Soongsc, might, but who says Strand Jumping was at play, as this is what I read in your post?
No, but I did some measurement of the harmonic content. At that time 6 CAT5e strands seem to provide the lowest hamonics with the driver connected. After using this in a few speakers, the results were quite satisfying. The issue first came up when I had two speakers of the same desigh but using different component and internal cable. Someone pointed out that the speaker using lower quality components was producing more detail, and the speaker using higher quality components had a more natural tone balance. Thus leading to more research into the cause.
I cannot say whether it has or not, but in the process, I did look into skin effect theory, impedance, and all the othet things commonly mentioned, and the result was 6 cores of CAT5e cable. I guess if one day we find that this is not satisfactory, more research will be done.
So, if I understand you, what you were measuring was the electrical signal at the speaker terminals? What were the harmonic differences? Can you give an idea of the magnitude? Repeatable? Sorry if this comes off the wrong way, I'm just really curious.
Detail, tone and soundstaging changes in my experience do not correlate to frequency response issues. There is obviously something else a foot with regards to these changes. Maybe its phase issues, I do not know. I just know that I can hear the differences and prove it to myself by continued rotation of the cabling systems with a known reference.
Yes, it was measured at the speaker terminals. It was repeatable at that time, which was probably at least a year ago. But interestingly, after I did some changes to my setup, some of the similar tests I've done could not be repeated. I have yet to figure out why. I cannot remember the exact amplitudes, only that the difference was very visible, and in the frequency range below 200Hz.
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Soongsc, you have hit on a very effective combination. Why? Mostly probably because of skin effect. It can be shown that wire larger than 22 ga. effects the high frequencies in a measurable way, due to skin effect.
Why isolation between 24 ga strands works, must be because there is 'some' strand jumping of the electrons, as well as the physical separation due to the insulation, for the wire to behave more like a bunch of 24 ga wires in parallel, rather than a single 16 ga wire, made of stranded smaller wires. To be sure, stranded wire, of the normal kind, without individual isolation, behaves like the total diameter of the wire thickness. Litz wire appears to be a variation on this, in order to remove certain problems with strictly paralleling isolated wires.
Why isolation between 24 ga strands works, must be because there is 'some' strand jumping of the electrons, as well as the physical separation due to the insulation, for the wire to behave more like a bunch of 24 ga wires in parallel, rather than a single 16 ga wire, made of stranded smaller wires. To be sure, stranded wire, of the normal kind, without individual isolation, behaves like the total diameter of the wire thickness. Litz wire appears to be a variation on this, in order to remove certain problems with strictly paralleling isolated wires.
On linear, that's by measuring the difference in temperature. If its a power supply and you get a benefit from modifying filtration, its not noise if the amp heatsink runs cooler than before. However, the mod is probably noise if the amp heatsink runs hotter than before. 🙂 Fancy equipment = Temperature Probe. 🙂 In some cases, you'll need to re-set the playback level with a decibel meter in order to judge the amount of work getting done versus the temperature (efficiency).
Mod a class a-b this way, with efficiency having a "veto" on voicing and you'll probably get a cleaner, clearer, midbass (so that most of the details in music are easier to hear). The cold running amp also makes the heatsink costs get really cheap. 😉
It's measurable. The audibility, a more pertinent question, is hypothesized and then accepted, but not actually tested.
I like that analogy - never heard it put that way before. Wonder how close it is? Physics guys - comment?
Thanks for the further info, soongsc. MLS signal, presumably? Do you remember more or less the signal level at the tweeter and at the soundcard? Have you eliminated test setup (especially connections!) as a contributor?
Again, my apologies for so many questions, I'm just trying to suck your brains dry.😀
You can`t expect to ever see my point if you decide not to try out my suggestions. I know what I`m talking about, been using this knowledge for years. But still I`ve never seen any meashurements backing it up.
Btw; this jumpin-thing is just one of several unwanted things going on in multicore cables.
Is there a suggestion on how to detect electron hopping? Why doesn't it happen in my scope probe?
Oh, I was just trying to make the point that the speaker cable conductors don't work like a hose. A conductor is already full. Thus a properly working conductor is so fast that its unlikely to make any delay at the speaker. 😉
Well, that's cool until. . . Howabout a super-fast speaker?
Point 1): 7" 4 ohm alloy cone woofer with about 70uF directly on the woofer terminals gets going pretty darned fast (dayton RS also uses about 1.3mh--especially nice if heavy gauge). Hey, don't barf at 4 ohm stuff--crossover inductor noise is halved, I can buy an inductor half as big and twice as thick on the same dime, thus inductor noise is only one quarter as much as an 8 ohm speaker (of the same price), and real reason is that I like to hear clearly a cello and other baritone notes without spending an embarrassing amount for it.
How does the speed of conductors apply to an unusually fast speaker like the one in the example?
Let me put it this way- when you turn the light off at night, can you get into bed before the photons go away?
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