USB cable supposedly improving DAC sound quality? How can I take other posts seriously after that? - Page 5  

Originally Posted by DeeLuxx 

how will using an exotic material between these point make any difference?!!??! 

Oh god, will I bite? I'm kinda bored of these arguments tbh.

Alright:

-shielding from EMI/RFI...and I know my neighbors do play the wifi warfare game

-different jitter eye patterns

-impedance mismatch

-skin effect, intra-pair skew, inter-pair skew, Far End Crosstalk(FEXT)

it was all already discussed here: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?hl=en&q=cache:8ZmefKMUWdoJ:http://www.head-fi.org/forum/thread/480692/on-hdmi-usb-and-firewire-super-cables/15+intra+pair+skew+leeperry&ct=clnk

long story short: a USB cable is far from being "a bunch of 0's & 1's" and adaptive USB audio doesn't give second chances.

i can see how the shielding would definitely afftect the quality and integrity of the data transmitted but how does using an exotic material provide better shielding?

say we have a silver core shielded cable vs a copper core one, the composition of the core is irrelivant to the shielding capabilities of the cable no?

and i was thinking.... its all good and well talking about how shielding may in theory impair performance but in a real life situation how does this turn out?

at what level does shielding of a cable become important?

how about doing a test by putting some strong source of rf interference around or near to the cable and comparing?

im not talking about wireless modems that out put a fairly predictable spectrum of rf, but things like hair dryers (brushed ac motor) that provide strong rf

Having tested upto 3 different USB Cables today, I can confirm they do make a difference in Sound Quality in the following aspects:

- Sound stage

- Instrument separation

- Aggressiveness

- Tone

- Honesty - will tell you if the source audio file is screwed up or not (I don't know how to say this in audiophile terms)

I have tested Oyaide d+ USB A-Class, Klotz USB AB1, & a standard USB cable, and my ears along with a couple of others have confirmed that indeed USB cables make a difference in sound (we also did a blind test). I of course can't explain why because I also wasn't a believer at first. 

But the Klotz cables are very cheap, at around 9 euros, and sound very good for the money you're paying. For those who still don't believe, you could just try out the Klotz cables and judge. :D

Quote:

Originally Posted by mahesh2012 

I have tested Oyaide d+ USB A-Class, Klotz USB AB1, & a standard USB cable, and my ears along with a couple of others have confirmed that indeed USB cables make a difference in sound (we also did a blind test). 

Methodology?

Quote:

Originally Posted by liamstrain 

Methodology?

 

and measurements ...?

Results of the blind test?

Advocating 100$+ USB cables in a first post in the midst of a sound science cable skeptic vent thread? Must be a masochist.

But what the hey, I'll purchase the product you are hyping in recognition of your effort.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mahesh2012 

Having tested upto 3 different USB Cables today, I can confirm they do make a difference in Sound Quality in the following aspects:

- Sound stage

- Instrument separation

- Aggressiveness

- Tone

- Honesty - will tell you if the source audio file is screwed up or not (I don't know how to say this in audiophile terms)

 

I have tested Oyaide d+ USB A-Class, Klotz USB AB1, & a standard USB cable, and my ears along with a couple of others have confirmed that indeed USB cables make a difference in sound (we also did a blind test). I of course can't explain why because I also wasn't a believer at first. 

But the Klotz cables are very cheap, at around 9 euros, and sound very good for the money you're paying. For those who still don't believe, you could just try out the Klotz cables and judge. :D

for a first post this smells a bit commercial. Klotz Cables anyone?

Methodology: I just used the 3 different cables plugged from my laptop on to my DJ mixer (Allen & Heath Xone 4D), and used my pair of headphones (Pioneer HDJ-2000) to listen to each one of the cables (I had another friend who switched the cables, played the same track on my mixer and I wrote my findings on a piece of paper). 

Measurements: 

Klotz USB AB1: Compared to a standard USB Cable, I experienced more aggressive mid range, a much cleaner and better instrument separation, and thicker gain.

Oyaide d+ NEO A-Class: Compared to a standard USB Cable - more aggressive mid range, better instrument separation and wider sound-stage. 

Klotz vs. Oyaide d+ NEO A-Class: When tried on sources that have a slight degradation in quality, the Klotz cables was more forgiving and was much more enjoyable than the Oyaides, the Oyaides are brutally unforgiving - anything on the track will be revealed. So as a result on mp3 that slightly lacked in quality (pirated) - the Klotz wins hands down, but on mp3s coming from Beatport.com the Oyaides have a slight edge - being thicker and slightly more aggressive than the Klotz cables. The tone of the track was also different. 

I do sell both items but I do not expect any of you here to buy them since I'm located in Indonesia, and it just doesn't make good sense for you guys to purchase from me (shipping cost). So - no I do not work for any of the brands, I do sell them at my online store, and this post isn't for the sake of promotion.

I took the time to write the above post and this one solely based on the fact that those of you who don't believe USB Cables make a difference in sound should open up your minds and just judge it for yourself. Like I said the Klotz cables are cheap and wouldn't hurt to try it. I switched from Oyaide A-Class (costing 69 bucks) to Klotz USB AB-1 (costing 13 bucks) because I felt I needed a more forgiving cable since most of my mp3's are not of perfect quality - it's a bit too risky for me to use Oyaide USB cables when playing in clubs with sources which are not of great quality. 

 

Did you know when cables were changed (e.g. were there ever replays of the track without the cable changing) Did you know what cable was in at any point during the listening - or did you write your impressions independent of knowing what was used? Did you repeat the test (blind) cable swaps multiple times - were your impressions the same each time?

If you open your mind too far, your brain will fall out.

Quote:

Originally Posted by liamstrain 

If you open your mind too far, your brain will fall out.

Both funny and metaphorically true!

I haven't read this whole thread.  I don't know if this has been mentioned yet, and I'm not arguing about the USB signal being affected by cable quality, although if it were bad enough perhaps enough packets would be dropped to make a difference, but It would have to be a damaged cable, or have some fairly intense interference as USB has very aggressive error checking, but anyway, I have found a situation where USB cable quality affected sound quality greatly.  Using my R24 Recorder/Interface/Controller/Sampler/Doohicky it has three power sources, battery power, wall wart, or when it's plugged in to a USB source and switched off it powers itself from USB.  USB has four wires two signal wires +5v, and Gnd.  With the R24 using the USB cable for it's ground I had one cable when being routed through the mess of cables behind my computer would pickup interference from my cable TV and hiss, The same cable was fine if I turned the R24 on before putting it into Interface mode because it would instead us it's wall wart for power, but I swapped the cable out anyways and now it's fine using USB power.

I wonder if any of these other DAC's are using the USB provided power or ground, although I'm sure that the R24 doesn't have the best power supply either and probably isn't doing very much filtering as all of the power that gets to it is supposed to be DC +5v.

Yes, I did know the cables were changed, because the song/track will stop when swapping cables. And yes I did repeat the test/cable swaps several times just to make sure it wasn't a placebo effect (cable swaps were done by my friend, while I wrote down my findings on paper). And yes, my impressions were the same each time, and nope I didn't know what cable was used during the swap. 

 

I think you'd be better off with an ABX test. Wrap one of the aftermarket cables and the standard cable in paper to obscure which is which, have another friend over and have him label one A and the other B without him knowing which cable is which and without you knowing which one is A and B. Test both of them for a while, with him saying "This is A" or "This is B" when he changes them. Then every round have him choose one and call it X. You pick which one X is, A or B. Do at least 10 rounds (20 is better). Tell us how many you got right.

The key here is to remove biases on both the listener and switcher. So neither of you can know which cable is A or B. That's the safest way.

USB cables will not make difference as long as they are working!

If they did you would get checksum errors on all files sent over USB!

The only thing that matters are the USB controllers and that the wires are thick enough for the length (and that you don't dump them in an EMI soup), same with HDMI cables!

Digital is not analog! You can not have subtle changes!