Well, amplifiers do vary in speaker driver control / electronic dampening, and this relates directly to how pleasant a speaker will do at short distance versus long distance.
Tubes with output transformers, solid state with output transformers and bridge amps may be more pleasant at short range, with less ability for speaker driver control and thus softer mids. Its similar to resistor-padding your midrange.
However, a really thick cable just isn't so effective at making a bridge amp have the speaker carry sound clearly for a long distance. Instead, that job needs a regulated power supply for the amp and a series type crossover for the speaker. Or, perhaps a different type of amplifier.
Likewise a really thin cable isn't effective at causing a chip amp to imitate a tube amp. Simply padding the midrange and tweeter with in-series resistors (or other speaker crossover adaptations) is surely more effective than efforts with the hookup cable.
What I'm seeing is a lot of strenuous efforts with cables serving as "wrong tool for the job" and rather ineffective substitutes for crossover components. Power supply interlink cable is a related topic.
If a normal and reasonable cable doesn't do just perfectly, then this indicates a problem that has nothing to do with the cable.
Tubes with output transformers, solid state with output transformers and bridge amps may be more pleasant at short range, with less ability for speaker driver control and thus softer mids. Its similar to resistor-padding your midrange.
However, a really thick cable just isn't so effective at making a bridge amp have the speaker carry sound clearly for a long distance. Instead, that job needs a regulated power supply for the amp and a series type crossover for the speaker. Or, perhaps a different type of amplifier.
Likewise a really thin cable isn't effective at causing a chip amp to imitate a tube amp. Simply padding the midrange and tweeter with in-series resistors (or other speaker crossover adaptations) is surely more effective than efforts with the hookup cable.
What I'm seeing is a lot of strenuous efforts with cables serving as "wrong tool for the job" and rather ineffective substitutes for crossover components. Power supply interlink cable is a related topic.
If a normal and reasonable cable doesn't do just perfectly, then this indicates a problem that has nothing to do with the cable.
(From Post #1)
This is good news because it means that your audio system is working appropriately.
P.S.
Well, now I've said this while hoping that there really weren't any beans involved in the comparison--some people use them for dampening material.
(From Post #1)
This is good news because it means that your audio system is working appropriately.
P.S.
Well, now I've said this while hoping that there really weren't any beans involved in the comparison--some people use them for dampening material.
So,if a system sounds bad with a "normal and reasonable" cable or with an "audiophile" cable,this means that the system is working appropriately?
That was fun
Offaxis and diffraction is very old news really
Diffraction tests was done way back in the late seventies
The paper, tests and measurements was made by a danish guy, and the only reason I know about it
It helped a lot, and many design really did seem to improve over the years
But time have also shown that it needs a bit more than that
Sure it's old in theory but show me some tweeters which are flat in all directions past 20kHz and don't sound like fingernails on a chalk board. That stuff I think is still pretty new. So I guess in that regard I am with you on about the disortions. But I don't think you have to match distortions between multiway speakers that just seems weird - to match something which you are ignoring.
My brother snapped a shoulder on free weights. After months of imitating a damaged airplane, he sought the advice of two top sports medicine experts in California on his next step. Their opinions were strong, authoritative, based in decades of personal case results, and directly at odds. It's also ironic that many indigenous peoples are now battling to retain the rights to medicines formerly discounted and ridiculed by mainstream science. The standard Wiki starting point. In the sense employed, Medicine might not be the best example. On the other hand, since it deals with the ambiguities and unknowns of humans, as opposed to a force acting on mass, maybe it is the best analogy.
Science's limit is its practitioners, one it eventually overcomes through time and repetition. I don't discount the possibility the subtle differences I sometimes hear between, for example, interconnects are spurious, but until we see properly structured, unbiased and multiple clinical trials it remains an open question for me.
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It means that some of the system is working appropriately, being that there is no difference when swapping cables. Hey, at least something is well with it.
If the system sounds bad, then you'd have to get it a bit less objectionable before resolving differences so small. Try adjustable speakers (equipped with potentiometers on the tweeter and midrange). That's more effective.
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I am somewhat familiar with Kuhn's works, that is why I brought up the topic about quantum physics.
It certainly did, by explaining long-known verified experimental facts and making specific and verifiable predictions.
Could someone explain this in laymens terms?
Planck hypothesized (correctly, as it later turned out) that some types of energy could not take on any indiscriminate value: instead, the energy must be some multiple of a very small quantity (later to be named a "quantum"). This is counterintuitive in the everyday world, where it is possible to "make things a little bit hotter" or "move things a little bit faster", because the quanta of energy are very, very small in comparison to everyday human experience. Nevertheless, it is impossible, as Planck found out, to explain some phenomena without accepting that energy is discrete; that is, it exists only in integer multiples of some base value.
Teaching basic quantum mechanics goes way beyond the scope of the thread and is frankly impossible without writing numerous books. Fortunately, the fundamentals can be understood by a close study of Volume III of The Feynman Lectures, a series of books that anyone styling themselves as educated should read and understand. You won't be ready to swap quark stories with the CERN guys, but you'll have a good understanding of what QM is all about. It's not a light read, but it's tremendously interesting and only requires basic calculus.
The Planck hypothesis was a way of overcoming some well-known (at the time) issues with black-body radiation unexplainable by classical physics.
The Planck hypothesis was a way of overcoming some well-known (at the time) issues with black-body radiation unexplainable by classical physics.
rdf
Speaker cables:
If the Litz is coil winding wire, with a dielectric coating on each strand then do the following. Place a 25mm length of shrink tube that will shrink down to about 3/4 of it's expanded value every half meter. You probably do not want a large enough size for it to shrink to 1/2 value. I alternate pieces, with the larger number being under the cotton tube. I use a glue coated interior tube for this and once shrunk I slit it down it's entire length.
Apply the cotton tube and then hold the send and return tubes together with single pieces of shrink tube of appropriate diameter alternated between the glued on pieces underneath the cotton. I slit these just on the ends, about 7mm. I won't make any claims about why I think this to be needed, but you might listen without cutting these 7mm slits for a few hours and then cut them and listen. Replace the pieces if you find the 7mm slits were a mistake.
Interconnects:
For up to 1.5 metes in length I apply the cotton tube and then a single central piece of tubing with 7 mm slits on the ends to hold the send and return wires together.
Since Litz is already heavily twisted and then braided any twisted pairing of send and return is moot. Bare Litz is a very boring cable to listen to. The small amounts of low dielectric constant plastic add just enough retention support to relieve this condition. You can "tune " the cables to suit your needs and can apply too much plastic. The result is a smear in the leading and trailing edge of signals. Entertaining, but not musical.
The cotton is also beneficial. Look here for a subjective test and the results. http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/parts/102180-groundside-electrons-25.html#post1756617
You must have a solder pot capable of 650 deg F to strip Litz winding wire down to the copper.
Bud
Speaker cables:
If the Litz is coil winding wire, with a dielectric coating on each strand then do the following. Place a 25mm length of shrink tube that will shrink down to about 3/4 of it's expanded value every half meter. You probably do not want a large enough size for it to shrink to 1/2 value. I alternate pieces, with the larger number being under the cotton tube. I use a glue coated interior tube for this and once shrunk I slit it down it's entire length.
Apply the cotton tube and then hold the send and return tubes together with single pieces of shrink tube of appropriate diameter alternated between the glued on pieces underneath the cotton. I slit these just on the ends, about 7mm. I won't make any claims about why I think this to be needed, but you might listen without cutting these 7mm slits for a few hours and then cut them and listen. Replace the pieces if you find the 7mm slits were a mistake.
Interconnects:
For up to 1.5 metes in length I apply the cotton tube and then a single central piece of tubing with 7 mm slits on the ends to hold the send and return wires together.
Since Litz is already heavily twisted and then braided any twisted pairing of send and return is moot. Bare Litz is a very boring cable to listen to. The small amounts of low dielectric constant plastic add just enough retention support to relieve this condition. You can "tune " the cables to suit your needs and can apply too much plastic. The result is a smear in the leading and trailing edge of signals. Entertaining, but not musical.
The cotton is also beneficial. Look here for a subjective test and the results. http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/parts/102180-groundside-electrons-25.html#post1756617
You must have a solder pot capable of 650 deg F to strip Litz winding wire down to the copper.
Bud
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Well if you don't believe in cable burn-in, come and visit, I will prove it to you with your own ears.
Or it means the system already corrupted the signal to such an extend that it is impossible to detect cable differences.
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