I once read somewhere that the human brain can only remember, in the context of doing a hearing comparison, for about 8 seconds.....

EG. When comparing two sets of speaker cables. You would have to listen to the two speaker cables no more than 8 seconds apart with everything else being equal to reliably notice a difference.

Ettore
BTW nice to see you posting again

I am not sure the argument presented in the web page has that much ultimate value. It addresses skin effect in a low freq system. Skin effect, if audible at all and not a false premise, should have minimal affect in the audible range (and even then only above 10-20,000 Hz). I suppose… the electrical affects could have some significance (i.e. harmonics) in the audible band but not one I would get my underwear in a wad over. The graphs are a nice touch and show that each cable marketing argument has value (much of the affect is in the audible band). I did not like the fact this was a text book paper (no real measurements just cut and paste). I have been inundated recently with articles and papers written by academics, they seldom have much value in real world situations.

The formulas in the article are not what I would have used in an AC system for inductive reactance or capacitive reactance. They are simple, BUT frequency dependant so the cables performance will be affected by the capacitance and the inductance of the cable. The quality of the preamp is an issue too since it only puts out milliamps, how the preamps outputs react to the combined impedance from the cable and amplifier input stage is the real question in my mind.

The article is interesting and it has technical merit, BUT it is a persuasionary article and has zero scientific value because of its bias. I don’t know why cables get everyone in a tizzy, they either make a sonic difference or they don’t. If you hear a difference buy the one that gives the best presentation, and meets your budget. If you don’t hear a difference then buy the one that suits your needs and budget.

I read an on line article recently that was very interesting on cable insulation. The author felt the insulation used in a cable WAS important since it is the insulation (dielectric) in a capacitor that determines its charge/discharge time as well as its capacity (in farads). This was rather thought provoking to me.

lol, IMO this does not help the 'it sounds different' side as: if you can't remember what it used to sound like how can you now say it sounds different?? :D

hey - who wants to start a thread on siffeneing caps?? [img]graemlins/headbang.gif[/img]

^^^ Or how can you say it sound the same?? :D

[ June 02, 2005, 10:26 PM: Message edited by: SweetnLow91SC ]

hey brandon you are right on, if you look at archive photos of the apollo befor landing and check where the moon in relation to the earth and sun are, then x reference to the time and date, and "BINGO" the shadows from the sun are in the wrong place!!! kind of like seeing moss growing on the south side of a tree in vancover. i have way to much time on my hands sometimes. lol

^ lol me too, but it's true.

Not to mention the American flag waving in the "wind" up there.

Well since I don't see companies advertising how amazingly the same their wires sound to everything else I would think the burden to be on those wanting to show a difference [img]graemlins/thumb.gif[/img]


"Hey everyone, buy our stuff! It's mundane!"

That's just not doing it for me [img]graemlins/dunno.gif[/img] [img]tongue.gif[/img]

Documented? Sure...I can write this down for ya....When I brought home my Totems I wired them with run of the mill 12 g. speaker wire. After some equipment swapping and well after they were broken in (whole new topic there) I decided to try making my own wire out of cat 5. I'm sure most of you have heard about this, stripping the jacket off...seperating all of the conductors and braiding them in sets of three yadda yadda yadda.

Well, my wife has very sensitive hearing compared to mine, and I couldn't really tell a difference, but she heard a big difference. It was as close to an A-B comparison as can be as I had both sets of wire run to the speakers and there was about a 10 minute waiting period while I swapped out the wires.

The interesting part is that she thought that the work I was putting into making these cables...and the mess in the house...was a giant pain in the ass and waste of time. So for her to actually admit to hearing a difference...I believe it.

Well considering that acoustic memory is very short and the tests were not done blind this really doesn't prove much at all.

Could she still hear a difference had the change been done in a second?

Would she still hear a differece had you not actually changed wires, just made her think so?

The brain is funny when it comes to sound.

[quote]Originally posted by JRace:

Quote:

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Would she still hear a differece had you not actually changed wires, just made her think so?

The brain is funny when it comes to sound.

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Have you ever replaced old speakers with a different brand and heard a difference? Did your brains' acoustical memory remember how the old speakers sounded?

I don't believe her reaction would have been as strong had she barely heard a difference. The point I'm trying to make here is that a barely audible difference to one persons ears can be a blatent difference to someone with more sensitve hearing...someone who say didn't blow their brains out with a walkman for 5 years...attend loud concerts year after year...drive around with a ridiculously loud system in their car everyday...in my case, work construction for 20 years etc..

[ June 03, 2005, 06:04 PM: Message edited by: pusnboob ]