Do speaker cables make any difference?

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#221
planet10 said:
Full article at http://www.t-linespeakers.org/oddsends/drabittX/cat5.html

The top graph is the impedance vs frequency. The bottom graph is the phase shift vs frequency. All the plots have been normalized to the impedance & PR of the resistor.

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.


dave
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quasi said:
Did I read it right. That the test was done into a 0.22 ohm resistance?

Should it be done into say a 4-8 ohm impedance (or 6 ohm)?

Or did I read it wrong?
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Measurement with .22 ohms is meaningless. No commonly used speaker has such low impedance. Speakers are inductive in general. Therefore phase shift measured with a real speaker will be zero until past 100kHz.
 
#223
Hi everybody,I'm glad the discussion is on fire and I thought to throw some oil in,although I know that it wont reach to an end as we are not the first or the last to make this discussion.A simple way is to learn how to accept simple facts in life.Many can hear differences(measurable or not)and many cannot.The difficult is to accept these simple things in life.We see friends in this discussion who can accept cable differences because can also measure them.100% correct but this is 50% of the issue.The other 50% is that they cannot measure(WE cannot-because we measure things you know)what many can hear.Instead of fooling these many that they live in fantasy or whatever,why dont we take the challenge to try and find out why cant we measure some things?People have different sensitivities in heat,cold,moisture,smell.But not hearing?Please no offences,I can assure you that my smelling is bad,and I could die in very high humidity.Woof woof....
 
#224
An interesting point. I've yet to see a properly controlled ABX test where anyone can differentiate between cables with similar electrical properties. However, it would also be lengthy, because to be of even the slightest value, you can only change 1 variable at a time -and that doesn't mean simply swapping one cable out for another. That means identical wire, with a single change in construction at a time.
 
#225
Scottmoose,you are right,but a controlled test might be any sort of test we might want to set up just to try our ''luck''.The more identical the cables the less the differences I suspect.However what I cannot accept is some friends attidute that all cables effect sound in the same way.You agree?
 
#226
koolkid731 said:





Measurement with .22 ohms is meaningless. No commonly used speaker has such low impedance. Speakers are inductive in general. Therefore phase shift measured with a real speaker will be zero until past 100kHz.
Click to expand...

This is a pretty much standard way of measuring impedance. If we measure driver impedance, we use something like 10Ohms, because cables have less impedance, so you use a resistor close to the expected impedance of the DUT.
 
#227
Hi,

just up to you guys who feel difference or not....

perhaps you guys who hear difference are who have a gift, while another people's ears (including me?) in malfunction?

The point is no problem you spent (waste?) your own money if you happy with that... meanwhile because no complaint from my ears, just accept a cheap cables, thanks to my ears too..

cheers,
kartino
 
#228
Kartino,as this goes straight on me,please spare me with the irony.No one spoke for gifted or not.As for me I have spent some logical money on my cables,yes,after I had listen to few alternatives but not as much as you might think.See my previous posts and you will see that I agree with all of you who think that cable manufacturers overcharge for what is afterall some metal,silver or copper or anything else.Life is life but I dont think that anyone can blame me or you for that.It is true thatt I have bad nose and I'm oversensitive to moisture and there is nothing I can do for that.Finally I insist that many of you who say that you dont hear cable differences you can in the end hear them.But this is another subject,not now.Dont get upset I never questioned anyones hearing integrity and you will see this if you see all my posts.That some think that I live in fantasy I dont really care.
 
#229
Hi poobah,
I was considering the same things you were. That prompted my post. It's always very instructive to look at the test itself. In fact, the test is always looked at and examined before the data is. That's so you don't waste you time with a test with inherent flaws.

-Chris
 
#233
Hi Cal,
For me, speaker cables range from POT64 to some inexpensive 12 GA fine strand. No more than $20 CDN I'm betting. This is regardless of the system price. For mine that might be 0.003 %. I am perfectly willing to spend more on IC's, but not hundreds per.

-Chris
 
#234
#235
Yes rdf,

I couldn't really "get" his procedure and results... something is whacked for any of those cables to show phase under 100 kHz.

Cal, Chris, soongsc, Panicos,

YES, YES... why are we worried about cables... perhaps even gainclones against 200 lb. tubed beauties, when we don't have speakers that even begin to keep up in terms of reproduction?

Sanity rears its ugly head!

😎
 
#236
Panicos K said:
Scottmoose,you are right,but a controlled test might be any sort of test we might want to set up just to try our ''luck''.The more identical the cables the less the differences I suspect.However what I cannot accept is some friends attidute that all cables effect sound in the same way.You agree?
Click to expand...

Right. While I don't believe cables have a sound of their own, I certainly do believe, and there is plenty of scientific proof, that their electrical characteristics affect the sound of the components they attach. In most 'normal' systems, with AB SS amps and multiway speakers, there will likely need to be some fairly dramatic changes before audible changes occur, but occur they eventually will. The question of why someone would wish to is another issue of course, and completely system dependant.
 
#237
rdf: " ... it's also hard to believe the Flatline is the same guage as a single CAT5. ..."

Not really, if the CAT5 is genuine silver plated copper, Teflon coated, eight conductor (4 twisted pairs) of #24 AWG, stranded ... average impedence (mostly resistance) of 0.0859 Ohms per meter ... all eight conductors ~= 0.01 Ohms per meter (from your linked calculator).

(If the CAT5 cable is rated for >> 1000BaseT EtherNet (1 GBit or ~ 4G Gtz.) over a several meter run, then it is not suprising to see a flat graph out passed 100K Htz. ... in fact I would be suspect if it showed significant phase shifting out passed 100M Htz. ... small signal, of course.)

:apathic:
 
#239
Panicos K said:
Soonqsc,cables was the last thing I bought,five years ago,and it will take a long long time before I think to try something else.
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poobah said:
Yes rdf,

I couldn't really "get" his procedure and results... something is whacked for any of those cables to show phase under 100 kHz.

Cal, Chris, soongsc, Panicos,

YES, YES... why are we worried about cables... perhaps even gainclones against 200 lb. tubed beauties, when we don't have speakers that even begin to keep up in terms of reproduction?

Sanity rears its ugly head!

😎
Click to expand...

Well, what I mean by the last thing is if you have everything else very good is reproduction, the correct cables give you that last touch. After than, we can go though another cycle of upgrades. 😀 You know you want to.:angel:
 
#240
rdf: " ... BTW, is gigabit CAT5 plenum silver-plated now? ..."

The good stuff is ... there are several grades of "server farm" level CAT5 interconnect and patch cables ... as most of you already know. The best stuff is silver plated with Teflon insulation, #24 AWG, stranded and a "not to exceed" line length of about 50 meters. Them service techies learned a long time ago to use the best when their service loads began to exceed slack time ... and their pay checks.

😕 = not!
 
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