castleofargh
Sound Science Forum Moderator
- Joined
- Jul 2, 2011
- Posts
- 10,419
- Likes
- 6,030
I'm a little sick of having to play both sides. but here I go anyway:
first, those with arguments or anecdotes about cables sounding differently, be hyper specific about material and testing conditions! it's annoying and a waste of everybody's time to constantly have to argue electrical properties without even knowing if the cable is used for digital transfer, or is carrying 100V into a Stax, or 0.3V into an IEM of extreme electrical design. or if your cable is made of chicken bones.
in the spirit of getting a little science involved, we need all the information we can get to make sense of what happens(whatever that is). obviously we have little hope of agreeing to a claim if we can't even know what's different between the 2 cables tested. expecting us to just tag along in total ignorance is wishful thinking. put yourself in our shoes.
as several people have said, there is very little mystery left in the cable world that wouldn't fully follow the accepted knowledge about conductors and electrical signal. I'll go on a limb and assume nobody is using a new superconductors as audio cable while keeping it at -50°C.
just saying that I tried 2 cables and they sounded different, will have people assume that I didn't test anything properly, and that I made up the differences in my head. or maybe there is a small difference in loudness and my brain drew all sorts of psychoacoustic conclusions about just a level change. or maybe one of the cables is just plain defective or really wrong for that specific use(like one chewed by a rabbit and hanging by a thread, using ethernet cable as a power cable, or other fun ideas like those). lack of proper information forces rational people not only to consider those options, but to consider them as the most likely answer. only when we can get as much data as possible, can people rule out various possibilities. don't blame us of being narrow minded when you guys bring empty anecdotes of "I heard a difference" as your only data and entire argument. let's not reverse the situation here, we're not demanding hard to get evidence to shut you up, we're demanding hard to get evidence because you're offering nothing to work with while making claims. if you don't want people to reject your claims and make unreasonable demands to an average audiophile, just don't come making empty claims. it's that easy!
now the other side. a single wire is almost stupidly easy to characterize, but a cable has a bunch of them very close to each other, and most of all, it has plugs and they're not all born equal. I wouldn't go as far as saying that a different plug and butchered soldering will result in audible differences on their own, but measurable difference without a doubt. same with different braiding, different insulation thickness, having a shield or not. all those can and will affect the electrical characteristics of the cable.
so getting measurable variations isn't impossible, that much is a properly established fact that nobody will deny. how would anybody go to prove that said variations will never reach a magnitude that is audible? or be placed between gears where that variations will become the difference between a stable circuit and a mess getting out of control? also all cables sound the same can't be proved. only disproved. let's avoid making anything resembling a claim on that subject.
and so we're left with something different, sometimes, for some reasons, resulting in some magnitudes of change in the output signal of a playback chain. will it be audible? did you blind test properly and volume match before running outside to tell the world how sure you are of an audible difference? do you know what's different between the 2 specific cables you're using? what electrical spec is the main cause of change and if such a specs should reach those values in a cable for that given usage? those are the questions we should care about. not dick measuring and people offended and thinking "Y U NO TRUST ME???", when the answer is so damn obvious. zero evidence or relevant information from some random guy on the internet. indeed why wouldn't we take such testimonies at face value... again, and I say this to everybody, try putting yourself in the other guy's shoes. the one with electrical understanding being told ludicrous stuff like how silver lose fewer details than copper. the one with 2 cables making a clear and very real difference in his system, reading that it cannot happen in this reality. both will be dumbfounded to find someone confident about something that makes obviously no sense at all.
now if the silver cable has a much lower impedance than the default cable and that somehow ends up increasing the trebles a little in an audible fashion on some weirdo IEM. that is something very specific that the laws of electricity can explain. but to properly explain it, we need enough data in the first place. not some dubious generalization based on logical shortcuts.
and if a situation creates a clear difference and I wish to convince people that it's true. the way to do it is to bother testing things properly, maybe record the output signal using both cables and sharing that. the way not to do it, is argue in the only place on Headfi allowing discussions of blind testing and placebo, that a sighted test is conclusive about sound because you trust yourself and are an "experienced" listener.
oh! and about measurements being only a small part of the equation. that as always can be interpreted as fair in the context where we're not measuring everything all the time with the best gears. or it can be interpreted as really ignorant in the context where someone truly believes his ears can notice something we don't know how to measure. so "a frequency response graph doesn't tell if I will hear a difference", that is true. but "there is more to sound than what can be measured", that's just dumb and completely divorced from reality.
but yes, @gregorio has a thing about antagonizing people instead of just sticking to discussing gears and facts about gears. which inevitably makes further dialogue tedious. I think we'd all like a more Care Bear Greg.
first, those with arguments or anecdotes about cables sounding differently, be hyper specific about material and testing conditions! it's annoying and a waste of everybody's time to constantly have to argue electrical properties without even knowing if the cable is used for digital transfer, or is carrying 100V into a Stax, or 0.3V into an IEM of extreme electrical design. or if your cable is made of chicken bones.
in the spirit of getting a little science involved, we need all the information we can get to make sense of what happens(whatever that is). obviously we have little hope of agreeing to a claim if we can't even know what's different between the 2 cables tested. expecting us to just tag along in total ignorance is wishful thinking. put yourself in our shoes.
as several people have said, there is very little mystery left in the cable world that wouldn't fully follow the accepted knowledge about conductors and electrical signal. I'll go on a limb and assume nobody is using a new superconductors as audio cable while keeping it at -50°C.
just saying that I tried 2 cables and they sounded different, will have people assume that I didn't test anything properly, and that I made up the differences in my head. or maybe there is a small difference in loudness and my brain drew all sorts of psychoacoustic conclusions about just a level change. or maybe one of the cables is just plain defective or really wrong for that specific use(like one chewed by a rabbit and hanging by a thread, using ethernet cable as a power cable, or other fun ideas like those). lack of proper information forces rational people not only to consider those options, but to consider them as the most likely answer. only when we can get as much data as possible, can people rule out various possibilities. don't blame us of being narrow minded when you guys bring empty anecdotes of "I heard a difference" as your only data and entire argument. let's not reverse the situation here, we're not demanding hard to get evidence to shut you up, we're demanding hard to get evidence because you're offering nothing to work with while making claims. if you don't want people to reject your claims and make unreasonable demands to an average audiophile, just don't come making empty claims. it's that easy!
now the other side. a single wire is almost stupidly easy to characterize, but a cable has a bunch of them very close to each other, and most of all, it has plugs and they're not all born equal. I wouldn't go as far as saying that a different plug and butchered soldering will result in audible differences on their own, but measurable difference without a doubt. same with different braiding, different insulation thickness, having a shield or not. all those can and will affect the electrical characteristics of the cable.
so getting measurable variations isn't impossible, that much is a properly established fact that nobody will deny. how would anybody go to prove that said variations will never reach a magnitude that is audible? or be placed between gears where that variations will become the difference between a stable circuit and a mess getting out of control? also all cables sound the same can't be proved. only disproved. let's avoid making anything resembling a claim on that subject.
and so we're left with something different, sometimes, for some reasons, resulting in some magnitudes of change in the output signal of a playback chain. will it be audible? did you blind test properly and volume match before running outside to tell the world how sure you are of an audible difference? do you know what's different between the 2 specific cables you're using? what electrical spec is the main cause of change and if such a specs should reach those values in a cable for that given usage? those are the questions we should care about. not dick measuring and people offended and thinking "Y U NO TRUST ME???", when the answer is so damn obvious. zero evidence or relevant information from some random guy on the internet. indeed why wouldn't we take such testimonies at face value... again, and I say this to everybody, try putting yourself in the other guy's shoes. the one with electrical understanding being told ludicrous stuff like how silver lose fewer details than copper. the one with 2 cables making a clear and very real difference in his system, reading that it cannot happen in this reality. both will be dumbfounded to find someone confident about something that makes obviously no sense at all.
now if the silver cable has a much lower impedance than the default cable and that somehow ends up increasing the trebles a little in an audible fashion on some weirdo IEM. that is something very specific that the laws of electricity can explain. but to properly explain it, we need enough data in the first place. not some dubious generalization based on logical shortcuts.
and if a situation creates a clear difference and I wish to convince people that it's true. the way to do it is to bother testing things properly, maybe record the output signal using both cables and sharing that. the way not to do it, is argue in the only place on Headfi allowing discussions of blind testing and placebo, that a sighted test is conclusive about sound because you trust yourself and are an "experienced" listener.
oh! and about measurements being only a small part of the equation. that as always can be interpreted as fair in the context where we're not measuring everything all the time with the best gears. or it can be interpreted as really ignorant in the context where someone truly believes his ears can notice something we don't know how to measure. so "a frequency response graph doesn't tell if I will hear a difference", that is true. but "there is more to sound than what can be measured", that's just dumb and completely divorced from reality.
I agree with you 100%. the difference I imagine is that when you're paid to tell people things, you're naturally more tolerant. money often has that healing effect where you can smile to people you wish to punch in the face if your paycheck relies on it. ^_^
but yes, @gregorio has a thing about antagonizing people instead of just sticking to discussing gears and facts about gears. which inevitably makes further dialogue tedious. I think we'd all like a more Care Bear Greg.
Apology accepted (and I hope I speak for everyone else)! (This, of course, assumes that I too am not on your Ignore list.)
