joshnich Posted January 27, 2014 Share Posted January 27, 2014 I am enjoying the thread. And yes it makes me miss the old days of different opinions enthusiastically presented and defended. I learned a great deal back then!I am in the “ cables make a difference camp” I find them similar to tube rolling. The cables at least to me that have the most impact are the interconnects. Not so much between the pre amp and the amp, but for the various components particularly with the TT. Because of the improvement in sound I get with fancy smancy interconnects, I have had my tonearm rewired to great satisfaction. Your mileage may vary - and that’s OK! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joshnich Posted January 27, 2014 Share Posted January 27, 2014 havent posted in a while and I notice that there is a warning points notation under my post total. What's that? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tigerwoodKhorns Posted January 27, 2014 Share Posted January 27, 2014 havent posted in a while and I notice that there is a warning points notation under my post total. What's that? Uh oh, if it says zero watch out, you are all out of warning posts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thaddeus Smith Posted January 27, 2014 Share Posted January 27, 2014 mine says zero. :| Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pzannucci Posted January 27, 2014 Share Posted January 27, 2014 Zero warning points. It would be interesting to find out when you do get picked for this list. I notice I have it and have no clue what it was there for or why. Perhaps the moderator could enlighten us. Secondly... Check out these 45,000 dollar patch cords, Marty...that's a lot of bud boxes and cake pans... http://www.thecableco.com/Product/Siltech-Emperor-Double-Crown Even the name of them reeks of excessive wealth. "unmatched performance in the soundstage of your imagination." LSD 25 can do the same for less cost. OTOH, a guy can hear differences in different patch cords if he tries hard enough. I also like the terminology in the ad. "performance in the soundstage of your imagination" For $45000 you shouldn't have to use your imagination. You should be right there, unless you have a little help as Mike said. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psg Posted January 27, 2014 Share Posted January 27, 2014 (edited) I would think that 0 warnings means you haven't received any warnings yet. Mine is still at zero. Edited January 27, 2014 by psg Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tigerwoodKhorns Posted January 27, 2014 Share Posted January 27, 2014 I would think that 0 warnings means you haven't received any warnings yet. Mine is still at zero. Nope, zero means you have used them all up, need to buy more from Chad. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest " " Posted January 27, 2014 Share Posted January 27, 2014 we need a blind test with coat hangers vs monster cable sigma retro to see which will really win. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tarheel Posted January 27, 2014 Share Posted January 27, 2014 I would think that 0 warnings means you haven't received any warnings yet. Mine is still at zero. Nope, zero means you have used them all up, need to buy more from Chad. Chad is out as well.....been locking too many threads Black market rate is $17-20 for a package of three! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebes Posted January 28, 2014 Author Share Posted January 28, 2014 we need a blind test with coat hangers vs monster cable sigma retro to see which will really win. Been there , done that, will post the link when I find it. No discernible difference to my mind, but i was wearing my tin foil cap at the time to keep the voices away so that may affected the results. Now come on now Mark. In a $13 trillion economy with the one percenters controlling 99 percent of it , they could buy $45k cable all day long without enough trickling down to pay for even one school lunch, not that purveyors of snake oil cable would ever bother to help a poor person. Nope I can only conclude that having failed to carry the day against The Might Thebes, you have descended into silliness to cover your chagrin. After all which of is is more knowledgeable about all things electronic. Somebody with an engineering degree, or somebody who read an ad in Popular Mechanics on how to send away for a book to learn about electronics. Sadly I was short the 3 cent stamp that month so I never did get the book Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zen Traveler Posted January 28, 2014 Share Posted January 28, 2014 You two channel dudes are a riot/trip. Thebes being God's scientific messenger and Mark arguing the virtues of Capitalism makes me think I've stepped into the Twilight Zone... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted January 29, 2014 Share Posted January 29, 2014 Mark, your observations about audio being the only place where people will debate the legitimacy of someone's opinions (if that's a fair summary) is definitely interesting. It's actually something I've been noticing, but lacked the right context and words to express it meaningfully. That said, I started thinking about these other areas ( like paintings and wine and whatnot) and realized that it might actually happen there too. It just takes a different form, and I think a large part of that could be related to the fewer demographics involved. Was your post on this in the other thread? It's a bit brutal searching with a phone, but I wanted to quote it and expand further. Dean, could you post those articles again here so I can find it in the "My Content" section? I didn't get in before the lock ( which is weak sauce btw). 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ClaudeJ1 Posted January 29, 2014 Share Posted January 29, 2014 These effects of wire are may be audible. If you can't hear them on your own, how is it beneficial to you to take the advice of some third party who hears them? What sort of idea is that? I don't mean that recommendations are not important - they are. What I mean is that if you are in doubt about the effects of wire, LISTEN rather than proclaiming what others may have heard. I would like to remark that it is important to try any component in your own system before buying it. Listening to demonstrations at a store won't tell you how the component that you're interested in will perform in your system. Even if you are purchasing a complete system from the store, you won't know how the speakers will sound in your room until you get home. Yes and the room acoustics.......hmmmm....let's see......make about a plus or minus 15 db peak/trough ratio difference on the sound (1,000: 1) vs. .000000001 db for cables, and where is the money spent first? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don Richard Posted January 29, 2014 Share Posted January 29, 2014 Anything that I refer to as the sonic benefit of a cable or wire has nothing whatever to do with frequency response curves, dips, peaks, valleys, or mountains. Those anomolies are farther down my priority list. Wire benefits clarity, space, liveliness, distortions, smearing and attributes like that. Aah, the smell of bullshit in the morning. It smells like... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
minermark Posted January 29, 2014 Share Posted January 29, 2014 Mark, your observations about audio being the only place where people will debate the legitimacy of someone's opinions (if that's a fair summary) is definitely interesting. It's actually something I've been noticing, but lacked the right context and words to express it meaningfully. That said, I started thinking about these other areas ( like paintings and wine and whatnot) and realized that it might actually happen there too. It just takes a different form, and I think a large part of that could be related to the fewer demographics involved. Was your post on this in the other thread? It's a bit brutal searching with a phone, but I wanted to quote it and expand further. Dean, could you post those articles again here so I can find it in the "My Content" section? I didn't get in before the lock ( which is weak sauce btw). 'Debate the legitimacy of someone's opinions' dam Doc, never thought of it like that. im just a simple workin joe who ran solid state for 30+ years, went to tubes about 10 years ago, learned tubes for the first five, been enjoying tube systems for the last five, and now for the rest of my days. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don Richard Posted January 29, 2014 Share Posted January 29, 2014 (edited) The only thing wire can do is to degrade the signal that flows through it. Well designed cables damage the signal less than poor designs. We can measure all of the characteristics of a cable that pertain to it's ability to carry the signal that it is designed to carry. A perfect cable would have zero capacitance, zero inductance, zero resistance, zero dielectric absorption and would be constructed so that outside electrical interference would not impact the signal the cable carries. Of course the perfect cable cannot be made. The materials we have to work with will cause it to have capacitance, inductance, resistance, and dielectric absorption. Various methods of construction will cause variations in a cable's capacitance, inductance, and resistance. For example, spacing the conductors of a two wire cable will decrease the cable's capacitance while increasing it's inductance with the resistance remaining the same in either case. Because of these factors designing a cable is a balancing act that involves compromises. What the designer needs to do is to first consider what the cable is to be used for. With audio we are dealing with relatively low frequency alternating current at relatively low voltage levels and with home audio the lengths of cable that are needed are fairly short, usually tens of feet at the most. This relieves the designer from needing to consider things like transmission line effects and losses that are important at radio frequencies and higher. Because of the short cable lengths involved with home audio setups the amount of capacitance, inductance, and resistance is fairly low. So low that there should be no effect on an audio signal in the case of a well designed cable. However, the cable is used between two pieces of equipment. There could be certain combinations of impedances from the equipment that would result in a small measurable effect that would change when the cable was changed. Please note that although the effect can be measured it would not be audible to humans in most cases. The cable would have to be intentionally designed to have capacitance, inductance, and resistance high enough to greatly damage the signal so as to have significant audible effects. The cable used between a CD transport and a DAC is another matter because it is carrying a digital signal in the megahertz range. That doesn't mean that it needs to be expensive. Ordinary coaxial cable is better than good enough in this application. Don't use a cable designed for analog as a digital cable as it can cause audible ill effects. When reading the ads from a cable company beware if they start talking about: clarity, space, liveliness, distortions, smearing and attributes like that. because they are conning you. Good cable design has everything to do with minimizing: dips, peaks, valleys, or mountains in the audio signal because those are the attributes which lower distortion and increase clarity. Edited January 29, 2014 by Don Richard 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zen Traveler Posted January 29, 2014 Share Posted January 29, 2014 I don't have a dog in this debate but after following these discussions for years can't ever remember someone being able to pick their wire apart from others...That said, Mark's argument about those that don't have the time or inclination to test wires may as well buy the expensive ones to put their mind to rest because those would definitely work seems legit, Does one set of wires sound better than another set of wires? Who cares...Some of us brag we buy Blue Jean and Monoprice cables others Monster cable and as was mentioned everyone can be happy unless they have to come online and defend their choice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ski Bum Posted January 29, 2014 Share Posted January 29, 2014 Mark's argument about those that don't have the time or inclination to test wires may as well buy the expensive ones to put their mind to rest because those would definitely work seems legit, Only if the goal is to spend more on wire than basic functionality demands. Expensive wire is audio homeopathy for those suffering audio nervosa. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zen Traveler Posted January 29, 2014 Share Posted January 29, 2014 (edited) Mark's argument about those that don't have the time or inclination to test wires may as well buy the expensive ones to put their mind to rest because those would definitely work seems legit, Only if the goal is to spend more on wire than basic functionality demands. Well, there lies the crux of the matter...What you want and where the person I described above may differ is that one of y'all doesn't mind purchasing designer cable and is satisfied with their decision. You otoh, may have bought expensive cable and experimented and didn't find any difference...Either way, you both got what you wanted is how I view mark's point--pure Capitalism. Edited January 29, 2014 by tkdamerica Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ski Bum Posted January 29, 2014 Share Posted January 29, 2014 Yeah, I hear you, but I also seem to be able to compartmentalize the good science from the bad business. It's great that exploitative business practices based on the mutability of human perception and the power of suggestion keep the economic wheels turning, for whatever marginal effect the magic wire market has in the grand scheme of things, but that doesn't make a very convincing technical justification for expensive speaker wire. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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