[archeryc]

  Question for those who know more than me out there ...and that most lol....I was using the Yiggy/Rago combo with my LCD-4 and with them  i was using the included XLR cable to connect the 2 and never thought about it much....i replaced my Rag with the moon 430 and simply used the same XLR cable and again didnt think much of it.....a couple of days ago I decided to replace the XLR cable with Bettercables XLR cable and when I connected everything up and gave it a listen i was actually shocked....the volume on the exact same settings is dramatically higher...in other words listening at 48 on the Moon 430 with the new cables is literally like listening at 55 with the old cables....i have never experienced such a dramatic difference in any sense with changes in cables and am wondering why this would be the case....Any thoughts would be appreciated...as i said i was and am shocked

I personally had many experiences on headphone cables. Every time I swap the cable i would able to notice a change of volume. But these changes can be very small, or can be huge (mostly not so huge to my ear.). Depends on the cable resistance and design I think. 

 

[jlbrach]

in this case we are talking about the XLR interconnect between the amp and DAC...i have yet to notice anything so dramatic regarding headphone cables....i was just wondering what the difference is and the cause

 

[archeryc]

  in this case we are talking about the XLR interconnect between the amp and DAC...i have yet to notice anything so dramatic regarding headphone cables....i was just wondering what the difference is and the cause

You mean you swap from RCA interconnect to XLR interconnect? If that's the case the volume will be HUGE different. Normally DAC XLR output will have higher db that the RCA output. 
 
If you mean XLR cable swap to XLR cable and hear a huge difference on volume. I believe it would happen but I never experienced such like that. 

 

[jlbrach]

i am speaking about replacing one XLR cable with another XLR cable and it is like literally raising the volume 5 or 6 clicks on the volume wheel.....again,i am speaking of going from the XLR cable that came with my Schiit yiggy/rag combo to connect the 2 balanced and now i am using a Bttercables XLR balanced cable which produces the increased volume

 

[archeryc]

i am speaking about replacing one XLR cable with another XLR cable and it is like literally raising the volume 5 or 6 clicks on the volume wheel.....again,i am speaking of going from the XLR cable that came with my Schiit yiggy/rag combo to connect the 2 balanced and now i am using a Bttercables XLR balanced cable which produces the increased volume

Copy that. It happens. Can be the resistance of your new cable are different from the original one. I swap my Oyaide XLR interconnect cable the the Audience XLR interconnect didn't notice such change on volume...

 

[YugiRider2]

  not something i can expect other tube amps or even SS to match easily, good that the ragnarok is) and since A2A in Sydney is really quite limited in terms of amps I wasn't able to match it with the Moon Audio Amp as it was not free and the only SS one that caught my eye there. Maybe ill go back and have another listen with a proper SS amp.

The store has a 430HAD for demo, was it being occupied the whole time?
There is also a Taurus Mk2 + Vega, which I'd definitely prefer over the Ragnarok. I remember that combo opened up the treble a bit.

 

[groovyd]

  i am speaking about replacing one XLR cable with another XLR cable and it is like literally raising the volume 5 or 6 clicks on the volume wheel.....again,i am speaking of going from the XLR cable that came with my Schiit yiggy/rag combo to connect the 2 balanced and now i am using a Bttercables XLR balanced cable which produces the increased volume

Maybe get a little more scientific about it.  play some white noise into your computer mic and register the spectrum levels and then switch cables without changing anything and capture that and see if really it is indeed louder or not at the same setting same mic placement etc. could be one of the conductors has a cold solder joint in the original cable inside connecting the pin causing a high resistance.  might want to also get a cheap multi-meter and measure the resistance of both cables for comparison. short interconnects should already have extremely low resistance, should not be able to measure the difference unless there is an issue with the cable.

 

[jlbrach]

that is above my pay grade....it sounds great just louder....just trying to figure out if this is something that varies from cable brand to cable brand or if it is something else

 

[mulder01]

Might be a question for the sound science section of the forum.  
 
Don't some manufacturer's slip in a sneaky resistor or capacitor into the connectors on the end of their cables to make sure if someone listens to them they hear a difference of some sort?  Could be a number of things but with my limited knowledge I would say there shouldn't be much difference between pieces of wire.

 

[jodgey4]

Some of the better known HD800s were twisted in such a way as to raise capacitance to audiable levels, but generally most RLC variations are unhearable.

I've never ever heard of added capacitors to cables, only resistors.

 

[JaZZ]

Such a difference isn't possible. There would have to be thousands of ohms considering the input impedances. I suspect that the older balanced cable is defective – not really balanced. Or the operator has made some mistake anywhere.

 

[groovyd]

  Such a difference isn't possible. There would have to be thousands of ohms considering the input impedances. I suspect that the older balanced cable is defective – not really balanced. Or the operator has made some mistake anywhere.

agree - original cable is defective, perhaps only delivering half of the balanced signal.

 

[jlbrach]

the original cable is made by straight wire for schiit and the new one is better cables balanced xlr interconnect cable.....i simply replaced the old with the new and YES the new one is louder than the old one but both do sound good when i match the volumes.....it seems to me that it would be unusual for one cable to provide substantially different volume than the other but I am no expert.....i am however curious and want to figure it out

 

[groovyd]

  the original cable is made by straight wire for schiit and the new one is better cables balanced xlr interconnect cable.....i simply replaced the old with the new and YES the new one is louder than the old one but both do sound good when i match the volumes.....it seems to me that it would be unusual for one cable to provide substantially different volume than the other but I am no expert.....i am however curious and want to figure it out

then you will need to get a little more scientific about it and meter it out as I said.  if you want to send it to me and include return shipping i will see if it is defective and report on the resistance and capacitance.

 

[jlbrach]

much appreciated,i ordered a different cable and will give it a try and see how it compares to the 2 i mentioned and whichever one it matches up with will lead me through process of elimination to identify the bad cable if either actually are