[SilentNote]

Between hi-res audio and light speed cable, seriously... I sometimes wonder if these "audiophiles" are just ignorance loving. Maybe we should call them idiophiles instead.

 

[Maxx134]

You'd be able to tell if there was crosstalk if you just dial the balance control all the way over to one channel. I doubt that is the case though.

I am thinking that wire, although transparent in itself, can be doing other things in the non-audio spectrum.

I see the wire as an extension of the amplification circuit, which, depending on design, can be affected.

Take an average 6foot headphone cable with so many braided strands we are looking at a field day of overall wire length.

Maybe acting like a nice antenna (!) or how any capacitance, or inductance, or various interference (like RF), or contributing oscillations to the circuit.

All that can happen in the non-audio spectrum, and can adversely affect a circuit.

Also it could be measured, so that would be a nice test to do .

 

[Davesrose]

One could always bring up the infamous blind test of Monster speaker cables vs coat hangers....and there not being a statistical difference. I don't believe in the audiophoolery of spending hundreds to even thousands of dollars on interconnects and power cords. To me, the main issue I run into is interference. I know professional settings are likely to require XLR cables for long runs. I'm in a metropolitan area and my house is near a radio tower: so I have a lot of RF interference. I have had a home theater receiver that picked up the radio station until I got a power strip that had an appropriate RF filter. My Single Power headphone amp will pick up the radio station if I raise its texture knob (best I can tell is that it's a feedback and my headphone cable acts as an antenna). I have had to get a ground loop isolator for my subwoofer. For my amplified speakers, regular 16 gauge speaker wire was fine....though recently when upgrading to 7.1.4 went ahead and got Amazon copper 14 gauge (as it was priced right and color coded). Not sure I could tell any difference with old 16 vs current 14 for any audible reasons (general guidelines for them are how many feet for your rear surrounds): and I'm in a situation that accounts for less than ideal situations.

 

[SpeakerBox]

One could always bring up the infamous blind test of Monster speaker cables vs coat hangers....and there not being a statistical difference. I don't believe in the audiophoolery of spending hundreds to even thousands of dollars on interconnects and power cords. To me, the main issue I run into is interference. I know professional settings are likely to require XLR cables for long runs. I'm in a metropolitan area and my house is near a radio tower: so I have a lot of RF interference. I have had a home theater receiver that picked up the radio station until I got a power strip that had an appropriate RF filter. My Single Power headphone amp will pick up the radio station if I raise its texture knob (best I can tell is that it's a feedback and my headphone cable acts as an antenna). I have had to get a ground loop isolator for my subwoofer. For my amplified speakers, regular 16 gauge speaker wire was fine....though recently when upgrading to 7.1.4 went ahead and got Amazon copper 14 gauge (as it was priced right and color coded). Not sure I could tell any difference with old 16 vs current 14 for any audible reasons (general guidelines for them are how many feet for your rear surrounds): and I'm in a situation that accounts for less than ideal situations.

I have no trouble believing that a coat hanger may sound better than monster cable.

 

[jarcher]

I don't understand why there's such a need for some people in the audiophile enthusiast community to "convince" people. It's a hobby, not scientific fact or religion. Well, maybe "religion" for some.

Re: cables - people are free to try them out, and if they can't (or don't wan't) to hear a difference or vice-versa, then that's really up to them and their wallet. Spending a lot of time and effort fruitlessly trying to convince the "other camp" seems pointless and a recipe for frustration.

 

[SilentNote]

I don't understand why there's such a need for some people in the audiophile enthusiast community to "convince" people. It's a hobby, not scientific fact or religion. Well, maybe "religion" for some.

Re: cables - people are free to try them out, and if they can't (or don't wan't) to hear a difference or vice-versa, then that's really up to them and their wallet. Spending a lot of time and effort fruitlessly trying to convince the "other camp" seems pointless and a recipe for frustration.

"It's easier to fool people than to convince them they have been fooled."

That's the gist of this thread, and a large part of the audiophile community.

 

[jarcher]

"It's easier to fool people than to convince them they have been fooled."

That's the gist of this thread, and a large part of the audiophile community.

Even if someone's been "fooled", they mostly they have to figure that out for themselves. Trying to tell people they've been "fooled" I find is one of the less agreeable aspects of the audiophile community, especially when it comes from limited personal experience or expertise.

There are so many thing that I've found over the last 5 years that can make substantial sound quality differences that I would never have thought possible. I've had the good fortune to try many of them out without having to buy them - so there's no "confirmation bias" because I spent my money on them. And often times it is just that - "differences" - not always improvements. Just a different sound, that I may or may not like at any given time, or may or may not be worth the money in my opinion. But in most cases they HAVE made a DIFFERENCE, and so I haven't denied that, particularly in advance of actual direct experience with it.

 

[Sgt. Ear Ache]

I don't understand why there's such a need for some people in the audiophile enthusiast community to "convince" people. It's a hobby, not scientific fact or religion. Well, maybe "religion" for some.

Re: cables - people are free to try them out, and if they can't (or don't wan't) to hear a difference or vice-versa, then that's really up to them and their wallet. Spending a lot of time and effort fruitlessly trying to convince the "other camp" seems pointless and a recipe for frustration.

what's wrong with accurate, true information? What if its a fact that expensive cables costing hundreds of dollars actually offer no benefit at all over decent $20 cables and the companies selling those expensive cables on the basis that they offer tangible benefits are lying in order to sell product? Is there not value in at least having true information out there for people who may not be aware of the facts? I mean this isn't religion. It's science. There is actual, real science behind the way wire conducts energy. It can all be measured. And there are relatively easy ways to test whether or not there are tangible benefits to these things - DBTs for instance.

 

[Sgt. Ear Ache]

Even if someone's been "fooled", they mostly they have to figure that out for themselves. Trying to tell people they've been "fooled" I find is one of the less agreeable aspects of the audiophile community, especially when it comes from limited personal experience or expertise.

There are so many thing that I've found over the last 5 years that can make substantial sound quality differences that I would never have thought possible. I've had the good fortune to try many of them out without having to buy them - so there's no "confirmation bias" because I spent my money on them. And often times it is just that - "differences" - not always improvements. Just a different sound, that I may or may not like at any given time, or may or may not be worth the money in my opinion. But in most cases they HAVE made a DIFFERENCE, and so I haven't denied that, particularly in advance of actual direct experience with it.

So you've found cables that sound different from cheaper cables? Have you done any actual testing to see if those differences were real or imagined?

 

[bigshot]

No one here is trying to convince anyone. They’re simply pointing out relevant facts. The main relevant fact is that perception is fallible. If you don’t put basic controls on your comparisons- specifically line level matching, direct A/B switching and blind testing- your conclusions are pretty much worthless to anyone but yourself. Bias is real. Perceptual error is real. Everyone is subject to them. If you do a sloppy comparison, you get incorrect results. Stack up a half dozen of these complete misconceptions, and reenforce them with your ego, and you can officially call yourself an audiophile.

 

[SilentNote]

Even if someone's been "fooled", they mostly they have to figure that out for themselves. Trying to tell people they've been "fooled" I find is one of the less agreeable aspects of the audiophile community, especially when it comes from limited personal experience or expertise.

There are so many thing that I've found over the last 5 years that can make substantial sound quality differences that I would never have thought possible. I've had the good fortune to try many of them out without having to buy them - so there's no "confirmation bias" because I spent my money on them. And often times it is just that - "differences" - not always improvements. Just a different sound, that I may or may not like at any given time, or may or may not be worth the money in my opinion. But in most cases they HAVE made a DIFFERENCE, and so I haven't denied that, particularly in advance of actual direct experience with it.

Some people don't find being agreeable to deception and deceit an option.

I don't think anyone here has any qualms about someone wanting to buy that placebo, but it's the dishonest marketing that annoys many here.

And no, you are not going to silence us with your "agreeableness".

 

[jarcher]

No one here is trying to convince anyone. They’re simply pointing out relevant facts. The main relevant fact is that perception is fallible. If you don’t put basic controls on your comparisons- specifically line level matching, direct A/B switching and blind testing- your conclusions are pretty much worthless to anyone but yourself. Bias is real. Perceptual error is real. Everyone is subject to them. If you do a sloppy comparison, you get incorrect results. Stack up a half dozen of these complete misconceptions, and reenforce them with your ego, and you can officially call yourself an audiophile.

The title of this thread is "How do I CONVINCE people that audio cables DO NOT make a difference". So at least ONE person IS trying to convince someone. In fact many people are trying to convince people : i.e. that they have the "facts" or the scientifically accurate and rigid way to establish these things (i.e. the audibility of cable differences, etc).

But the "fact" is that ALL listening "tests" are ultimately subjective however supposedly rigid the experimental parameters are and that "bias" - for OR against - is going to factor prominently. In one well known experiment speaker cables experiment - A/B / blind / etc - with "cable believers" and "non-believers", the actual experiment was to hook up the SAME speaker in and out of phase vs actually changing speaker cables, which is what attendees were told would happen. The cable "non-believers" all said they could hear no difference, despite having a speaker hooked up out of phase is very noticeable to even most lay people.

Therefore "sloppy" comparisons are ok - because at the end of the day - that's all we really have and all we can really expect, PARTICULARLY from the lay enthusiast who can not honestly be expected to perform elaborate and supposedly "rigid" listening experiments, which ultimately are not going to satisfy anyone on either side of the fence, and therefore would be pointless.

Furthermore, I contend that if enough people seem to have a similar opinion of the sound quality of say a particular cable, that's about as good a result as you can expect. No elaborate DBTs etc required.

 

[joesuburb]

Can we ridicule people that think you have to break-in digital components in this thread or do we need a new one?

 

[Sgt. Ear Ache]

The title of this thread is "How do I CONVINCE people that audio cables DO NOT make a difference". So at least ONE person IS trying to convince someone. In fact many people are trying to convince people : i.e. that they have the "facts" or the scientifically accurate and rigid way to establish these things (i.e. the audibility of cable differences, etc).

But the "fact" is that ALL listening "tests" are ultimately subjective however supposedly rigid the experimental parameters are and that "bias" - for OR against - is going to factor prominently. In one well known experiment speaker cables experiment - A/B / blind / etc - with "cable believers" and "non-believers", the actual experiment was to hook up the SAME speaker in and out of phase vs actually changing speaker cables, which is what attendees were told would happen. The cable "non-believers" all said they could hear no difference, despite having a speaker hooked up out of phase is very noticeable to even most lay people.

Therefore "sloppy" comparisons are ok - because at the end of the day - that's all we really have and all we can really expect, PARTICULARLY from the lay enthusiast who can not honestly be expected to perform elaborate and supposedly "rigid" listening experiments, which ultimately are not going to satisfy anyone on either side of the fence, and therefore would be pointless.

Furthermore, I contend that if enough people seem to have a similar opinion of the sound quality of say a particular cable, that's about as good a result as you can expect. No elaborate DBTs etc required.

OK, then you don't need to hang around the SOUND SCIENCE forum then I guess. It's not like we're venturing into other areas here trying to rain on peoples parade...

Oh, and introducing bias is no way to conduct a dbt btw. All the experiment you refer to did was further prove the case that bias matters - which is one of the primary points being made here. (and that's aside from the fact that there's no actual proof anywhere that the experiment even happened. It was an anecdote told by a salesman.)

 

[bigshot]

The title of this thread is "How do I CONVINCE people that audio cables DO NOT make a difference". So at least ONE person IS trying to convince someone..

You’ll have to take that up with the original poster.

As for your God given right to post your subjective impressions... No one is denying you that. You can type long winded diatribes to your heart’s content. No one is stopping you. We’re just exercising our right to point out the areas where you don’t know what you’re talking about. Lord knows you aren’t the only person on the internet claiming things that clearly aren’t true.

The thing you don’t seem to understand is that you’re posting in sound science right now. If you put your hand on your heart and make an impassioned speech defending the right to be ignorant, it might go over well in other parts of head-fi, but sound science is a different audience with different standards. If you aren’t willing to lurk and figure out the lay of the land before emitting your I’ll conceived rant, you shouldn’t expect that you won’t be brusquely contradicted.