[philodox]

No offense intended, but who cares if people guessed the cables correctly? What I care about is which was the overall preferred cable sonically! Do we have any results for that?

 

[Jeff Wong]

I remember reading about this experiment awhile ago and was happy to see some results finally posted. But, I'm with markl on this... without a reference, or control, I don't quite see the point of this. If there had been a 4th cable, perhaps, designated by a rhomboid or something, that was the same cable as one of the first three, and listeners were asked to ID which shape it matched, we might glean something from all of this. I don't remember the goal of this project. Somebody care to recap?

 

[tkam]

Quote:

Originally Posted by philodox No offense intended, but who cares if people guessed the cables correctly? What I care about is which was the overall preferred cable sonically! Do we have any results for that?

Yeah I think thats a pretty valid point, I don't think it's really about who guessed correctly. The more important thing is did people hear differences between the cables??

 

[hciman77]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tkam Yeah I think thats a pretty valid point, I don't think it's really about who guessed correctly. The more important thing is did people hear differences between the cables??

Well the results would seem to imply that people thought that they heard differences, enough to make a judgment - if not they would not have proferred an opinion - though we dont know who/how many made a subjective judgment and who just made a blind guess.

 

[philodox]

Quote:

Originally Posted by hciman77 Well the results would seem to imply that people thought that they heard differences, enough to make a judgment - if not they would not have proferred an opinion - though we dont know who/how many made a subjective judgment and who just made a blind guess.

Yep, but taken in the context that those judgements were given the information in useless to us consumers.

 

[Samgotit]

Everyone should read this. It's from Edwood's original thread:


Quote:

So here's a chance to prove whether or not you can hear the difference between cables. This is my current method for this "test" I'm open to suggestions. I think this will be [size=large]fun[/size].

I took the liberty to highlight one important word.


Quote:

Originally Posted by tkam Yeah I think thats a pretty valid point, I don't think it's really about who guessed correctly. The more important thing is did people hear differences between the cables??

B/c they switched the cables themselves.

 

[Samgotit]

Whoops

 

[markl]

But this is a forced choice. You are required by the test to hear differences because you have to assign each cable to one of the categories-- silver, copper, or cheap. So being able to detect differences in this test is assumed. What was measured was can you guess which one is silver, copper or cheap.

I think that whomever suggested a a test where two cables were identical while the third was different, and you were asked to identify the different cable would yield a more relevant to result to answering the question: "are all cables the same?".

i don't want to belabor the ppoint, so I'll just quit here. Cheers.

 

[Audiofiler]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tkam The more important thing is did people hear differences between the cables??

We have a bingo people

 

[003]

Quote:

Originally Posted by markl But this is a forced choice. You are required by the test to hear differences because you have to assign each cable to one of the categories-- silver, copper, or cheap. So being able to detect differences in this test is assumed. What was measured was can you guess which one is silver, copper or cheap. I think that whomever suggested a a test where two cables were identical while the third was different, and you were asked to identify the different cable would yield a more relevant to result to answering the question: "are all cables the same?". i don't want to belabor the ppoint, so I'll just quit here. Cheers.

That does sound like a better test.

 

[PhilS]

As was discussed in the original thread regarding the test, the test was supposed to be fun, and to give people a chance to see what they thought about different cables, under certain conditions and parameters. It was always recognized, by Edwood and others, that the test would not really establish whether people could hear differences in cables. And the comments by markl and others re the limitations of the test and the need to be careful about drawing certain conclusions from it are spot on. Nevertheless, it seems like the test was fun for those who participated, and it does seem like it yields some information regarding the fact that people did not always prefer a certain type of cable. Kudos to Ed for taking on and supervising such a project.

Knowledge is good. -Faber College (Animal House)

 

[bigshot]

My system is wired with Radio Shack cables. Never had any reason to complain about them. Their speaker wire is great too.

See ya
Steve

 

[milkpowder]

Thanks for the results. We've been waiting for absolutely ages, but I guess it was well worth it! I must admit that I often fail to hear the differences between different interconnects on the same headphone system. For some reason, it's completely different with speaker systems: I can tell between different interconnects and speaker cable!

Again, thanks for everyone who was involved for making this possible!

 

[geek707]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TKAM The more important thing is did people hear differences between the cables??

Quote:

Originally Posted by Audiofiler We have a bingo people

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sunburn And for those of you who are statistically inclined, this produces chi-square(4) = 6.86, p = .14. Cannot reject the null hypothesis of no association. This suggests, but does not prove, that responses were effectively random. We'd need a bigger sample to have more confidence either way, but on the other hand, if the Rat Shack cable was obviously much worse than the other two, it should have been picked up. I wouldn't term this "proof," but the results are more consistent with a skeptical position than a believer position. Everybody update your subjective priors accordingly. (Sorry, statistics joke.)

Just looking at the distribution, I would agree with Sunspot.
So now we have a new market, re-packaging Rat-Shack to look like high-end. Cables have been much more of a style issue for me anyway.

 

[JahJahBinks]

It provides relief to people who don't have "golden ears".

How about a blind power cord test next?