I say, buy the better cables--find a nice used set at half price, and they will be with you through many improvements of gear. The cheaper cables will be left behind at your first upgrade, and you will be left wanting. Try to make your own power cords--not difficult at all.
Opening a can of worms
Here is the can filled with opinions. It's been hashed and rehashed to infinity and beyond with no clear result. Since I am a seeker of truth I'll post my thoughts here for the yea and naysayers to debate over. Question is: Are expensive speaker or any other cable in a system worth the exorbitant cost over a reasonably priced cable loom? I thought I'd experiment myself to find out. My comparison is between Transparent Ultra cable loom and Blue Jeans cable loom on a pure stereo system comprised of Proceed PAV, Proceed PDSD, Krell Kav 250, Musical Fidelity A3cd, Sony Ps4300 TT and B&W 803D2 speakers. All sources were used by this experiment using identical playback material. Cables had in excess of 200 hrs burn time and all were identical in lenght. The only variation were the connector manufacturers.
One change that occurred during this 4 week long endeavor was that I'm firmly seated on the sharpest picket on the fence.
My result is that I'm now a believer that there are audible differences in cables. I also believe that these differences are minute and one has to really listen carefully and for a long time to discern these differences.
Now to the crutch of the matter, $$$$$, As we all know Transparent Cables would reside in the upper tier of Audio Cable expense. Blue Jeans Cable on the other hand falls into the lowest tier of expense (well maybe not lowest but low nontheless )
One would think then that the Transparent would be far superior to the BJs. Not really! Yes the highs were a little cleaner, mids a little tighter and lows a tad more pronounced but not by as much as one would expect. Soundstage was somewhat more open and airy and depth was somewhat more defined with the higher priced cable but again less than one would expect.
Now for my personal opinion regarding the cable debate: expensive cable looms are slightly better than reasonable priced looms, if a dollar equals a penny to you then by all means opt for the higher priced loom, if a penny equals a penny don't be ashamed for opting for the best you can do. The differences are so minute that it's not worth going into debt over. BOTH looms sounded superb on my test system and I would be happy with either loom.
Now let the debate begin, just know I'm a fence sitter and not in one camp or the other
One change that occurred during this 4 week long endeavor was that I'm firmly seated on the sharpest picket on the fence.
My result is that I'm now a believer that there are audible differences in cables. I also believe that these differences are minute and one has to really listen carefully and for a long time to discern these differences.
Now to the crutch of the matter, $$$$$, As we all know Transparent Cables would reside in the upper tier of Audio Cable expense. Blue Jeans Cable on the other hand falls into the lowest tier of expense (well maybe not lowest but low nontheless )
One would think then that the Transparent would be far superior to the BJs. Not really! Yes the highs were a little cleaner, mids a little tighter and lows a tad more pronounced but not by as much as one would expect. Soundstage was somewhat more open and airy and depth was somewhat more defined with the higher priced cable but again less than one would expect.
Now for my personal opinion regarding the cable debate: expensive cable looms are slightly better than reasonable priced looms, if a dollar equals a penny to you then by all means opt for the higher priced loom, if a penny equals a penny don't be ashamed for opting for the best you can do. The differences are so minute that it's not worth going into debt over. BOTH looms sounded superb on my test system and I would be happy with either loom.
Now let the debate begin, just know I'm a fence sitter and not in one camp or the other
216 responses Add your response
Suttle improvements in cable changes can represent a milestone for many. However I can change interconnects and hear a noticeable difference providing this is done on the same day. One time I ordered a new pair of Cardas interconnects and was such a revelation that it was as if I purchased a new power amp and or preamp. |
Damn the torpedoes and full speed ahead, my droogies! 👁 In the never ending story. of better sound and how to find it one always finds exasperated knuckledragging angry angst ridden ruffians plotting to bring the whole juggernaut down and pervert the whole scientific process and squash the joy of discovery. Killjoys, name droppers, name callers, pill poppers, drive by shooters, pile it up, pile it up, higher, higher. An ordinary man has no means of deliverance. Illegitimi non carborundum. Made the scene Week to week Day to day Hour to hour The gate is straight Deep and wide Break on through to the other side Break on through to the other side |
@shadorne Congratulations, you have stumbled upon a truth! Air it is. But what is it that is sealing in what air is there around the wire, eh? That is where the burn-in takes place. I just visited over a half dozen audio manufacturer sites that discussed the issue of component and cable burn-in. Most recognized the controversy surrounding this elusive issue but ALL recognized its absolute existence. This includes manufacturers who do not sell any products meant to address burn-in. In their own product development and listening tests, burn-in is readily heard and anecdotally is reinforced by customers who, after putting newly purchased cables into their system heard a harshness and lack of body to the sound relative to the cables that had previously inhabited that space in their system. The manufacturer's response is to allow time for the cables to burn-in. Voila! Problem solved. As stated before...I sympathize with your inability to hear this well-recognized phenomenon. To Area 51 with you!😋 |
@shadorne of course not, as that would be a silly assertion. Air is the "best" dielectric which accounts for cable manufacturers such as Audioquest who have been, for several years now, been using either PE tubes or Teflon tubes as the physical dielectric to minimize the physical dielectric's contact with the conductors, thus rendering "air" as the substantive dielectric in their designs. Might be instructive for others to weigh in on their experience with "air tube" dielectrics versus "wire coating" dielectrics which may make burn-in even more critical as those contacting dielectrics must "form" through burn in and in my experience yield a greater magnitude of sonic improvement through burn-in. |
@hifiman5 How about you look it up instead of just making it up. You're talking about a few picofarad per foot. The mechanism that drives cap break-in is that the feet or yards of thin conductor actually move around and the dielectric seats around it. You're going to tell me the conductor and insulation are moving around? And if so, why would you even want that? It's well know premium cable makers deliberately build their cables with high capacitance. Wanna tell me why that's a good thing too? Seems to me the best cable would be the least reactive, not one designed to be as reactive as possible. You seem to be calling reactivity virtue for some reason. Explain yourself. |
@kosst_amojan Interesting. You seem fixated on capacitor break-in and by comparison I suppose it seems like I am stuck on the issue of cable burn-in. to each their own. You said..."Seems to me the best cable would be the least reactive, not one designed to be as reactive as possible. You seem to be calling reactivity virtue for some reason." Don't know what I've written here that brings you to that assertion. I've had quite a number of different interconnects pass through my systems over the years. In all instances burn-in yielded a sonic benefit usually in the form of dynamic musical swing, smoothness of treble and upper midrange and openness of the soundspace. I have never addressed technical measurements ie. capacitance, inductance etc. I care about what I hear and realize the obvious, that not all aspects that affect sound can be measured. |
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@hifiman5 Thank you but I am actually the one who has no worries about dielectric burn-in. I don’t worry about the fact that the dielectric air around cables is constantly changing and therefore for a fact that the cable can never ever fully burn-in. (I know that these effects are totally negligible and of the order of a butterfly flapping its wings half way across the otherside of the globe and somehow affecting my subwoofer response) |
No, no, no, @hifiman5 . Unlike your cable break-in myth, my statements about cap break-in are supposed by actual science. Go over to ELNA's website and look up their white paper on their silk cap paper. If your break-in myth had any truth to it then there would be audible microphonic effects and cables just don't do that. You're just lying to yourself. |
@hifiman5 Considering you're clearly lifting a statement out of context and ignoring where I told you to look, uh.... You're pretty stupid. Let me know when you get those ears calibrated. I'm not sure they're the problem though. Again, you didn't read what I said. I never said your ears lie to you. I said you like to yourself. That suggests your brain itself is faulty, as does your very poor reading comprehension. Now go get butt-hurt and report this. |
@hifiman5's avatar > An ambassador of forum peace. Ahhhhhh 😇 Blindjim > Just re-stating the obvious. bringer of Peace? Nope. Prophet, philosopher, queller of wars, puller offer of wool over eyes. Echo of other people’s important audio experience and cool audiophiliac sayings. lol = = = = = = = @geoffkait > “….exasperated knuckledragging angry angst ridden ruffians plotting to bring the whole juggernaut down and pervert the whole scientific process and squash the joy of discovery. Killjoys, name droppers, name callers, pill poppers, drive by shooters…” Blindjim > keep your day job. This one ain’t paying off! BTW how you allowed yourself to continually post such mediocre juvenile, condescending embarrassing nonsense astonishes me. 7K posts… minus all the inane jokes and senseless prattle and you’d have what? 500 or 600 worthwhile posts? As to your baseless insinuations… When ‘joy’ was killed I was not there and have pictures to prove it. I ride horses, not angst’s, and am seldom angry unless forced to suffer fools, like at the DMV, or with the Cable provider.. my knuckles do not drag the floor. I wear gloves. Science is perverted only on Wednesday nights and then only if it is holding a western saddle, a pair of jumper cables while wearing a welder’s mask and bunny slippers. I’ll leave the name calling and pill popping to those who it appears are better at it than me. I got past all that noise sometime after 5th or 6th grade. Until, and unless you’ve been involved in an invasion, or drive by, and coped with it favorably with near no sight, you’ve nothing to offer, and should not, unless some inner compulsion to demonstrate sheer ignorance is beond your control. BTW… I’d see somebody about that OCD thingy, soon. Its only funny to you, and you should mention that to the Dr on your initial visit. = = = = = = @dynaquest4 > “For someone who seems to want to squash this discussion….” Blindjim > say what? Where do you get that? Its obvious you did not read what I said, no prob. There’s ton’s of that going on around here all the time. Its why arguments ensue, persist, and unfortified assertions fly around like bees at a hive. Every post here is as worthy as the next one, isn’t it? Its as worthy as your’s. I offered merely perspectives. Agree. Disagree. Makes me no mind. Infer something which is not there and we have a communication breakdown. Or perhaps a reading and comprehension issue. Of course, another explanation could fit, if a member has an issue with another merely due to bias, presumptions, input from others who know nothing more, or at all, well, then that’s understandable. Silly. Stupid. But understandable to think one knows someone when one actually does not. Projection gets folks into trouble as it is ‘scientifically’ irrational. Unless they are a mind reader! Quick! What color am I thinking of? What? Too many words? Why? Did you have to catch a bus? If ADD is an issue, I’m sorry. But really, 3 or 4 minutes? Shheesh. Lastly: …if you feel all that plagiaristic folderol geoffkait strucke was clever , it explains a lot. Even to a friend I’d draw a line on that much bull. To each their own. = = = == = @samzx12 > “…around the block…..” Blindjim > Thanks. Very kind. Block? yep. Several times and still rolling by some unknown Grace. Although, I’m not trying to convince anyone to bat for the other team here. Just demonstrating a more practical side of life for those of us not employed by N.A.S.A., or M.I.T. and or are currently having their Oscilloscopes recalibrated. I gave mine to the Salvation Army. I think. Maybe it was a kid On Halloween. Dunno. = = = = = = The jury is out anecdotally or scientifically on the wire run in biz. I mean if you add all of them up I feel it will be a draw. Inconclusive. Too close to call. Sure that is speculation, but I sure ain’t scouring the web, to add them all up and find out. Which means, you be the judge. We be the judge. I feel I’ve been able to discern changes with time passing a signal in external cables, or from electricity in power cords. But that’s just me. But people read or hear what they want to, regardless the truth or proof, same thing. I showed how preposterous some lengths can be with the rocking chair demo mentioned earlier. It always comes to one thing. You. me. And our ears, biases, and preffs. Loads of other factors exist and persist no one ever mentions lately. Temperatures. Time of day for the listening sessions. Humidity which affects are hearing and speakers. Physical health. Emotional well being. The family cat sleeping on the speakerwires behind the rack. Least of all, is anything wrong or declining in our hearing? Its our best judgement at the time. Hear it? Like it? Can afford it? Then freakin’ buy it. End of story. Well, not for the ones who are argumentatively predisposed, bi polar, manic, OCD, or simply must oppress any notion not their own. If Bill Nye, the Science Guy came to my house with cables, told me these were the hot ticket none better on this rock, well, I’d try them to see. Meaning I’d still be skeptical until I was satisfied they were better than what I had. But best in the world? No. I’d still be skeptical regardless. ‘cause I’ve not tried every wire in the planet, and don’t plan on it.. Its said here a lot, take it with a grain of salt. How did that adage get kicked to the curb when it came to what wire makers say of their wares? It holds large when folks review reviews and or reviewers articles on gear and accessories. Suddenly, makers accounts, reviews, becomes ‘Scientific fact’ if it can even remotely be applied to some other area of audioland to support one’s view point on any subject.. It seems just another black hole for endless contention. I’ll begin buying the purely based on science aspect for every instance of audio gear, when I find a pocket sized, talking, evaluating and measuring device that runs on batteries I can carry into a a listening room at the dealership and use to eliminate the pretenders from the contenders. Maybe Amazon has some. Till then I’ll do it the same way anyone else does it, by using my own eears EXP, as much honesty as I can muster, and my wallet. Although it’s a well kept secret here, I’m betting the overwhelming majority of audiophiles do it the exact same way when it gets right down to the nitty gritty. . |
Blindjim...I suspect no one actually read that laborious, long, rambling post of yours. Please try to pre-think your responses and attempt to be succinct and concise enough that others here will actually read what you have to say. Unless, of course, you are one of those who is the digital equivalent of one who likes to hear himself talk...in which case, you are likely very proud of yourself. |
dynaquest4 Blindjim...I suspect no one actually read that laborious, long, rambling post of yours. Please try to pre-think your responses and attempt to be succinct and concise enough that others here will actually read what you have to say. Unless, of course, you are one of those who is the digital equivalent of one who likes to hear himself talk...in which case, you are likely very proud of yourself. >>>>>Yeah, right. You are the model we all should follow. 🐑 🚶🏻🏃🏻🚶🏻🚶🏻 |
....yeah, also referred to as The Aristotelian Fallacy....which some see as a major tenet in the science as religion/the absolute truth movement...also see Russell’s Paradox which plays on the same theme...or as Bateson said, " the name is not the thing named".... ...nicely puts Man’s self-anointed "brilliance" into perspective, where the reality is its just institutional hubris back-stopped by numbers and a bunch of formulas ( this is the modern version, in the not modern version chants, rituals and prayers are substituted for the formulas.....and the effect is more or less the same....we know very little about nature but we have to convince ourselves we do, otherwise existance can be pretty frightening...).... |
I am also fond of, "Perception gets in the way between reality and ourselves." In audiophile terms we are quite naive to believe what we hear is simply the result of the sum of the technical specifications of the electronics and the parameters of the room, the house AC, weather conditions, all the usual mundane audiophile jibber jabber. The great unexplored universe of perception lies beyond this vale of tears. 😢 |
@geoffkait Nice post. I am struck by the angry responses from those who disagree with something YOU are hearing. Only I truly know what my ears are perceiving as I listen. In the same way, I can't disprove what you or anyone else is hearing. Whether it can be measured or not is immaterial to me. I'm not listening through a set of scientific measurements but rather the elegantly designed human ear. All of our chemistry is different. There are so many different human variables at play. I can and have heard sonic differences as cables burn-in. Period. If someone else hasn't it doesn't invalidate my experience. On a personal note, I have always had highly sensitive ears. Example...as a kid, there was a department store in a nearby town that I didn't enter because the florescent lights gave off a high pitched whine that I found very annoying. Because of my awareness of the sensitivity of my hearing I have endeavored to protect it. Any activity I engage in that involves a loud persistent noise, ie. vacuuming, mowing weed whacking etc. I wear ear plugs. On the flip side of that I have a suppressed sense of smell and unfortunately, taste. I would never critique someone's cooking or wine selection because I know that those two senses for me are compromised. It's just who I am. If there are audiophiles who truly cannot hear cables burn-in or other difficult to perceive sonic events, that may just be them. And that's fine. It doesn't mean they can't be discerning listeners and comment intelligently on the hobby. In closing, perhaps we all have to be a bit more cognizant of our personal uniqueness and accept that, rather than get angry that we're not all alike. |
Agreed we are all different. Some brains are more wired to fanciful wishful thinking and some are more logical with a higher degree of rationality. Does this affect what we thinkwe hear - absolutely! If fuses or wires made a difference to equipment performance it is rational to expect these affects would be well known and many industries (hospitals, military, IT, airlines, manufacturers etc.) would all be purchasing these audiophile specialty products for the increased precision they bring to any electronic device. |
@shadorne I can, without reservation state that I am a logical, sequential left-brained thinker prone to wanting all things rationally explained, but I know I hear differences in cables burned in or not. Just because there are such perceived differences, the nature of those differences would not, I suspect matter or apply to hospitals, etc. There are, I'm sure, differences in visual acuity of test equipment (imaging) that would indeed matter to a doctor who is examining an Xray, MRI or mammogram image. I doubt that the qualities that affect my aural perception would be applicable to their desire for more acute visual perception. |
So special wires and fuses are ONLY critical in audio sound quality? Nobody else has a need for special performance tuned $50 110 volt AC fuses. Nobody else has a need for better performance from $1000 wires to run 3 feet? Seriously, how could anybody buy into this kind of logic? It is predicated on audio equipment being somehow different from all other electronics. Why wouldn't your digital camera provide shaper images and better color from a better USB cable. Why woudn't all printers or PC perform that much better with a better fuse? Why do people upgrade RAM in PCs but nobody buys special digital performance PC fuses so that the digital bits have rounder zeros and sharper 1s? Why wouldn't your car run better and faster with a different fuse or specialist battery cables - after all modern cars all run on electronics? |
In case you glossed over, forgot, or simply didn't retain what you read from other threads, audio fuses are rebranded specialty fuses that are used in medical, military, aerospace, and important IT functions, among others. They're called high rupturing fuses. Google it. Now that they've been around awhile (what, two decades?) some audio makes have specified certain builds and styles (think real hard) like SR who have the factory do it or BeesWax, who go and do it themselves after buying audio fuse stock. Do you honestly believe that SR has their own fuse factory? Please. And as for your analogy regarding printers and cabling, to call that the same as audio reproduction is both a silly and lazy argument. Not well thought out at all. All the best, Nonoise |
@shadorne You're arguing with audio Scientologists. They will only believe the dogma the quack gurus sell them at great price. Never mind that the people who actually make the music don't concern themselves with hocus pocus such as fuses and magic wires. They're not going to let that kind of rational thinking get in their way. |
Ah, the Crusader Rabbits are hard at work today. Let us pause and reflect. note to self: apparently the naysayers are just being superstitious. "Superstition, ignorance, denial, disinformation, taboo..." That makes sense! 🙈 🙉 🙊 OK, it's that time again, boys and girls. "Seeing with humility, curiosity and fresh eyes was once the main point of science. But today it is often a different story. As the scientific enterprise has been bent toward exploitation, institutionalization, hyperspecialization and new orthodoxy, it has increasingly preoccupied itself with disconnected facts in a psychological, social and ecological vacuum. So disconnected has official science become from the greater scheme of things, that it tends to deny or disregard entire domains of reality and to satisfy itself with reducing all of life and consciousness to a dead physics. As the millennium turns, science seems in many ways to be treading the weary path of the religions it presumed to replace. Where free, dispassionate inquiry once reigned, emotions now run high in the defense of a fundamentalized "scientific truth." As anomalies mount up beneath a sea of denial, defenders of the Faith and the Kingdom cling with increasing self-righteousness to the hull of a sinking paradigm. Faced with provocative evidence of things undreamt of in their philosophy, many otherwise mature scientists revert to a kind of skeptical infantilism characterized by blind faith in the absoluteness of the familiar. Small wonder, then, that so many promising fields of inquiry remain shrouded in superstition, ignorance, denial, disinformation, taboo . . . and debunkery." |
Am I the only one who sees the supreme irony and hypocrisy of these snake oil suckers and salesmen appealing to the virtue of scientific open-mindedness to defend there completely unscientific opinions and claims? Good science doesn’t begin with being a gullible fool. Good science doesn’t mean believing the snake oil in the face of all known theory disputing it. Nobody is hearing .001 ohm differences in a fuse. That’s just your imagination. Oh... Great Scientology rant there, Geoff. You forgot about the audio thetans though. |
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kosst_amojan You're arguing with audio Scientologists. They will only believe the dogma ...I don't care how goofy you think someone else's religion is; using it in a demeaning way here is a just simple disgrace. You've just revealed yourself to be nothing but another ignorant bigot. |
kosst_amojan ... I genuinely pity you. I’m more than happy to be recognized as a bigot ...Yup, that figures. Bigotry and ignorance go hand-in-hand. |
