Cable - audible differences?

I have read so many things about how this amp receiver speaker etc sounds great only to buy it and find that for me it sucks that I understand people being skeptical when it comes to higher dollar cables and other specialty audio items. My thoughts are this purchase 4 different pairs of cables that you get for a good price so you can always re sell for a profit if you hate them then try them for yourself if they improve things great if not you have not lost anything.

If you cant tell a difference fine but keep in mind that just because you cant does not mean others cant.


I personally have noticed little difference in sound changes between most speaker cables I have tried except for one pair from Canada they were made of 4 strands of very stiff wire it looked like the type you see in transformers with a plastic type coating and wow what a difference in sound after taking them out and trying my normal speaker wire it was like the bass and sound stage had went away put them back on and it came back the difference was night and day, trust me on this if you heard them versus most others you would be a believer unless you were totally deaf. They were the Tice Audio 416 cables not sure of original cost I think I paid $200.00 or so.


p1070434.jpg p1070433.jpg


As to cost well that's up to you what you want to spend do 3k per meter cables sound better then $10.00 a foot cables? maybe maybe not only you can be the judge but don't be envious of people who can afford to buy them and do.



Regards Snow
 
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About inaudible cables and whether we are able to actually detect this


In fact, it's easy to observe if you have a really clean open high-end system at your disposal. Meaning no horns, no di- or bi-pols, a reference system. I have met quite a lot of those angry naysayers through the years, only to see how they lights up in a smile and suddenly starts to see the picture when listening to my system. Even if they do not have years of experience in this matter like I have.


Every component in the signal path has an audible signature, moore or less. This is like seeing the world through several layers of more or less clear glass, lets say we have like 22 layers. If all these are colouring your sight, just cleaning one will not seem to have any effect, though you might still imagine a certain improvement but not anyewhere near as big as claimed by some.

Unlike what Wojciech claims anything but inaudible cables means you`re listening through dirty glass, colouring and degrading the signal. Specially if you starts to realise WHY certain cables are coloring. And no, industry-cables are not anywhere near beeing inaudible, think again.

I have never made any secrets out of what I use and how I do this, have allready posted reciepes a few times here at AK. but yeah I know, people have been lied too for so long they do not believe in anything anymoore. And sometimes the true answers seems too simple to be taken seriously.
 
Thanks for the links :)
No problem. Leebs has put together a good magazine. It's nice to see it get mentioned around the 'net (although I don't appreciate the earlier digs at PS Audio earlier in this thread). The articles by Roy Hall alone are often a hoot. :D
 
One man's "Detail" is another man's "Please, just stab me in the eardrums with knitting-needles". To steal a phrase: "Presentation is everything". Cables can taylor presentation.
 
In fact, it's easy to observe if you have a really clean open high-end system at your disposal. Meaning no horns, no di- or bi-pols, a reference system. I have met quite a lot of those angry naysayers through the years, only to see how they lights up in a smile and suddenly starts to see the picture when listening to my system. Even if they do not have years of experience in this matter like I have.
Your horn bias is showing. If you haven't heard a "Good, clean, open, high-end" horn-based system, that's on you. And yes, I have heard several "Reference system's" in major recording studios and mastering labs. Most people that have heard my system don't even believe what they're hearing is horns.
 
One man's "Detail" is another man's "Please, just stab me in the eardrums with knitting-needles". To steal a phrase: "Presentation is everything". Cables can taylor presentation.

You can do it this way but as I said, this is to add another dirty glass on top of the wrongs you allready have.
 
Thanks for the info/links Wildcat and Soundmig. I have some information that I think is very useful concerning speaker wires and ics.

Below is a graph from Jensen concerning coax cable's impedance vs frequency. Notice the impedance rises as the frequency is lowered, confirming what Mr. Galen Gareis and Gautam Raja concluded. This graph is for RG58U coax cable.

coaxZo.jpg

Here is some information I posted earlier concerning single vs multiple parallel speaker wires, reducing the inductance and therefore inductive reactance at higher frequencies.

Inductance is frequency dependent. For comparison, below is the DC resistance, the self straight wire inductance, and inductive reactance for 5 feet of single wire and parallel wires at 20khz:

Single Single Single 5 parallel

18 gauge wire 13 ga. ~11 ga. 18 ga.

.0325 .0104 .0066 .0065 DC resistance

2410 nh 2232 nh 2162 nh 482 nh

.30 ohms .28 ohms .27 ohms .06 ohms Inductive reactance at 20khz

Notice the 5 foot 5 parallel 18 gauge wires equate to an approximate 11 gauge wire in DC resistance, but the inductive reactance is nearly 1/4.5 that of the 11 gauge wire at 20khz.

(You may have heard the past arguments over the small wire parallel with the large wire improving the highs. The highs were increased because the inductance of the two wires was about 1/2 that of a single wire.)

Remember, this is for a single 5 foot lead, not both leads. Multiply this by 2 for the total 10 feet speaker lead length. I would say .54 ohms is quite a bit in series with a 4 ohm, or 8 ohm speaker, although the impedance of a speaker at 20khz is higher. One could easily be about half a db down at 20khz, a couple of tenths at 10khz and even a tenth at 5khz. Whether one notices a difference will depend upon some factors. I and friends perceived a difference between 8 and 10 parallel wires per lead.

With speaker wire, not only is the inductance greatly reduced by paralleling smaller wires, but if +/- speaker wires are separated, the speaker wire capacitance can be nearly eliminated, a plus. The only downside is the aesthetics.

One other thing. When I compared two interconnect cables (ics) I made, exactly the same capacitance, inductance, resistance, except one plugs in, while the other was soldered in to the components, there was a sonic difference. I later found out that the termination materials, influences the sonics.

On my speakers, I have been adjusting a 9k ohm resistor across a full range driver by hundredths of an ohm and is easily perceivable by friends. Amazing how sensitive one's ear is.

Anyway, I have been tweaking for some years now.

keep on truckin

joe
 
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You can do it this way but as I said, this is to add another dirty glass on top of the wrongs you allready have.
Not necessarily. You make the assumption that the "Detailed" system is not plagued by excessive brightness. We've all heard the quote about systems that measured right but sounded bad...
 
Seriously, who wants skinny, cheap-ass looking cables on the floor connected to megabuck speakers and amplifiers? It looks stupid.

As with everything, there is the law of diminishing returns and some people are prepared to push further along that curve than others. Good luck to them I say.
Quoted for truth^^^

About inaudible cables and whether we are able to actually detect this
I have inaudible cable whenever I forget to plug one end in, I assure you my detection meter in my brain goes off immediately. ;)
 
I have network cable CAT7 for speaker cable and its sound good. Capacitance is not big problem for my amplifier but soon I can doing measurements how much is capacitance have.
 
Quoted for truth^^^ I have inaudible cable whenever I forget to plug one end in, I assure you my detection meter in my brain goes off immediately. ;)
My inaudible cables get louder with very limited bandwidth when I forget to plug them in.
 
Not necessarily. You make the assumption that the "Detailed" system is not plagued by excessive brightness. We've all heard the quote about systems that measured right but sounded bad...
No need IMHO for all the measurements and scientific jargon along with a healthy dose of BS by the speaker cable makers as to why there cable is better then someone elses. Keep it simple either you like how they change the sound or you don't. We could spend the rest of our time on earth demanding double blind testing, measurements of all sorts etc and fighting amongst our selves trying to prove one point or the other. Who cares who has the biggest dick?

If they sound good to you keep your cables if they don't sell them to someone else on the same journey.


Regards Snow
 
^ Never seen an objective standard for raising goosebumps outside of temperature : ) Excepting perhaps Ella Fitzgerald or Howling Wolf ...
 
I have read so many things about how this amp receiver speaker etc sounds great only to buy it and find that for me it sucks that I understand people being skeptical when it comes to higher dollar cables and other specialty audio items. My thoughts are this purchase 4 different pairs of cables that you get for a good price so you can always re sell for a profit if you hate them then try them for yourself if they improve things great if not you have not lost anything.

If you cant tell a difference fine but keep in mind that just because you cant does not mean others cant.


I personally have noticed little difference in sound changes between most speaker cables I have tried except for one pair from Canada they were made of 4 strands of very stiff wire it looked like the type you see in transformers with a plastic type coating and wow what a difference in sound after taking them out and trying my normal speaker wire it was like the bass and sound stage had went away put them back on and it came back the difference was night and day, trust me on this if you heard them versus most others you would be a believer unless you were totally deaf. They were the Tice Audio 416 cables not sure of original cost I think I paid $200.00 or so.


View attachment 1077960 View attachment 1077961


As to cost well that's up to you what you want to spend do 3k per meter cables sound better then $10.00 a foot cables? maybe maybe not only you can be the judge but don't be envious of people who can afford to buy them and do.



Regards Snow


Yup Snow, strands of very stiff wire is the only way to do speakerwires. Anything else will reduce bass-dynamic and soundstage++ as you correctly observed. The (separately isolated) strands needs to have an area of at least 9awg each to get clear of any bass-compression. Thinner strands like 12awg will still compress the bassdynamics even if they clearly outperforms all kinds of "high-end" factory-cables.

About soundstage, any multistrand wires will have a high amount of cross-over distortion that ruins the 3D while a (thick) solid wire will deliver a clean undistorted signal.

Moorebeer; Yeah I guess some sarcasm is what every cable-thread needs
 
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