Objective cable testing

[Intjmastermind]

The purpose of a headphone cable is to transmit a signal from one location to another. High-end replacement cables claim to be able to transmit that signal "better".
 
Has anyone done objective testing on these cable claims? Take two cables, connect them via a splitter to a source. Connect the ends of the cables to a Wheatstone bridge circuit. Place an oscilloscope lead between the two leads so you're measuring the time-dependent voltage difference at the ends of the cables. Play some music and see what the actual difference is?

 

[batpig]

yes, all sorts of claims about different-sounding cables or amplifiers or speaker wire have been tested a bazillion times.  And the claims of exotic cables to provide audible are basically always hogwash.  In any properly set up, blind test, there is zero audible difference between competently designed cables.  That doesn't stop people from claiming otherwise!

 
some exotic cables WILL sound audibly different because they filter / change the signal, and thus color the final output.  But that just means they aren't transmitting the signal accurately... and do you really want your interconnects to change the sound?  Isn't their function to simply get it from point A to point B without f'ing it up?  And the truth is, the vast majority of cables accomplish this task just fine.
 
If you want to learn more, spend some time googling and you will find many tests and discussions on forums online.  The header of this forum states "DBT Free Forum" so it may not be the place to find scientific data, if that's what you are looking for.
 
it's a contentious issue, so put the flame-suit on!

 

[myinitialsaredac]

This is something I tinkered with a while back,
 
I didn't get perfect results as the window scaling and such was not particular to audio bandwidth.
 
The experiment did demonstrate electrical differences however and also RFI differences.
 
Take a gander:
 
http://www.head-fi.org/forum/thread/368745/interconnect-impact-on-electrical-waveform-lab-with-results
 
Dave

 

[batpig]

great stuff, thanks for the link!
 
it would be interesting to see if the waveform differences correlate to audible differences, but obviously that would be a much more involved experiment with much broader scope...

 

[myinitialsaredac]

Quote:

great stuff, thanks for the link!
 
it would be interesting to see if the waveform differences correlate to audible differences, but obviously that would be a much more involved experiment with much broader scope...

 
Glad you enjoyed it, it was a project i did my senior year in high school. My knowledge of the material at the time limited the scope to which I could investigate the phenomena. 
 
Indeed it would be interesting to test whether or not the electrical differences were audible. It would require much more sensitive equipment, binaural microphones, and a sound proof room. The only facility I know of that has the equipment already is in Montana. 
 
As it is actually an exceptionally easy experiment to conduct, sometime maybe I will take a trip up there if they will let me tinker 

 
Dave

 

[JerryLove]

Quote:

This is something I tinkered with a while back,
 
I didn't get perfect results as the window scaling and such was not particular to audio bandwidth.
 
The experiment did demonstrate electrical differences however and also RFI differences.

There are, however, several caviats, such as the fact that you tested interconnects (high resistance, low power), which differ from speaker (or headphone) cables which are low resistance, (relatively) high power. That RF interference can be an issue for interconnects is generally agreed upon. (and what was that really thin interconnect you used as "generic"?
 
Don't get me wrong: I'm very glad you performed your experiment. Data is a good thing. But to draw conclusions about audible differences in properly constructed headphone wire from it would, in my estimation, be assuming too much. (though I may have missed something in the middle pages).

 

[Uncle Erik]

The purpose of a headphone cable is to transmit a signal from one location to another. High-end replacement cables claim to be able to transmit that signal "better".


 


Has anyone done objective testing on these cable claims? Take two cables, connect them via a splitter to a source. Connect the ends of the cables to a Wheatstone bridge circuit. Place an oscilloscope lead between the two leads so you're measuring the time-dependent voltage difference at the ends of the cables. Play some music and see what the actual difference is?

Sure, there's lots of design and testing with some cables. Mostly high power lines and cables for very high frequencies and antennas.

With those, test results do show measurable differences to exist and they also behave according to known science.

Curiously, audio cables - if the believers are to be believed - do not behave under any known principle of science. They cannot be measured. Test equipment, some of which is used to develop other cables, becomes ineffective and/or unreliable. Further, anyone who tries to apply similar methods is "hateful" and trying to suppress knowledge and truth.

Another way to look at this is assuming that every believer's claim is accurate. Never mind that the claims conflict most of the time. But if even a fraction of the claims were true, it would mean that many electrical goods we have should not work as they do.

Audio gets put on some special plane of purity. It isn't. There are thousands of applications with far more critical tolerances and performance issues. My amateur radio is like that. It's a complex unit with DSP, transmitting section, and lots else. Now, if tiny bits of metal in a wire, power cords, etc., made a difference, then those differences would probably screw up delicate functions inside. Same goes for all sorts of other electronics.

I'll put that argument yet another way. If it were shown or demonstrated that cryo'ed silver strands wrapped in fine silk and bathed in the tears of a virgin Tibetan monk improved, say, antenna reception in aircraft, then, believe me, the patent lawyers would be dispatched and there would be freakish amounts of work at the USPTO detailing this. If something has audio applications, it also has commercial and industrial uses. Electricity doesn't know the difference between some precious NOS tube and a commercial food dryer. If different cables made improvements, then industry would be all over it.

Another curious thing is the difference in cable costs. Most cables are priced fairly. Cover costs and make a fair return. However, the cables that claim science is wrong and that people who ask questions are full of "hate" are priced, typically, several hundred percent over costs. In fact, you'll often find $20 or $30 of materials being sold for several hundred.

Ask them why and hear yourself called a hateful, close-minded zealot with an agenda.

Maybe they're right. Or maybe they have something to hide.

 

[myinitialsaredac]

Quote:

Sure, there's lots of design and testing with some cables. Mostly high power lines and cables for very high frequencies and antennas.With those, test results do show measurable differences to exist and they also behave according to known science.Curiously, audio cables - if the believers are to be believed - do not behave under any known principle of science. They cannot be measured. Test equipment, some of which is used to develop other cables, becomes ineffective and/or unreliable. Further, anyone who tries to apply similar methods is "hateful" and trying to suppress knowledge and truth.Another way to look at this is assuming that every believer's claim is accurate. Never mind that the claims conflict most of the time. But if even a fraction of the claims were true, it would mean that many electrical goods we have should not work as they do.Audio gets put on some special plane of purity. It isn't. There are thousands of applications with far more critical tolerances and performance issues. My amateur radio is like that. It's a complex unit with DSP, transmitting section, and lots else. Now, if tiny bits of metal in a wire, power cords, etc., made a difference, then those differences would probably screw up delicate functions inside. Same goes for all sorts of other electronics.I'll put that argument yet another way. If it were shown or demonstrated that cryo'ed silver strands wrapped in fine silk and bathed in the tears of a virgin Tibetan monk improved, say, antenna reception in aircraft, then, believe me, the patent lawyers would be dispatched and there would be freakish amounts of work at the USPTO detailing this. If something has audio applications, it also has commercial and industrial uses. Electricity doesn't know the difference between some precious NOS tube and a commercial food dryer. If different cables made improvements, then industry would be all over it.Another curious thing is the difference in cable costs. Most cables are priced fairly. Cover costs and make a fair return. However, the cables that claim science is wrong and that people who ask questions are full of "hate" are priced, typically, several hundred percent over costs. In fact, you'll often find $20 or $30 of materials being sold for several hundred.Ask them why and hear yourself called a hateful, close-minded zealot with an agenda.Maybe they're right. Or maybe they have something to hide.

 
Well actually I know that Cardas has found a use for the ultra pure copper that he uses for his wires (his copper from his own foundry) in superconductors for Hadron colliders of all things. He mentioned to me it has to due with the eddies in the copper forcing the physical structure to lose its thermal conductivity at around 40 kelvin. In tests he has found that his eddy free solution (or virtually eddy free - maybe some hydrogen, water, and oxygen 9 Ns or more out) maintains its thermal conductivity our past that point. It also eliminates eddy currents in stereo systems which in theory should be better sounding. 
 
I can understand it in terms of a molecular orbital sense. Simply put pure molecular copper will have contiguous molecular orbitals of a certain range which will from a valence and conductance band that extends as long as the copper is in a continuous pure solid. Energy moves in, electrons switch bands, electron falls, energy moves to next electron and therein a current passes. Eddys (impurities) would essentially stop this current pass on a microscale (one row). Macro, the eddys probably wont stop the entirety as there is copper alongside it that is still contiguous. 
Quote:

Quote:

This is something I tinkered with a while back,
 
I didn't get perfect results as the window scaling and such was not particular to audio bandwidth.
 
The experiment did demonstrate electrical differences however and also RFI differences.

There are, however, several caviats, such as the fact that you tested interconnects (high resistance, low power), which differ from speaker (or headphone) cables which are low resistance, (relatively) high power. That RF interference can be an issue for interconnects is generally agreed upon. (and what was that really thin interconnect you used as "generic"?
 
Don't get me wrong: I'm very glad you performed your experiment. Data is a good thing. But to draw conclusions about audible differences in properly constructed headphone wire from it would, in my estimation, be assuming too much. (though I may have missed something in the middle pages).

I hope you did not in any way gather that I said those differences I saw back then were audible. It was my full intention to disclose that they were solely electrical differences. To test if they are audible requires a different setup and equipment that I don't currently have access to. I have no idea what that little interconnect was, it was sent along in the package of cables from Cardas to test. 
 
Dave

 

[Lenni]

let's get real for once - I mean, let's cut the nonsense. what's your view of us "cable-lover" audiophiles? - simpletons; easily mislead; nuts; other... - if not then what is. I'd like to remind that cables' manufactures don't force anybody to buy their cables - it's not a requirement, it's optional - and most (if not all) offer a money-back trial period. if I spend $500 of my hard earned cash on a cable it better be worth it.
 
what's also curious is that you haven't got into the cable business, since you seem to know everything on how it's done. I realize that you may find it morally uncomfortable, and I'd agree - but you'd not do it for the money, but to prove something. imagine the headlines: "hi-end cable manufacture reveals that its thousands $ cables are in fact worth $20 or $30 of material. jeez...that'd be quite a blow for us "cable-believers", since some of you guys seem bent in proving us wrong.  and I'm not talking specifically about you U.E. I find you to be genuinely interested in revealing cable properties, and I even coughwelcomecough some skepticism - and if you'd go ahead with such a test I'd give you the benefit of the doubt that you'd be fair, and not distort the results. I can't say the same for the like of Progrockman though: it's not even about cables anymore, but more like a  personal mission, some sort of ego perversions, which is annoying and disturbing to say the least.
 
anyway, having said that, if I spend $500 on cables is nobody's business, but mine

 

Quote:

Sure, there's lots of design and testing with some cables. Mostly high power lines and cables for very high frequencies and antennas.With those, test results do show measurable differences to exist and they also behave according to known science.Curiously, audio cables - if the believers are to be believed - do not behave under any known principle of science. They cannot be measured. Test equipment, some of which is used to develop other cables, becomes ineffective and/or unreliable. Further, anyone who tries to apply similar methods is "hateful" and trying to suppress knowledge and truth.Another way to look at this is assuming that every believer's claim is accurate. Never mind that the claims conflict most of the time. But if even a fraction of the claims were true, it would mean that many electrical goods we have should not work as they do.Audio gets put on some special plane of purity. It isn't. There are thousands of applications with far more critical tolerances and performance issues. My amateur radio is like that. It's a complex unit with DSP, transmitting section, and lots else. Now, if tiny bits of metal in a wire, power cords, etc., made a difference, then those differences would probably screw up delicate functions inside. Same goes for all sorts of other electronics.I'll put that argument yet another way. If it were shown or demonstrated that cryo'ed silver strands wrapped in fine silk and bathed in the tears of a virgin Tibetan monk improved, say, antenna reception in aircraft, then, believe me, the patent lawyers would be dispatched and there would be freakish amounts of work at the USPTO detailing this. If something has audio applications, it also has commercial and industrial uses. Electricity doesn't know the difference between some precious NOS tube and a commercial food dryer. If different cables made improvements, then industry would be all over it.Another curious thing is the difference in cable costs. Most cables are priced fairly. Cover costs and make a fair return. However, the cables that claim science is wrong and that people who ask questions are full of "hate" are priced, typically, several hundred percent over costs. In fact, you'll often find $20 or $30 of materials being sold for several hundred.Ask them why and hear yourself called a hateful, close-minded zealot with an agenda.Maybe they're right. Or maybe they have something to hide.

 

[JerryLove]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lenni /img/forum/go_quote.gif
 
what's also curious is that you haven't got into the cable business, since you seem to know everything on how it's done.

Really? He knows how to secure financing, incorporate, and successfully fund and run an ad campaign to the point that he'll make money worth the effort with no chance of loosing his shirt in some attempt to satisfy a random poster on the internet's dare?
 
Quote:

imagine the headlines: "hi-end cable manufacture reveals that its thousands $ cables are in fact worth $20 or $30 of material. jeez...that'd be quite a blow for us "cable-believers"

 
It would be like the 1970's and the interest in Parapsychology; which seems to have lasted even after the most "proven" psychic revealed in a national press conference that he had been faking it.

 

[9pintube]

I'm With You Lenni, well said from the Believers Pt. of view...  as you said no bodies got a gun to the Non- cable believers Head making them buy anything they don't believe works...  If they want to use "Lamp Cord"  Go for it.....  But I will give U.E. the benefit of the doubt that many cable Manufacturers spend a lot less on their cables then what you'd think, But they must then spend big bucks on Adverts talking/selling their "Slice of Heaven"........So, tell me any manufacturer in High End Audio who doesn't inflate the hell out of their products, not just cables......especially when they're Slapped  together over in China.......... 

 

[myinitialsaredac]

Quote:

I'm With You Lenni, well said from the Believers Pt. of view...  as you said no bodies got a gun to the Non- cable believers Head making them buy anything they don't believe works...  If they want to use "Lamp Cord"  Go for it.....  But I will give U.E. the benefit of the doubt that many cable Manufacturers spend a lot less on their cables then what you'd think, But they must then spend big bucks on Adverts talking/selling their "Slice of Heaven"........So, tell me any manufacturer in High End Audio who doesn't inflate the hell out of their products, not just cables......especially when they're Slapped  together over in China.......... 

I spose....
 
Iphones make >100% their production cost... doesn't mean they aren't the best device out there. 
 
At risk of being labeled a Cardas fanboy I think it is reasonable to suggest them as one of the more technical manufacturers. They have their own foundry which operates in an oxygen reducing atmosphere (think molecular oxygen is a bronsted acid), make their own connectors, and think about the time it takes to lay wire and shielding in the shape of a little nautilus 

 (or the amount of time it takes to make the equipment to do so on a larger scale).  
 
I am not suggesting that audio companies don't make a lot of profit, but its not fair to say that because they do, that they are in anyway not entitled to do so. 
 
For an interested example beyond iphones, what about xbox/ps3/w.e games. I bet those cases + CDs only cost 10 cents all said and done 

 
 
Edit: I don't mean to say that you were implying whether or not they make a difference, but the production and revenue figures don't have any context in that argument was my point. 
 
Dave

 

[Lenni]

Quote:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lenni /img/forum/go_quote.gif
 
what's also curious is that you haven't got into the cable business, since you seem to know everything on how it's done.

Really? He knows how to secure financing, incorporate, and successfully fund and run an ad campaign to the point that he'll make money worth the effort with no chance of loosing his shirt in some attempt to satisfy a random poster on the internet's dare?
 

 
 
I suppose you're referring to big companies like Monster Cable. in that case I'd agree 100%. I think MC is about 90% ads. personally I wouldn't use MC cables if they give to me for free. but, there are also a lot of smaller companies that rely solely on word of mouth. they don't run ad campaigns; you don't see them on magazines; don't have fancy websites - yet their cables sell for thousands, and selling well.
 
I was talking more about in those terms. You could try it as well: since you believe that cables make no difference. buy the cheapest copper wire you can find, dress it in some nice sleeves, give it all sort of claims, put up a web site, and sell it for thousands. then once you've sold about 100 pieces (returns don't count), and your cable has become relatively known, you can then reveal the truth. easy huh?
 
Quote:

It would be like the 1970's and the interest in Parapsychology; which seems to have lasted even after the most "proven" psychic revealed in a national press conference that he had been faking it.

 
I don't really think that relates to cables. once people believed that the Earth was flat, so what... some still do.  can you prove that every cable is the same? no, you can't.
 
 
genuine skepticism is both fair and most welcome, since snake oil exists, and I guess the burden of proof is on us 'believers' to counter it. it all balance out in the end. and the cable debates will carry on for many years to come... lol

 

[JerryLove]

Quote:

I suppose you're referring to big companies like Monster Cable. in that case I'd agree 100%. I think MC is about 90% ads. personally I wouldn't use MC cables if they give to me for free. but, there are also a lot of smaller companies that rely solely on word of mouth. they don't run ad campaigns; you don't see them on magazines; don't have fancy websites - yet their cables sell for thousands, and selling well.

 
Even if not myth (which I suspect), still luck of the draw.
 
Heck: for all you know I've already made the greatest cables in the universe and they are sitting on the table in front of me, so let's assume I do (for the sake of discussion). Why hasn't word of mouth sold them already?
 
Quote:

I don't really think that relates to cables. once people believed that the Earth was flat, so what... some still do.  can you prove that every cable is the same? no, you can't.

Some people still believe in parapsycology. Can you prove that every psychic is a fake? No, you can't.

 

[DittoBox]

Cognitive dissonance plays a huge role in audiophile, wine, art and other highly subjective cultures. This isn't a bad thing, unless people are being taken advantage of (e.g. 10,000% mark up on 3" cables) and the basic economic waste associated with that. Development costs cannot possibly be high enough to justify that kind of mark up. Unlike art or wine, cabling differences are far less about opinion and more about science.

Personally I feel cables make a difference only to a certain point. Hence the reason I prefer Monoprice cabling if they make what I need. They're cheap, but very high quality. Well shielded cabling is important when you're dealing with analog signals. The number of wires and the quality of the metals used can make a difference when using longer cables. Even some digital signals need special treatment when used over distances, such as twisted pair ethernet/cat5e/6 cabling.

That being said there's quite a bit of voodoo surrounding expensive cables. Take for instance the 750USD USB cable that separates power and data into two cables, only to combine at the end. They say this has "dramatic effects" on the audio quality. The cable rejoins to one plug at the other end, utterly nullifying any perceived gains. It's digital, USB has error correction. If interference causes stray bits, they're caught and resent. This happens so fast that there is no chance for any change in final analog output. Even if there were, moving your head and tugging on the leads to your headphones will cause a thousand times greater audio disturbance than a few bad samples in the audio stream.

Ultimately I've found that bad analog cables can allow interference, but they will not inherently change or color the signal like the way some op amps and tubes can. Even the latter two aren't about accuracy as much as they are about how much you like the way they sound. Listening environments, amp choices, source choices and headphone construction will introduce infinitely more change to the quality of sound. Going from 2USD cables to 30USD is barely likely to make a detectable change, going from 30USD to 300 or even 3000USD will make no discernible difference. If someone has actual science (blind a/b/c+ testing with multiple testers, peer review, causation studies) that proves otherwise, I'd love to see it.