I don't doubt whether cables make a difference because I can hear it myself. I think I just hit my diminishing returns limit and deciding the prices werent worth the changes I was hearing and decided **** it and sold most of my cables...
That is the thing. Cables make a difference, but it never changes the characteristic of the IEMs and stays within the restrictions of "tinkering" with a set signature. I love tinkering like that, but it only makes sense if the IEMs are already to my liking (like my Phantom) and it is all about synergy, as different pairings give different results and it certainly is not a case of 'more expensive = better'. I love my Phantom with Leonidas II, the synergy is excellent, but the Fealty with Leo II sounded "off" to my ears. In fact, I had a bit of fun cable rolling with the Fealty and ended up back with the stock cable as my preferred pairing. Some pairings were nice, like Lionheart and Eros II 8W, but I simply felt something was missing because the stage dimensions changed too much for my liking.
I would love for someone to actually look into this in a comprehensive way. I have always wondered if measurements could reveal something about the effects of cables, but also about the effective limits of measurements. For instance, what can measurements tell us of stage dimensions? If I use the stock Ares II cable with my Phantom the stage is quite intimate, but doubling up the wires to Ares II 8-wire expands the stage considerably. Where in the measurements would we be able to see that? Similarly, some cables have a liquid quality to how the music flows. What is that and where (if anywhere) can we find that in a frequency response?I'd love to see cable manufacturers actually provide cable measurements to back up their claims.
Something like these, but you know, with differences:
..or is it not possible for some reason?
Well to be fair, cables can make a difference with headphones with low, inconsistent impedance through the audible frequency range such as low impedance IEMs with multiple drivers. But how they will affect the sound is based on the ouput impedance of your source, and the particular impedances of your headphones, and is not possible to generalize. In this case, how it alters the sound is based on the resistance of the cable and not its price or overall quality.
While the placebo effect is real, it in itself is as much subject to proof as any other claim and you cannot apply it in an arbitrary fashion. Unfortunately in this hobby I see people use the placebo effect as a sort of free-for-all way of explaining away things they do not agree with or cannot (strictly theoretically) figure out how it would work. Especially people who proclaim to be scientific often do this and it is anything but scientific to explain away things you don't like the sound of.
I really want to look into this if I do end up getting some iem drivers to experiment with. I get the feeling that there are many ways it could go. The biggest problems with iem drivers is that they are all fullrange drivers and that electronic crossovers don't work the same way in iems as they do in speakers. A multi-driver could be worse than a single driver if there are cancellation issues at each crossover point, but if one could make properly good crossover points then it would probably make a pretty good iem. Since I haven't gotten my hands on any materials yet though, this is all just conjecture.
That is an important aspect of it. People who use the placebo effect as a means to explain away things, fail to properly address that the placebo effect can only occur under a very specific set of circumstances. The main problem in this hobby is the narrative in general.
Not really the intention, I just haven't been tickling my brain enough recently and then it can sometimes be a little bit of an unguided projectile with a severe case of philosophism. A bit like this:
I have only had a brief opportunity to chat to Ito-san in London a couple of years ago where I also demoed the Lakh, which I remember were a bit brighter, but very nice with classical. Other than that Kumitate Lab is one of the more illusive brands and I am very jealous of Daniel's more privileged access to all the audiophile goodies.
Not really the intention, I just haven't been tickling my brain enough recently and then it can sometimes be a little bit of an unguided projectile with a severe case of philosophism. A bit like this:
I have only had a brief opportunity to chat to Ito-san in London a couple of years ago where I also demoed the Lakh, which I remember were a bit brighter, but very nice with classical. Other than that Kumitate Lab is one of the more illusive brands and I am very jealous of Daniel's more privileged access to all the audiophile goodies.
I'm glad you didnt mention decent price, because then we'd be talking about unicorns and other mythical beasts.
All good points, but this one occurred to me as well. That is how I would test it and see what it does. Can you effectively reduce the property of a cable and its material into a single impedance adapter (or something similar). I hope that at some point someone will find a way to play around with that thought.
