Interconnect Myth Busted

[merkin]

I believe in science so that is why I don't believe AGW has been proved.

Keith

another argument another day Mark[]

[Mallette]

Is there a single person on this forum who believes in Science???

Why does one need such belief? Only ones personal experience counts. Science, religion, philosophy...these things are useful guides, but when one makes the mistake (IMHO) of somehow thinking they represent absolute truth and reality, that person is no longer objective and is unlikely to experience either truth or reality.

Anybody for a listening break? I hear Bach calling, and that's the truth.

Dave

[NOSValves]

It is a scientific fact that humans cannot hear 100 kHz. Go to the pet store and try a dog whistle, around 35 kHz or so. Not you, not anyone, can hear it. Nor will you hear those tones if played through any sound system. That is not an anecdote, that is a fact. Macintosh merely demonstrated that fact.

None of that has anything to do with wideband amplifier design, or anything I have posted about. I have never suggested humans can hear 100KHz tones, nor did Stu Hegeman, or any other designer of wideband amplifiers. [Go back and read all my posts for proof.]

Your argument this time is called a "straw man." It means you construct an artificial argument that was never offered, and then you knock it down. So, you've now gone from quips and annecdotes to straw men. I wouldn't call that progress at all. This kind of maneuvering has no place in an argument about physics or engineering. It's really totally silly nonsense.

A wideband amplifier design intends to reduce phase shift and distortion WITHIN THE AUDIBLE BAND, not outside of it.

For anyone curious about physics and not a part of the religious audio cult of the deaf, you can simply try it for yourself - no instruments or dog whistles needed. Go get a Citation II and an MC-30 and hear for your self what is the difference. It's as plain as day and night. If you can't hear it - wonderful - you can save a bundle on your stereo gear! Buy the cheapest components you can find. If you can hear it, you will understand the genius of Stu Hegeman and all those who came after him perfecting wide band amplfiers.

Is there a single person on this forum who believes in Science???

Well now I have to chime in..

I've had just about every amp you could mention on my bench.... Macs, Marantz, Leak, Scott and so on....and yes I've also had a mighty Citation II on my bench a number of times... While it may be technically superior in spectification the amp is in no way superior to many models from the companies I mentioned... How the Citation II reached these technical specifications?.... Via the use of gobs and gobs of feedback.

Mark I'm kind shocked by your statements since not all that long ago you were taughting the importance of having zero feedback and now trumpeting the genoius of a designer that used feedback to death. IMHO the Citation II is nothing but a huge brute and sounds like it. It does an awesome job at Heavy Metal... I'll take an original pair of McIntosh MC-60 or even a stereo MC-275 over it any day of the weak. Or even better give me a pair of Marant Model 2's... or yet even better a pair of Model 9's. Plus any of the others mentioned will be way more reliable and will not spit output tubes out as fast as you can plug them in.... I'm talking NOS tubes to boot.

[Thaddeus Smith]

you guys take this shit way too seriously.

[thebes]

Further experiments and comments underway,i including the 24 gauge speaker wire test Mark wants me to try.. Too pooped from the heat and all this fiddling has given me a "rush" noise in one of my tubes.

I've just cracked open a sealed lp of the Motels called "Careful" pretty much because I'm Thebes and for some reason I have over 200 sealed lps to open up and I'd better get started.

I will recharge my batteries with copious amount of wine, and dare I say it, cheese, and be back tomorrow.

Until then, here's some descriptors from the charlatans:

Cable Research Co.
RCA’s starting at $850:

· Stranded OCC conductors

· Double shielded with braided OFC and
aluminum mylar tape to reduce RFI/EMI

· Polyethylene insulation around twisted pair
conductors, encased in foam polyethylene

· Expert hand terminated to prevent conductor
damage

· Compression connected

· Bocchino Audio connectors: all copper RCA,
silver plated (no nickel plating); BAXLR: all copper pins, silver plated (no
nickel plating) Delrin insulation

Decritpion:

Precision and value are combined in CRL's very affordable Copper
Series. The Copper Series achieves natural sound through braided wire
technology. Making them both flexible and smaller in diameter than our solid
core design.

There's no skimping here. Expertly hand made in the U.S. with
attention to every detail – twisted pair copper conductors provide neutral
sound, a black background and a wide soundstage. Bocchino Audio connectors made
of pure copper and plated with silver are compression terminated, never
soldered.

Chord Co.

Sarum connectors:

Description:

Heavy gauge silver-plated precision finished stranded conductors, Air-spaced
Teflon™ insulation

Unique combination flat weave/high density braid silver-plated shielding
system

Specially designed non compression aluminium cable clamp, High performance
Teflon™ outer jacket

Cable geometry

Once again, we have taken a
proven conductor geometry, refined and improved it. Sarum interconnects, like
the Chord Indigo Plus, utilise a secondary return path conductor. This
conductor configuration enhances a cable’s ability to accurately carry an audio
signal across an extended bandwidth. There is no doubt that the single signal
path/dual signal return path configuration brings major benefits to the
critical elements that are essential to reproduce an engrossing and involving
musical performance.

The primary and secondary
return path conductors used in the Chord Sarum are identical to the signal path
conductor. The sonic advantages of using dual signal return
conductors can be improved still further by separately shielding each set of
conductors. The three conductors used for each run of Chord Sarum
interconnect cable are fitted with the ground-breaking Sarum shielding
system. The shielding brings improvements to timing and dynamic information,
increases the sound
stage, imaging and depth and brings greater separation and definition to
individual instruments.

Chord Sarum mains and
speaker cables are more conventional in their configuration. Critical however
to extracting the full performance potential from any power cable is the wiring
configuration within the mains and the IEC plug. The decision to fit Furutech
plugs gave us a chance to reconfigure the internal conductors and improve
performance still further.

Origin Live:

Origin Live interconnect cables deliver the performance you’ve always
wanted. They are capable of making a staggering difference to your system due
to their absolutely unique and radical design. The outstanding benefits of
these cables are neutrality, accurate tonal balance, pinpoint imaging and
separation plus sheer musicality.

Wyred4Sound

Specifications:

• Silver coated multi-gauge,
  multi-strand 99.99% OFC copper
• Ultra-low loss Foam
  Polyethylene dielectric
• Less than 30pf of capacitance
  per foot
• Less than 0.009 ohms of
  impedance per foot
• 100% Aluminum Mylar shielding
  construction

Large 8mm overall size

[fini]

I will recharge my batteries with copious amount of wine, and dare I say it, cheese

What, is Colter over to take pictures of you?

[NOSValves]

While it may be technically superior in spectification the amp is in no way superior to many models from the companies I mentioned...

Mark I'm kind shocked by your statements

1. Let's for once be clear what I said. I made two comments involving amp comparison. In the first I said the C-II blew the stodgy Macs off the shelf in 1959 - and it did just that. It was raved about as the first real challenger to the McIntosh amplifier. It had a significant following and Hegeman got significant kudos from peers. Need proof of that? Go review the history.

Second, I said compare the Citation II yourself to a MC-30 to hear how it differs from narrow band amps like the MC-30. This isn't a preference test I am suggesting, just a difference test. It isn't really even about amps. It is simply an example of the nature of wideband design.

2. Backing up one step further, I simply referred to a wideband amplifier as ONE EXAMPLE of why extended bandwidth creates different sound than narrow bandwidth as it related to wire and cable. Go back to my post where I showed the equivelent circuit of a shielded wire. I showed direct mathematical proof that different wire would create different transfer functions. At that point Don Richards (and others) attempted to say such differences were in frequencies beyond the audio band, and were therefore insignificant. The reason I then introduced the C-II and Stu Hegeman into the discussion was to give an example of why extended bandwidth is NOT insignificant at all, but in fact very, very significant to what we hear in an audio system.

3. I am not making a subjective argument for "what amp sounds best" - that's something entirely aside from anything I am working on here. I really don't care one HOOT what amp anyone prefers. My preferences make no difference to this argument either. I am simply flushing out ways for people to hear what the science predicts will happen when you make changes to the transfer function.

Just about every day now someone tries to turn my comments in this thread into a preference argument regarding "X being better or worse sounding than Y." I'll say it again, I don't care about subjective preference here, that is an argument of art. I am only making the science argument about circuits and their actual physical effects. e.g. "X sounds different than Y. "

NOTE: I owned 3 Citation IIs in the 1970s and never had any trouble at all with them.

\

Well I'll take a pair of MC-30's over a Citation II. The History of the Citation chewing up output tubes is just as easy to track down as the folks that raved about the amp when it hit the market... Heck there are still loons raving about the beast..and an entire industry devising ways to make it more reliable on the output tubes and the power supply. Heck 99.9% of the McIntosh amps still operate within specification 50+ years old and still electrically original. Now that is an engineering and design accomplishment. Yes they should be rebuilt and will sound better doing so... but most of then work darn well if they were cared for and stored in a reasonable fashion. That can not be stated about a Citation II no way no how. That amp tears itself up.

But honestly I think folks were being fooled by what the specs read and the available power....it surely couldn't of been from the sonic character of the amp. I mean really 75 watts of KT-88's is hardly a fair comparison to the little pair of 6L6 based 30 watt MC-30's....Heck a lowly Dynaco Mark III would shock many listeners when compared to the MC-30's in some respects... Put the Citation to a real test and line it up with the MC-275..... Oh and all the McIntosh amps of that era were fairly similar except the maximum power rating... some mild changes were made in rectification but in essence they were all similar.

SPEC's and POWER were the rule of the day in the late 50's and especially through the 60's... It took a while but most every one realized that specs are not the be all end all.

[Mallette]

Yeah, let me know if you still think that way when the person giving you change at the store "personally believes" that $20 minus your $4 purchase = $3 in change.

reductio ad absurdum, about all that remains unless I join your religion.

In any event, I'm simply enjoying this awesome fracas of giants from the sidelines listening...through, that is...my plain jane cables to Virgil Fox.

"Meddlest not in the affairs of dragons, for thou art crunchy, and good with ketchup." [:#]

Dave

[Mallette]

I will recharge my batteries with copious amount of wine, and dare I say it, cheese, and be back tomorrow.

tap...tap...tap...tap...tap...tap...tap...

As soon as you get through reporting to God on the big white telephone, please report to the rest of us.

Dave

[Mallette]

the Cerachrom disc is then covered in either yellow gold or platinum, atom by atom, and polished until only the precious metal in the numerals and graduations remains

Actually, a bargain given the tedium of placing gold or platinum atom by atom...

Dave

[NOSValves]

Well I'll take a pair of MC-30's over a Citation II. The History of the Citation chewing up output tubes is just as easy to track down as the folks that raved about the amp when it hit the market... Heck there are still loons raving about the beast..and an entire industry devising ways to make it more reliable on the output tubes and the power supply. Heck 99.9% of the McIntosh amps still operate within specification 50+ years old and still electrically original. Now that is an engineering and design accomplishment. Yes they should be rebuilt and will sound better doing so... but most of then work darn well if they were cared for and stored in a reasonable fashion. That can not be stated about a Citation II no way no how. That amp tears itself up.

But honestly I think folks were being fooled by what the specs read and the available power....it surely couldn't of been from the sonic character of the amp. I mean really 75 watts of KT-88's is hardly a fair comparison to the little pair of 6L6 based 30 watt MC-30's....Heck a lowly Dynaco Mark III would shock many listeners when compared to the MC-30's in some respects... Put the Citation to a real test and line it up with the MC-275..... Oh and all the McIntosh amps of that era were fairly similar except the maximum power rating... some mild changes were made in rectification but in essence they were all similar.

SPEC's and POWER were the rule of the day in the late 50's and especially through the 60's... It took a while but most every one realized that specs are not the be all end all.

Yes, reliability is often a useful criterion for selecting amps or cars or televisions. But reliability isn't why I brought the Citation II into my comments.

The McIntosh amplifier is a design of the late '40s. The Citation is representative of the late '50s. This was happening in the era of the most intense tube amplifier research and design. The C-II was a newer generation of amplifier, employing new ideas. In this case, the circuit, and especially transformers, were designed to maximize bandwidth for the cause of reducing phase shifting - making the amp much "faster" than was previously thought possible - especially with the unity coupled amplifier of McIntosh.

This allows two important points to be made: First, changing the design of the circuit in the out of band region changed the "audible" sound of the amplifier. That is exactly what the physics predicted would happen. Two, proof of the first is that some people like the sound of one, and some people liked the sound of the other. None of that has anything whatsoever to do with dog whistles or humans hearing 100KHz tones. Playing regular old music on each amp clearly reveals how these different design approaches changes what you hear. It's a test anyone can perform in their home. It's an experience anyone can have on their own. You don't need others telling you what it sounds like, you can find out on your own. No magic, no cultish dogma, no evil daemons involved.

Yup I agree the difference is readily apparent...in a negative way. The Citation II utilizes 32db of feedback in 3 seperate loops to achieve the specs it garnished... and yes you can hear it.

[Mallette]

... and yes you can hear it.

OK, either of you guys individually or separately are so far beyond me as to make any comments I might have technically of the "Duhhhh..." variety.

However, can it be that the folks hearing the "difference" of Hegeman's design simply liked it, and this was re-enforced by their religion of specs? What I am saying here is my off repeated thing about accuracy coming in different flavors. Perhaps their absolute faith in specs pre-biased them towards the amp, and the audible difference was interpreted as "better," when it was simply slightly "different."

I've been involved in audio freak gatherings where someone would pronounce something in the sound that those present where predisposed to accept, or the same pronouncement from someone of considerable stature within the group, and all nod and say "yes, master, we hear..." Maybe they all do and I just don't, but I'm generally of the opinion we have some sort of social network in play in many cases.

For a while, the X-Can tube stage sold like rubbers on Fire Island as all seemed to agree it tamed the harsh CD. IMHO, it did, but mainly by simply blurring the signal a bit. Haven't seen one in years...

My opinion is that there are alpha audiophiles that set the agenda for many others, and what they hear all hear. Hear! Hear!

Audiophilia is almost as reactionary as the Roman Church when it comes to change. Whilst young, I remember the bias against stereo. The arguments were, well, sound. It didn't take quite as long for that battle as it has for surround, mainly, IMHO, because stereo came from the same sources (LPs) as the mono, and the engineering to produce a quality stereo sound wasn't anywhere near that required for surround...which still hasn't produced much that lives up to the promise.

However, when each new fad is gone, the basics of simple, accurate reproduction of a space-time acoustic event remain startlingly the same. The simpler, the better. Less is more. The playback chain should be as close as possible to inverse of the recording chain.

I once knew a light director who went through the same drill every shoot. He'd order up light after light, snooting, barndooring, gelling, diffusing, etc, etc. Finally, he'd scowl and say "I want ONE light, and I want right HERE!"

It was always beautiful. Simple is good.

Dave

[Colin]

"Jane, you ignorant ****,"

High quality interconnecting and speaker cables are not an absolute necessity for a superb home

movie and audio reproduction system (MARS). But after you have added a subwoofer,

acoustic wall panels and digital-to-analogue converter, what else can a

tweaking audiophile do to improve the sound?

Evidence suspends disbelief. I heard audible differences in patch

cords. Perhaps enough to justify the expenditure of thousands. My own personal

test

(http://www.enjoythemusic.com/Magazine/equipment/0906/cable_shootout_pt2.htm)

showed there are measurable differences in resistance, capacitance and

inductance between silver interconnecting patch cords.

From the cords I reviewed, "it looks like silver interconnecting

cords have lower values than inexpensive freebie cords. Silver wire has lower

resistance compared to the same gauge of copper wire. On long runs, this should

make an audible difference." The "Basic Generic Freebie" interconnects seem

to have much higher values for all three measurements.

The patch cords cost from $99 to $1090. With a girlfriend, I auditioned

the patch cords mostly on a modest office MARS, one with a vintage Harmon

Kardon 330B solid-state receiver and Altec-Lansing bass reflex speakers.

We rated the interconnecting cords from one to five on 12 EnjoyTheMusic.com

criteria: Tonality, Sub-bass (10Hz - 60Hz), Mid-bass (80Hz - 200Hz), Midrange

(200Hz - 3,000Hz), High-frequencies (3,000 Hz on up), Attack, Decay, Inner

Resolution, Soundscape extension into the room, Imaging, Fit and Finish and Value

for the Money. I included my own bottom-line category, Enjoyment.

1.

DH Labs Silver Sonic Air Matrix

2.

Dynamic Design Lotus Whites

3.

DACT Dual Connect Precious Metal Audio Cables

4.

MAC Silver Sound Pipes

5.

MAC UltraSilver Sound Pipes

Overall score

41

51

59

37

41

Price

195

750

1090

99

149

Price/score

4.75

14.70

18.48

2.68

3.63

The total scores range from 37 to 59 points (22 or 60%). In every

category, the gold wire DACT Dual Connects scored four or five points. They

were noticeable enough to stand out in blind listening tests. All of the cables

made my basic copper Monster interconnects seem congested and grungy by

comparison.

In all categories, except Value for the Money, the Dynamic Design Lotus

Whites scored four points. A difference of one point in just one category,

Attack for example, is not enough to make any one interconnecting patch cord

sound significantly better than another. The difference between $1090 Dual

Connects, with their consistent four and five points, and the $750 Lotus Whites

however does seem to be worth the $340 premium (45% more) for those who carry

the Kroners.

Dividing the price by the score shows a ratio. The ratio shows that the

lowest scoring and priced interconnects are the best value! While the highest

scoring and priced patch cords would be the worst ones to buy! The best sounding

DACT interconnecting patch cords are the worst value. For those of us who don't

have the Kroners, rest assured that a point or two in one or two categories does

not make all that much difference. Yet I returned the other patch cords

and kept the wonderful sounding Dual Connects for use in further reviews.

I am absolutely certain that a new large screen TV, driver crossover network,

mid-range drivers and/or horns and tweeter, each new item costing about $1K or

less, would make a far more noticeable improvement in my modest MARS

than even the delicate DACT white interconnect strands. Yet, after all those

improvements are in place, I am sure that gold

wire patch cords and speaker cables are on my "won the lottery" dream system list.

BTW, I briefly heard a massive solid-state Citation up against

a $40 gold Fisher tube receiver (mine) on Ralph Karsten's big ole Khorns. No

comparison. One made clean sound. The other made music. Mine.

[ClaudeJ1]

Colin. I want to point out that the sticky: "Horns love tubes, bass love solid state"comment in your posts is what Saul Marantz himself told me back in the 70's when he had sold his company/name to Superscope and had come out of retirement to be Dalquist's (remember the super inefficient DQ-10?) Marketing VP.

I believe that the extra energy required by any bass speaker (excrusion-wise) and the resultant current required to control it, is better served by SS amps because of their low source impedance, behaving as more a a "current valve" vs. a "voltage valve" for tubes.

I remember Nelson Pass, the great amplifier designer, once tested wires and found that skinny little cheap 24 AWG wires improved the sound of a certain AR speaker that had a 1.2 ohm reactive impedance dip that fried amplifiers (AR 11? or 9?). The extra impedance of the cable was enough to dampen the nasties that speaker created.

So, the choice of wire can make a difference, where cheaper is better under certain circumstances. Also, the efficiency of horn bass demands less current and therefore you can get away with a smaller wire gauge in the chain.

[NOSValves]

... and yes you can hear it.

OK, either of you guys individually or separately are so far beyond me as to make any comments I might have technically of the "Duhhhh..." variety.

However, can it be that the folks hearing the "difference" of Hegeman's design simply liked it, and this was re-enforced by their religion of specs? What I am saying here is my off repeated thing about accuracy coming in different flavors. Perhaps their absolute faith in specs pre-biased them towards the amp, and the audible difference was interpreted as "better," when it was simply slightly "different."

I've been involved in audio freak gatherings where someone would pronounce something in the sound that those present where predisposed to accept, or the same pronouncement from someone of considerable stature within the group, and all nod and say "yes, master, we hear..." Maybe they all do and I just don't, but I'm generally of the opinion we have some sort of social network in play in many cases.

For a while, the X-Can tube stage sold like rubbers on Fire Island as all seemed to agree it tamed the harsh CD. IMHO, it did, but mainly by simply blurring the signal a bit. Haven't seen one in years...

My opinion is that there are alpha audiophiles that set the agenda for many others, and what they hear all hear. Hear! Hear!

Audiophilia is almost as reactionary as the Roman Church when it comes to change. Whilst young, I remember the bias against stereo. The arguments were, well, sound. It didn't take quite as long for that battle as it has for surround, mainly, IMHO, because stereo came from the same sources (LPs) as the mono, and the engineering to produce a quality stereo sound wasn't anywhere near that required for surround...which still hasn't produced much that lives up to the promise.

However, when each new fad is gone, the basics of simple, accurate reproduction of a space-time acoustic event remain startlingly the same. The simpler, the better. Less is more. The playback chain should be as close as possible to inverse of the recording chain.

I once knew a light director who went through the same drill every shoot. He'd order up light after light, snooting, barndooring, gelling, diffusing, etc, etc. Finally, he'd scowl and say "I want ONE light, and I want right HERE!"

It was always beautiful. Simple is good.

Dave

Dave,

By gosh I think you got it. The Citation had great technical specs/maximum power for its day. Technical specs and maximum power were the rule of the day... The amp IMHO sounds like dung. So as a general rule folks knew the specs before they gave things a serious listen. Heck I'd take a zero feedback limited bandwidth all triode Pcat over it hands down [] broad bandwidth, high power and low distortion are important but the means used to achieve it are even more important IMHO. The Citation II fails the later IMHO.

The same basic problem happened when SS hit the market place.. People read the spec's and listened to the salesman quickly getting sold a bill of goods. Not that all SS amps today sound horrible mind you....so lets not go down that road. But the first generation SS that shows up at the Hi Fi shops in the late 60's were just plain horrible but people went nuts over them anyway.

[Mallette]

Score a hearty +2 for science!

Or, highly trained ears who've learned to ignore the source material and listen to the difference. Highly commendable, but of very little use to the music-oriented audiophile.

There's one guy down in Lousiana whose nose can detect petroleum in seafood nobody else can. He's staying busy, but I don't think the rest of us need to develop that talent.

Colin didn't mention the source material for his test. As I've said in the past, above speakers, amps, wires, cartridges, or any other thing in the audiophile arsenal, it all starts with the source material.

My corrollary: I prefer first class source material on Mark's 49.00 boom box to the run of the mill crap on the best money can buy. Further, I can detect it on ANYTHING. The one tweak I recommend without hesitation.

Dave

[DrWho]

Don, I don't really think Mark needs to attach numbers. I think his point is that a wire or a cable has physical properties that make it a "circuit" and he showed an example of such a circuit. I also feel that he wisely avoided the issue of attaching numbers since that would lead to endless discussions about various combinations of R, L and C's that might have an effect.

He has clearly shown that R. L And C does have a physical impact. It's .... physics!

Thanks Tom. Yes, that is the only argument I presented. I did so because many people seem to ask, even if rhetorically, "how can wire be different?" I think it is important to separate the physics argument about wire, which is simple, clear, objective, understandable and not controversial, from the marketing arguments about wires which are simply subjective. Or psychology arguments about how and why people hear what they hear (which I don't care about).

Why is it important? Because over the years, when small physics breakthroughs have been made in audio, there was always a huge, massive chorus of irrational dogmatic magic believers who would keep shouting "THAT CAN'T POSSIBLY MAKE A DIFFERENCE IN SOUND!!!" It happened when people began to discover new distortions, it happened when people discovered time alignments, it happened when people discovered differences in capacitors, tubes, transistors and on down the line.

The mystics and magicians who want to believe "all amplifiers sound the same" and "all CDP players sound the same" and "all wires sounds the same" and so on, need to be shown that this universe is governed by physics and scientists, not religion and it's priests and druids.

My argument contained no claims about how big the differences must be in order for any specific person to hear them under some specific conditions. That's because such claims are impossible to make. There is no testing mechanism involving humans that will definitively measure which changes are audible and which are not. I am making a philosophical argument about science, measurement and causation in audio. I am simply arguing against the dogmatic, religious "mystics" of audio who attempt to constantly deny science and mathematics with the argument that all things sound the same.

I'm a bit late to this thread, but I agree completely.

I also wanted to add a few random thoughts of my own...

The transmission model for the cable is incomplete without the source and load impedances defined, there will be an RLC on each of those as well, which will define the interaction with the transmission line.

Most audio equipment is designed to minimize the influence of the cable's transmisison model. That's why we have low output source impedances feeding high input load impedances.

Also related to impedance is the fact that higher input/output impedances are more susceptible to noise pickup. This is why your speaker cable doesn't need to be shielded (8ohms is small in the world of electronics), but your IC does (100kohms is rather large).

Most if not all audio engineers are in their profession because it's what they love to do, not because of the money. In fact, the breadth of expertise required to be an awesome audio engineer quickly makes one worth a lot more money in other industries, but the audio engineers stick around because they're the biggest users of their own creations. I bring this up for two reasons: One, as Mark pointed out, "our universe is govenred by physics and scientists"....no audio gear would exist without the people that create it. And then two, I find it very interesting that the uneducated want to argue with the educated about how the world works. I think part of that is due to the bad engineer that Mark refers to that wants to spread the religion of everything sounds the same, but I think a lot of that is instigated by the bad engineer's ego trip against the magical dogma of the golden-ear audiophile.

Well I'm probably opening up a huge can of worms, but all I wanted to say is that good audio engineers are using their ears and want to enjoy music just as much (if not more) than all the audiophiles out there. I think golden-ear audiophiles should get off their high horse and try to understand what the engineers are trying to communicate. I also think engineers should stay open-minded and be careful not to over-simplify the conclusions they arrive at.

This hobby should be about a humble investigation of what we like and don't like...not an ego trip claiming higher levels of refinement, nor a big hug fest to justify mediocrity. Arguments about "good enough" or "not good enough" are both rooted in pride in a "foolish hobby" (to paraphrase Mark's comments about a $49 boombox). However, I don't think exploring Creation and learning how the world works is foolish, but that's probably a discussion better saved for elsewhere.

Btw, I also wanted to stress the distinction between good audio engineers and bad audio engineers. I'd argue that the vast majority are not good...and ironically they tend to be the most vocal.

[Mallette]

Mike, I've looked back through the thread and don't find anyone debating scientists. "Meaningful" comes up more often than not. You are a very high priest of science in the design of amplifiers. I'd find it rather strange if you did not hear things that mean nothing to me, just as I'd find it strange if a Stradivarius restorer did not hear things I could not.

As about the only individual I know of here with significant experience in location recording of purely acoustic music it's hardly surprising that it's in the source material that I hear things that don't seem to much matter to most. The largest difference in two tubes, capacitors, or interconnects means nothing to me compared to the wrong mike at the wrong place, recording the wrong instrument played by the wrong person. On the other hand, when all those things are lined up, a factory car stereo becomes a concert hall to me and I hear nothing but music.

Of course, one can then say "Why do you need Klipschorns, a tube amp and preamp, etc, etc?" Well, because I can and these things provide a far more transparent window on the acoustic space/time event I am reliving.

The only argument I've made here is that the differences between Belden or Mogami interconnects and 100% copper speaker wire of adequate gauge for the current are audible only to those who've intensely concentrated on such differences. No doubt to them it's huge. To me, it's like moving the furniture around my listening room. It makes a difference because I know every inch of the place acoustically...but it doesn't really affect the accuracy of the system and I rarely get up and move something because of it.

However, I throw down the gauntlet when it comes to the religion of science. That science can't even deal with simple issues like physcial immoratility or the nature of gravity. My wife works at a research institution connect to NASA, and I am constantly amazed at the regular chagrin as they find things from Cassini, Lcross, etc that completely alter what was yesterdays absolute truth.

The minute somebody starts with "Scientists say..." my skepticism levels go up to max.

There is certainly room for improvement in audio and I am carefully watching a number of technologies. However, all that was absolutely necessary to reproducing first class source material cleanly enough to bring any music lover to tears in less than a minute was in place by the 70's. I know this because I experienced it in PWK's listening lab and I've never heard anything significantly better.

Now, if you take those kilobuck interconnects and cut them in varying lengths, then string them tautly, I've no doubt I'll hear a diffence when I pluck them.

Until then, I'll settle for my Beldens and Mogami and continue my search for source material remotely worthy of my system. For those of us who listen through, rather than to, equipment, it's a better return on investment.

Dave

[Cut-Throat]

Mark,

Just tell us what kind of IC's and Speaker cable you use. I'll just go out and get some.

I know I would exhaust myself trying to compare them all.

thanks[]

[DrWho]

Mike, I've looked back through the thread and don't find anyone debating scientists.

I dunno, it's kind of implied when people would rather subscribe to mystic reasons for the cable sounding different. The physics are very clearly understood...and the frustrating part is those that understand the physics are saying that it is straightforward and inexpensive to design/choose a cable that will not be the weakest link in the chain. At the same time, other companies are capitalizing on the mysticism to make an extra buck - maybe if I were better at marketing I wouldn't be bitter about it []

For what it's worth, I have the "privilege" (more like torture) of dealing with the parasitic effects of "cables" (traces on a circuit board) just about every day since I've been at Shure. The size, length, width and location of a single trace can have a huge impact on the final performance, but we allow the circuits to be designed that way because we have control over what happens inside the box (that and there's no practical alternative). I would by no means consider myself an amplifier guru (far from it actually), but my understanding of transmission lines (or just the flow of electrical energy in general) continues to grow, and I've not come across anything thus far that has changed my perception of audio interconnect behavior. I still firmly believe that if a difference is heard, then something is either wrong with the listener or one or both of the cables... []

The only argument I've made here is that the differences between Belden or Mogami interconnects and 100% copper speaker wire of adequate gauge for the current are audible only to those who've intensely concentrated on such differences. No doubt to them it's huge. To me, it's like moving the furniture around my listening room. It makes a difference because I know every inch of the place acoustically...but it doesn't really affect the accuracy of the system and I rarely get up and move something because of it.

I think essentially what you're describing here is what I like to refer to as "acoustic focus"....and it's kind of along the lines of those silly pictures that could be perceived as two things at once....like the two faces or the vase thing (anyone know what I'm talking about?). Or the Magic Eye pictures might be a better example. One of the fun things I've learned while mixing live sound, is that when a musician asks for more of themselves in the monitor, I can usually turn them down and they'll think it's louder.....and it's mostly just because they've changed the focus of their listening. I think the very same thing happens when we choose to either listen to the music, or to the equipment. And if I may be so bold, I might suggest the vast majority in this hobby have no clue what they're focusing on, but just simply enjoy exploring the sound-scape.