, there are measurements that can be performed that correspond to our listening but there are things that he is not able to measure. For example, different copper types do have their own sound characteristics but he is not able to come up with a test that he can measure as to why the differences.

So can he, in an A-B listening test, listen and say "the first cable is made of copper type B and the second cable is of copper type A?" If there's a difference he can hear, this would be a test where he could demonstrate hearing the difference.

Maybe it's true that audio grade cables are not cheap to manufacture.

What makes a cable "audio grade?"

Before you buy your high capacitance, high inductance .... fancy cable, to perform high powered passive EQ on your system, you can just perform the same EQ with a couple of clicks in JRiver DSP Studio. Maybe we could get these high end cable guys to release the expected EQ settings that match what their cables do to each kind of speaker so you could simulate before you buy.

This is "theoretically" true, but may not be in the real world. A passive EQ won't make the amplifier oscillate, whereas a "fancy" cable connected to the speaker output might.

At the point when such cable first came on the market (many decades ago, see elsewhere in this thread), amplifier designers were on notice. They knew they needed to add some extra protection against previously-unexpected heavily capacitive loads that some "hifi" store might sell with their amps, but did they ...

The hifi stores just say "It's a specialized thing, some amps and some cables just don't work well together, but we're here to help..."

The brain uses vision as an aid besides the hearing to locate and characterize the sound. Our vision actually has some processing power and if one closes the eyes, those processing power will be turned off.

It was known that speakers with white color will sound well brighter vs. black color speakers. In a well lit room, the sound will be perceived as brighter and more open vs darker room. If one closes one eyes, the sound stage won't be as clear or well defined when eyes opened.

So that explains why NS-10s have white woofers, to make them sound brighter...

 

[gabdx]

I think the best wires is a 3 wires...

I think no one wire will outperform the others...

The best cable, to end discussion once and for all... is ... a 14 gages of solid core OFC copper (all wires should be coated with silver or tin and isolated) from amp to woofer.

From amp to mid a 14 gage stranded twisted cable, for tweeter a 16 gage stranded twisted cable.

with 3 specialized wires from amp to each speaker XO entry this is the best setup, it WILL sound better than any type of wire.

as each wire is carrying the part of one driver alone as split with XO.

 

[Max Headroom]

.....May I reiterate:- If pigments in plastic wire sleeving have an effect upon a audio signal, it would be logical to have identical wiring for both the positive and the negative wires - as in the same colour for the sleeving, and the same gauge or thickness for the wiring. Taken further, it would be logical to eliminate all coloured wiring throughout the entire signal chain. Might be a tad difficult for troubleshooting or repairs, but hey - this is high end audio, and if I may be frank, where is your sense of humour?

It follows then that it is logical to assign wire/cable directions .

As PMA has (quite rightly!) said, this is a childish debate, and for some of us a bit of a larf at a time when the world is going completely apeshit. You need to lighten up a bit.

Ah that's the thing, TOS's argument above is perfectly logical in that possible wire/cable differences are assigned properties (ok he forgot direction) thus eliminating at least one layer of possible 'randomness'. It is not logical to dismiss all properties as having "almost certainly a negligible effect on sound" when no proofs of this theory/assertion are provided. So while you guys think you are having your 'larf' I logically suggest the joke may be the extent of your assumptions. Dan.

 

[benb]

It follows then that it is logical to assign wire/cable directions .

Even further, zip (lamp) cord usually has a small rib in the insulation of one conductor, so polarity is easily determined. To make both conductors the same, this rib should be removed!