Jennice
The polarising voltage has no connection whatsoever to the signal carrying wires. It only serves one purpose - to polarise the dielectric.
The suggestion that Kuei is ignoring a biasing voltage is almost insulting.
I have have no direct experience with applying polarising fields in a controlled fashion but have been baffled with the effect that lifting a speker cable offf the carpet produces.
The polarising voltage has no connection whatsoever to the signal carrying wires. It only serves one purpose - to polarise the dielectric.
The suggestion that Kuei is ignoring a biasing voltage is almost insulting.
I have have no direct experience with applying polarising fields in a controlled fashion but have been baffled with the effect that lifting a speker cable offf the carpet produces.
Analog-sa,
Right...!
If the point is to polarise a non-conductive (to some extend capacitive) material, then how is the insulator polarised uniformly?
Is it really that insulting to ask? I had somehow hoped for a logical, non-woodoo, explanation, rather than the need for someone to defend him (isn't he able to do that himself?)
Maybe it's because I'm doubting this woodoo stuff, and no "believer" has found a valid, bullet-proof argument for it to actually work...
(Isn't that interesting, b.t.w.???)
Furthermore, if there should actually be sense in biasing the dielectricum, it should be biased beyone the voltage levels of the line signal.
Quite frankly, I can't see the point in 1.2V (whoever came up with that figure???) bias for a signal that may reach 2V or more, other than colouring sound with asymmetrical distortion rather than symmetrical distortion. Yes, it may sound different... but is different == better by definition!?
Regarding your floor phenomenon:
Might there be an electrostatic charge potential between your floor and the audio equipment? If so, it may be in the kiloVolt range, which is a rather differnt offset than what we're talking about in the thread. Also, it may indicate that your amplifiers have severe problems driving (slightly) capacitive loads...?
Jennice
Right...!
If the point is to polarise a non-conductive (to some extend capacitive) material, then how is the insulator polarised uniformly?
Is it really that insulting to ask? I had somehow hoped for a logical, non-woodoo, explanation, rather than the need for someone to defend him (isn't he able to do that himself?)
Maybe it's because I'm doubting this woodoo stuff, and no "believer" has found a valid, bullet-proof argument for it to actually work...
(Isn't that interesting, b.t.w.???)Furthermore, if there should actually be sense in biasing the dielectricum, it should be biased beyone the voltage levels of the line signal.
Quite frankly, I can't see the point in 1.2V (whoever came up with that figure???) bias for a signal that may reach 2V or more, other than colouring sound with asymmetrical distortion rather than symmetrical distortion. Yes, it may sound different... but is different == better by definition!?
Regarding your floor phenomenon:
Might there be an electrostatic charge potential between your floor and the audio equipment? If so, it may be in the kiloVolt range, which is a rather differnt offset than what we're talking about in the thread. Also, it may indicate that your amplifiers have severe problems driving (slightly) capacitive loads...?
Jennice
Konnichiwa,
Cables as such are neither balanced or unbalanced, shall we refer to the type of cable used in my case in an unbalanced connccection as pair & screen (for balanced I use a triplet and screen)?
Of course not. Doing that would be really daft. No, NO and NO again. The bias ia applied between a screen which is used STRICTLY as screen (meaning no signal current flow).
Try it. Maybe you will.
Sayonara
Jennice said:Noe you've lost me...!
Unless you're referring strictly to balanced cables, you will have current in your screen also.
Cables as such are neither balanced or unbalanced, shall we refer to the type of cable used in my case in an unbalanced connccection as pair & screen (for balanced I use a triplet and screen)?
Jennice said:
Of course not. Doing that would be really daft. No, NO and NO again. The bias ia applied between a screen which is used STRICTLY as screen (meaning no signal current flow).
Jennice said:
Try it. Maybe you will.
Sayonara
Konnichiwa,
No.
The problem is that there isn't one I'd care to advance. I have heard a number of arguments, to me non of them hold water.
I will say that I have excluded microphony and dielectric absorbion as sources of the audible change we observe. I did a prett well blinded test once with someone who INSISTED that "all cables sound the same". The person was not a little shocked and put out when I illustrated to him that simply removing and returning the Bias on around 12m worth of AIR DIELECTRIC cable did make a difference he could hear with good realiability and without being prompted.
As mentioned earlier in the thread (it is polite to read a thread through before jumping in), I have empirically evaluated the problem and found that to my satisfaction the Effect exists. I am a practical Enginner first and a scientist second. If something works but is not explained (well) by current theory it still works as far as I am concered.
So, if I concocted a sufficiently "scientific" Bull (most scientific theories are revealed by time as exactly that) that is hard enough to disproof that I can always insist on it's reality you would have been prepared to believe me.
Yet given that I am merely an empiricist who observes something and is content to accept reality, to accept his limitation of knowledge and to avoid theorising of the cuff I have become a Woodoo (actually VouDoun is a better spelling - it's a very interesting system that I am more than a little familiar with, as an aside) High Priest.
Funny how in modern times the "scientific" methode has shifted from the laboratory to the armchair. Well, your approach certain explains something about the state of the cable industry.
I better go away and concoct some scientific bull about quantum physics, electrostatic fields and sound transmission if I want to sell some of my cables I guess....
I agree.
While it may REACH 2.8V peak on occasion, CD's are usually matered with 14db headroom, so the AVERAGE level in LOUD passages will be 14db lower and much below 1.2V. So 1.2V will bias the dielectricum. However, if our dielectricum is air and the wire bare silver and the Biasing still brings audible changes we may conclude that whatever is audible is NOT related directly to biasing the dielectric and to "swamp out" dielectric absorbtion.
Now let's just assume that for arguments sake the experimenter has already considered the obvious and the amplifier is capable of driving any load and that no electrstatic field exists (it may have been eliminated with commercial antistatic spray), yet the difference in sound persists. What do you do then?
I had an eyeopening experience once (nearly 20 years ago) when I had to liberate some sensor cable where I worked (long ago in former East Germany) to make a microphone cable I needed that evening because another was severely damaged. The new cable (PTFE insulation, silverplated copper conductor, silverplated copper screen and silicon rubber outer sheath) sounded very different from the cable usually employed (PVC insulation stranded copper, basically generic twinax mike cable).
It SHOULD by all I knew about electronics have sounded the same. Yet it consistently and annoyingly so refused to do what theory told the cable it should have done. Maybe it is a shame cables are not required to read electronic textbooks before they start conducting. I'm sure my cable would have been very chastised and down about putting so many eminent academics in the wrong and would probably not have misbehaved....
Sayonara
Jennice said:
No.
Jennice said:
The problem is that there isn't one I'd care to advance. I have heard a number of arguments, to me non of them hold water.
I will say that I have excluded microphony and dielectric absorbion as sources of the audible change we observe. I did a prett well blinded test once with someone who INSISTED that "all cables sound the same". The person was not a little shocked and put out when I illustrated to him that simply removing and returning the Bias on around 12m worth of AIR DIELECTRIC cable did make a difference he could hear with good realiability and without being prompted.
As mentioned earlier in the thread (it is polite to read a thread through before jumping in), I have empirically evaluated the problem and found that to my satisfaction the Effect exists. I am a practical Enginner first and a scientist second. If something works but is not explained (well) by current theory it still works as far as I am concered.
Jennice said:Maybe it's because I'm doubting this woodoo stuff, and no "believer" has found a valid, bullet-proof argument for it to actually work...
So, if I concocted a sufficiently "scientific" Bull (most scientific theories are revealed by time as exactly that) that is hard enough to disproof that I can always insist on it's reality you would have been prepared to believe me.
Yet given that I am merely an empiricist who observes something and is content to accept reality, to accept his limitation of knowledge and to avoid theorising of the cuff I have become a Woodoo (actually VouDoun is a better spelling - it's a very interesting system that I am more than a little familiar with, as an aside) High Priest.
Funny how in modern times the "scientific" methode has shifted from the laboratory to the armchair. Well, your approach certain explains something about the state of the cable industry.
I better go away and concoct some scientific bull about quantum physics, electrostatic fields and sound transmission if I want to sell some of my cables I guess....
Jennice said:
I agree.
Jennice said:
While it may REACH 2.8V peak on occasion, CD's are usually matered with 14db headroom, so the AVERAGE level in LOUD passages will be 14db lower and much below 1.2V. So 1.2V will bias the dielectricum. However, if our dielectricum is air and the wire bare silver and the Biasing still brings audible changes we may conclude that whatever is audible is NOT related directly to biasing the dielectric and to "swamp out" dielectric absorbtion.
Jennice said:
Now let's just assume that for arguments sake the experimenter has already considered the obvious and the amplifier is capable of driving any load and that no electrstatic field exists (it may have been eliminated with commercial antistatic spray), yet the difference in sound persists. What do you do then?
I had an eyeopening experience once (nearly 20 years ago) when I had to liberate some sensor cable where I worked (long ago in former East Germany) to make a microphone cable I needed that evening because another was severely damaged. The new cable (PTFE insulation, silverplated copper conductor, silverplated copper screen and silicon rubber outer sheath) sounded very different from the cable usually employed (PVC insulation stranded copper, basically generic twinax mike cable).
It SHOULD by all I knew about electronics have sounded the same. Yet it consistently and annoyingly so refused to do what theory told the cable it should have done. Maybe it is a shame cables are not required to read electronic textbooks before they start conducting. I'm sure my cable would have been very chastised and down about putting so many eminent academics in the wrong and would probably not have misbehaved....
Sayonara
Kuei Yang Wang said:
That's an interesting start...🙄
That was not my claim, if you please!
I DID actually read the entire thread... very interesting stuff. (Otherwise, I wouldn't have subscribed to it).
No, but you have convinced me that not all bull is scientific...
Meanwhile, I'll continue living happily ever after, with inductances, capacitances, and resistances, as far as passive components are concerned.
All of a sudden, things are becoming clearer to me.... Not that I like what I see, but it's becoming clearer nonetheless.
Are the folks in the cable industry really rotten? It seems to me that they're just employing the smartest sales guys. After all, they've sold the most expensive zobel networks I know.
(And no... I don't work with a cable company)
Some would probably buy your cables then... I wouldn't. You could also consider applying for a job as technical writer at some of the existing companies.
In my world, that depends on the gain- and buffer stages throughout the system. After all, not all CD players have the same output level...
I would conclude that it's super-natural, and call a priest. I know where to find one... 😉
...and I suppose that you measured it for L, C and R over the audio bandwidth, and compare it to the previously used cable, before using the replacement? Oh, of course.. being a practical guy who doesn't like armchair science, you naturally did, no doubt. 🙄
Again... I have never claimed that all cables sound the same.
I rest my case... otherwise I'll just end up with the Pope putting a spell on me. 😱
Konnichiwa,
Which is fine with me. I am not trying to convince/convert people. I merely tend to keep a more open mind than many, tend to try more and have no qualms to share what I experience. It provides some datapoints to those interested. How you use them is your call and not much of interrest to me. To me it matters to share the experience and hope that others do the same, giving me datapoints too that I can use, interpret and apply as I like.
My scholarship is rather heterodox. It does indeed include esothric items from many disciplines and areas. It does prevent mental sklerosis from setting and broadens ones outlook. I recommend it. No point being a prisoner of your own prejudices and ides in your own head when you can be free....
As always, some are, some are not. One company makes high tech cables which require a huge fabrication system and use very advanced cosntruction methodes to make cables that electrically behave more closely to the ideal than anything that came before. Another company uses the cheapest genric cable printed with their name and hooks some tone control networks into fancy boxes which compensate for bad design in electronics.
Either companies cables fetch similar amounts. I may be forgiven for not thinking much of one of them.... ;-)
They already do, simply based on listening.
You know, I could concoct some really convincing scientific bull, much better than most cable makers (arguably, I also have more of technology in the cables anyway than most....).
Nah, I prefer doing my own thang.
Absolutely. Actually, my commercial cable includes a supply that is adjustable between 1.2V and 12V. Different voltages do lead to notable, if subtle difference.
I need an old priest and a young priest. The power of Christ compells you. Nice one, excorcising cables. And you think I'm the nutcase.
Actually, both where twisted pairs with about the same crossection and general construction. The RLCG parameters MAY have varied a little, but by far not enough to cause an audible change to a Vocal Mike (Shure SM58) hooked to a PA system.
One of the things that do come to mind is that due to it's application (sensor cable in a moving, hot envoironment) the cable had been constructed to minimise microphonics and to withstand high temperatures which gave better dielectric parameters, usually not piced up by RLC Measurements. These two may have contributed to the better sounding "microphone cable". I also must admit that I later managed to finagle to buy a large reel of the cable at "scrap" prices from work and changed all microphone cables over to this.
What case?
The case that you do not accept that applying a voltage across a dielectricum can cause audible differences? Or that you you fail to see any theoretical foundation for it? Or that you wish to avoid practicing VouDoun to avoid excomminucation by the pope? Or that you simply dislike my approach to reality?
Sayonara
(PS, the pope is constrained from practicing magic by the catholic churches interpretation of the scriptures, so don't worry)
Jennice said:
Which is fine with me. I am not trying to convince/convert people. I merely tend to keep a more open mind than many, tend to try more and have no qualms to share what I experience. It provides some datapoints to those interested. How you use them is your call and not much of interrest to me. To me it matters to share the experience and hope that others do the same, giving me datapoints too that I can use, interpret and apply as I like.
Jennice said:
My scholarship is rather heterodox. It does indeed include esothric items from many disciplines and areas. It does prevent mental sklerosis from setting and broadens ones outlook. I recommend it. No point being a prisoner of your own prejudices and ides in your own head when you can be free....
Jennice said:
As always, some are, some are not. One company makes high tech cables which require a huge fabrication system and use very advanced cosntruction methodes to make cables that electrically behave more closely to the ideal than anything that came before. Another company uses the cheapest genric cable printed with their name and hooks some tone control networks into fancy boxes which compensate for bad design in electronics.
Either companies cables fetch similar amounts. I may be forgiven for not thinking much of one of them.... ;-)
Jennice said:
They already do, simply based on listening.
Jennice said:
You know, I could concoct some really convincing scientific bull, much better than most cable makers (arguably, I also have more of technology in the cables anyway than most....).
Jennice said:
Nah, I prefer doing my own thang.
Jennice said:
Absolutely. Actually, my commercial cable includes a supply that is adjustable between 1.2V and 12V. Different voltages do lead to notable, if subtle difference.
Jennice said:
I need an old priest and a young priest. The power of Christ compells you. Nice one, excorcising cables. And you think I'm the nutcase.
Jennice said:
Actually, both where twisted pairs with about the same crossection and general construction. The RLCG parameters MAY have varied a little, but by far not enough to cause an audible change to a Vocal Mike (Shure SM58) hooked to a PA system.
One of the things that do come to mind is that due to it's application (sensor cable in a moving, hot envoironment) the cable had been constructed to minimise microphonics and to withstand high temperatures which gave better dielectric parameters, usually not piced up by RLC Measurements. These two may have contributed to the better sounding "microphone cable". I also must admit that I later managed to finagle to buy a large reel of the cable at "scrap" prices from work and changed all microphone cables over to this.
Jennice said:
What case?
The case that you do not accept that applying a voltage across a dielectricum can cause audible differences? Or that you you fail to see any theoretical foundation for it? Or that you wish to avoid practicing VouDoun to avoid excomminucation by the pope? Or that you simply dislike my approach to reality?
Sayonara
(PS, the pope is constrained from practicing magic by the catholic churches interpretation of the scriptures, so don't worry)
You do polarize dielectrics with AC- it's just that the polarization changes with the signal. Let's consider a polymer dielectric. As you apply an electric potential across it (which is equivalent to saying that you're impressing an electrical field across it, with the field being the gradient of the potential), the electron cloud of the polymer chain slightly shifts its probability density in the direction of the positive side of the field. As the field reverses, the cloud gets pushed a bit the other way. The stonger the field, the more the push.
As the cloud gets pushed, it induces a dipole moment in the direction of the push. How much it's pushed for a given field and how much dipole moment gets induced is reflected in materails parameters like dielectric constant and polarizability. The more the push, the greater the induced dipole moment. And as the field goes to zero, the cloud returns to its equilibrium position. It's a bit like a spring in this fashion. And, like a spring, its most linear response is for small deviations away from the equilibrium position.
And, lest anyone misunderstand, the response of the electron cloud to a polarizing field for normal dielectric polymers is VERY fast. I mean unbelievably fast.
SY said:
Thanks, SY. I guess what I had in mind was a more permanent type of polarization, one which lasts, in one direction, after the electrical signal has ceased. From what you wrote and some google searches, that permanent effect does not seem to occur,
Ho-ho----- Hold your horses guys...
One thing that has amused me for over 30 years now, is the fact that the lesser the knowledge of even basic electronics and even worse for advanced transmission theory, - the stronger the beleifs in metaphysics. This seems to adhere specifically to magazine reviewers, and is probably the main reason I stopped buying mag's like Stereophile and the likes many years ago.
This is definately not to advocate a standpoint that there is nothing between heaven and earth that engineers don't know, - but it is increasingly more strange that most of these phenomena cannot be backed up by conclusive measurements. Human hearing is a rather strange thing, and it is an absolutely undisputed fact that e.g. trained musicians, amateur or pro, will hear things in music that most people don't notice, - but by virtue of training. Thus I absolutely condone the fact that also music lovers can hear things that "ordinary people" cannot, - but reading and hearing all the mumbo jumbo one sometimes comes across, could lead us to beleive that all engineers must have lost this ability, - by traing??? I don't think so! Metaphysics rules,- for a lot of self appointed beleivers.
It is also an undisputed fact that various dielectrics play an important role, - at megaherts freq!.
Sorry! Must dash--- more to follow!!
One thing that has amused me for over 30 years now, is the fact that the lesser the knowledge of even basic electronics and even worse for advanced transmission theory, - the stronger the beleifs in metaphysics. This seems to adhere specifically to magazine reviewers, and is probably the main reason I stopped buying mag's like Stereophile and the likes many years ago.
This is definately not to advocate a standpoint that there is nothing between heaven and earth that engineers don't know, - but it is increasingly more strange that most of these phenomena cannot be backed up by conclusive measurements. Human hearing is a rather strange thing, and it is an absolutely undisputed fact that e.g. trained musicians, amateur or pro, will hear things in music that most people don't notice, - but by virtue of training. Thus I absolutely condone the fact that also music lovers can hear things that "ordinary people" cannot, - but reading and hearing all the mumbo jumbo one sometimes comes across, could lead us to beleive that all engineers must have lost this ability, - by traing??? I don't think so! Metaphysics rules,- for a lot of self appointed beleivers.
It is also an undisputed fact that various dielectrics play an important role, - at megaherts freq!.
Sorry! Must dash--- more to follow!!
kelticwizard said:
Well, yes it does to some extent in all solids (it's reflected in DA). The ones where this effect is large are often used as electrets. The ones where this is exceedingly small include the polymers most commonly used as dielectrics in caps and insulation in wire. Mechanistically, this is a different phenomenon than the polarizability at AC and one has very little to do with the other.
It would be interesting if one of the polarized cable proponents would measure DA, DF, and the change in dielectric constant with frequency, with and without the polarizing voltage. If their hypotheses are true, we should see an effect.
Konnichiwa,
Hmmm. So, even if a hypothesis explicitly excludes the DA (Pierre Johannets MDI) measuring DA & DF would show an effect if the hyphotesis was true. Interresting feat of logic.
Shall we agree that non of the currently proposed theories on the why are sufficient to provide us with the ability to explain any phenomenae, if indeed present (I posit they are but cannot be arsed to proove it to those who fervently wish to disbelieve)?
Here some datapoints:
I have observed the effect with good reliability.
1) It's not microphonics - I have cables where the flexibility between screen and center is absolutely minimal, applying a bias voltage does the same as with cables that are very "loose".
2) It's not DA/DF as the same effect with more or less the same magnitude is observable between air dielectric and solid PTFE which differ notably.
3) IT MAY be related to MDI, I lack the measurement gear to quantify, but it may not be MDI, which is more likely, as MDI should be absent with bare silver in air.
4) I have observed that polarity matters.
We have now a good list of things that are more or less disproven and with which people can experiment. Anyone wishing to posit a new theory that accounts for 1 to 4.
Sayonara
SY said:
Hmmm. So, even if a hypothesis explicitly excludes the DA (Pierre Johannets MDI) measuring DA & DF would show an effect if the hyphotesis was true. Interresting feat of logic.
Shall we agree that non of the currently proposed theories on the why are sufficient to provide us with the ability to explain any phenomenae, if indeed present (I posit they are but cannot be arsed to proove it to those who fervently wish to disbelieve)?
Here some datapoints:
I have observed the effect with good reliability.
1) It's not microphonics - I have cables where the flexibility between screen and center is absolutely minimal, applying a bias voltage does the same as with cables that are very "loose".
2) It's not DA/DF as the same effect with more or less the same magnitude is observable between air dielectric and solid PTFE which differ notably.
3) IT MAY be related to MDI, I lack the measurement gear to quantify, but it may not be MDI, which is more likely, as MDI should be absent with bare silver in air.
4) I have observed that polarity matters.
We have now a good list of things that are more or less disproven and with which people can experiment. Anyone wishing to posit a new theory that accounts for 1 to 4.
Sayonara
I haven't seen any actual proposed theories, just some vague speculation which doesn't provide any means of testing or prediction.
kelticwizard said:
By which signal I meant was AC.
SY said:
Okay, just to clarify then. An AC signal, (which is a constantly reversing signal) still leaves almost all solids, to a greater or lesser extent, polarized in one direction after the signal has ceased?
Do I have this correct?
Nooooooooooo! An AC signal won't, unless it has a DC component. You used the term "electrical signal" which is a general one, not just limited to AC with a zero DC component.
kelticwizard said:
So the above quote would be correct if I had added "with AC"?
So you do need a DC voltage to polarize something.
However, in any case this is not the same kind of phenomenon that was referred to in fdegrove's post #62?
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=447009#post447009
Ahh, here's the communications gap. You need something with a DC component to permanently polarize something. An AC signal polarizes a dielectric, but that polarization varies from moment to moment, following the signal, and is not permanent.
Got it. The dielectric is being polarized by the AC, but only momentarily. But being polarized momentarily is not the same as not being polarized at all.
Konnichiwa,
However, what MAY BE in some cases of import is the fact that most dielectrics are subject to "soakage", best described as a "memory" of the signal prior the current which is released delayed.
So, while the polarisation of the dielectric may not be permanent, it is a process that is subject to a certain degree of "memory effect".
Sayonara
SY said:
However, what MAY BE in some cases of import is the fact that most dielectrics are subject to "soakage", best described as a "memory" of the signal prior the current which is released delayed.
So, while the polarisation of the dielectric may not be permanent, it is a process that is subject to a certain degree of "memory effect".
Sayonara
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