The only difference between Geoff's snake oil and that of other snake oil sellers is that it is a bit more obvious. At least this scam is still quite cheap compared to $599 bi-wire jumpers from Nordost.
Directionality of wire
I am a fan of Chris Sommovigo's Black Cat and Airwave interconnects. I hope he does not mind me quoting him or naming him on this subject, but Chris does not mark directionality of his IC's. I recently wrote him on the subject and he responded that absent shunting off to ground/dialectric designs, the idea of wire directionality is a complete myth. Same with resistors and fuses. My hunch is that 95% of IC "manufacturers", particularly the one man operations of under $500 IC's mark directionality because they think it lends the appearance of technical sophistication and legitimacy. But even among the "big boys", the myth gets thrown around like so much accepted common knowledge. Thoughts? Someone care to educate me on how a simple IC or PC or speaker cable or fuse without a special shunting scheme can possibly have directionality? It was this comment by Stephen Mejias (then of Audioquest and in the context of Herb Reichert's review of the AQ Niagra 1000) that prompts my question;
Thank you for the excellent question. AudioQuest provided an NRG-10 AC cable for the evaluation. Like all AudioQuest cables, our AC cables use solid conductors that are carefully controlled for low-noise directionality. We see this as a benefit for all applications -- one that becomes especially important when discussing our Niagara units. Because our AC cables use conductors that have been properly controlled for low-noise directionality, they complement the Niagara System’s patented Ground-Noise Dissipation Technology. Other AC cables would work, but may or may not allow the Niagara to reach its full potential. If you'd like more information on our use of directionality to minimize the harmful effects of high-frequency noise, please visit http://www.audioquest.com/directionality-its-all-about-noise/ or the Niagara 1000's owner's manual (available on our website).
Thanks again.
Stephen Mejias
AudioQuest
Read more at https://www.stereophile.com/content/gramophone-dreams-15-audioquest-niagara-1000-hifiman-he1000-v2-p...
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The crazy thing is I think he's sitting on a gold mine. If he didn't take it so seriously and dropped the prices a little bit these would make awesome gag gifts for that obsessed audiophile in your life. I love the Codename Blue Meanies. That's exactly the kind of thing I might stick on things just to tell people that they're manipulating your subconscious. That's exactly my style of humor. |
Geoff is actually a magnanimous and beneficent soul. Not infrequently he suggests tweaks that would cost the user nothing, and that provide him with no monetary return. An example is the following excerpt from his post dated 9-7-2012 in this thread: Taking all telephone books out of the house will usually be audible when you go back and listen to the system. Even if the telephone books are in other rooms of the house, they should be removed. The telephone book is perceived as an intruder by virtue of the fact that it is linked to a strong Field created by the tens or hundreds of thousands of identical telephone books. So, the link to that field can be eliminated by removing the telephone books from the house, making the house Safe from the telephone book "information field".Regards, -- Al :-) |
I've spent the last few hours looking over his site when I have a minute and my face hurts from laughing so hard. Geoff is awesome! His stuff is so weird and crazy that it really blurs the lines between tweak, snake oil, and gag. He really does take snake oil to a whole new level. We'd be in a lot of trouble if he sold medical products and services, but his stuff is at least harmless. |
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