Testing audiophile claims and myths - Page 115

You do when there is no reason to think that cables will make much (if any) difference, regardless of how much you spent on them. 

Quote:

Originally Posted by jnorris 

Am I missing something?  Shouldn't $2000 cables sound amazingly clean and open at first listen and to all listeners?  Do you really have to work this hard to hear a difference after spending that much money?

Taxes are the perfect example of spending a lot of money and not getting anything back for it. Audiophile cables are like taxes.

With the difference that one MUST pay taxes. Audiophile cables are more a tax on those who lack critical thinking skills.

This is what the guy said :

Quote:

No Report just a little experiment that was done with friends, male and female.

How long ? They listened until one would wave a hand and stop the playing, 2-3 minutes.
The environment - except for the fact that out environment if fcked, It was in a living room 6240mm x 5530mm x 2453mm, couches made of 350g/m3 material hammered to pine wood planted 1954/3, havested around 2006.
The method - I did it in 4 very easy steps. plug in RCA, press Play........press Stop, swap cable (without listeners noting cable... not that they had a clue what brand/material it was or cared)

No Vaughan, seriously, the two experiments was for FUN, and to be a little informative to a bunch of fiends that are curious and that was little bit skeptical. The fact that I posted it on the forum under General discussion is specifically as a conversation piece.

That EVERYBODY hear differences - YES Fact
Were they unanimous in picking cables - NO
Were the differences vast ? NO, maybe in a R2m system in R1m listening room they will be more prominent
Could identify cheapo cable consistently- Fact (5 out of 5 times is a small sample though, but fff me I wasnt going to play the same damn song 100x swapping cables)
Do I want to convince anybody - NO I really dont care 

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot 

 

Taxes are the perfect example of spending a lot of money and not getting anything back for it. Audiophile cables are like taxes.

Among the things that you are getting back for your tax dollars are roads, clean air, clean water, cheap food, a military to protect you, health care, Social Security benefits, the benefits of scientific research, and education. If one spends $2000 on audio cables, there might not be a measurable difference between the signal that they transmit and the sound transmitted from cables that are much less expensive can transmit. Of course, you might have been joking about our tax dollars being wasted; however, "audiophile" cables are unlike taxes.

Incremental difference per dollar keeps decreasing as the investment in the upgrade increases. I mean, when you make you first 100dollar upgrade the difference will be exponential but as you keep increasing the value of you upgrades the difference is always smaller and smaller. If you upgrade from a 5 dollar cable to a 50 dollar cable you will hear a significant difference but to get the same quantum of sound improvement you will probably have to spend 500 dollars. Although there comes a time whem the minds starts hearing what the ears cant. Its a curse.

I have been lurking on head-fi for a very long time. This is by far my favorite thread so far. Thank you for the detailed post Prog Rock Man.

Quote:

Originally Posted by 80884 

If you upgrade from a 5 dollar cable to a 50 dollar cable you will hear a significant difference...

Ah, no. No you won't unless one of the cables is broken, or deliberately futzed with to affect the RLC so much that it becomes a passive component in the circuit - which is just bad cable work.

Quote:

Originally Posted by 80884 

Incremental difference per dollar keeps decreasing as the investment in the upgrade increases.

Although I've found that it is pretty easy to spend too much, I haven't found much of a corollary between cost and sound quality improvement. In fact, a lot of very inexpensive equipment sounds just as good as the best high end stuff.

I'm buying a fancy IC and then I read this thread.

And then most probably i'll end up buying it still.

Cost me around $25. Not that I can hear a difference. Just that I'd want one for its aesthetics. I got one previously, but i think it has oxidized because i saw the inner part turned green.

Actually I did try a sighted test on 3 cables, each is priced at $50, $100, and $160 respectively. Not sure what the materials are, and it seemed like the cables have certain names, or what number of N. And the question I'd like to ask is, I found out that I can hardly remember what I just listened. When i plugged in the cable between a portable media player and a portable amp, I started the song for around 30 seconds and then i stopped to change to another cable. But then, as soon as I started the song with the new cable, I came to realize I had forgotten how the previous song/cable sounded. Frankly, I can't be sure i hear anything different. I can't even notice anything significant because either I don't hear a difference or that I really forgot how the previous one sounded.

For that matter, how can I successfully test a cable (sighted or not) as I have memory issues. Is there a better way to preserve my memory of that 30 sec so that I can compare the difference between the cables?

You could set up a rapid switching box, that would allow you go back and forth between them at the push of a button/switch. 

For one cable i experience a loud crack or something on the headphones. Then i screwed the gold plug tighter and the crack is gone. I wonder what caused the sound. Tried it with different cable (the ones which the plug isn't "screw-able"). No such issue on that particular song.

Using a switching box sounds like a great idea, however I tried it at the store. It's impolite to do that so obviously when the owner believes in his products (our culture here is a more conservative one). Maybe at my leisure at home. Was wondering how on earth can they tried different cables and say they heard difference. Before this I thought maybe it's that my ears aren't trained to listen to things... (not like the ones in sixth sense)

crack/crackle is usually oxidized or otherwise bad connections.