Wiring, Nordost or Audioquest way?

[abacus]

I myself am one of the boring people in that I deal in facts and scientific proof, not fiction, and following this principal there is no evidence of any of the differences mentioned, (I have certainly never heard any in a blind test) but if somebody can prove that the above mentioned changes actually make a difference in a repeatable monitored and documented scientific test then I will certainly accept it, however as no one anywhere in the world has yet been able to do this I will stay as I am.

Bill

 

[songox]

So if it's all in the head can the non-believers brain not tell him that there is no difference between cables? If a non-believer is so sceptical about it plus there is no scientific proof would their brain not lie to them if it actually sounded different! Placebo effect should work both ways! We all got brain!

 

[abacus]

So if it's all in the head can the non-believers brain not tell him that there is no difference between cables? If a non-believer is so sceptical about it plus there is no scientific proof would their brain not lie to them if it actually sounded different! Placebo effect should work both ways! We all got brain!

You are completely correct, which is why it must be a repeatable monitored and documented scientific test, so that all the variables you mention are removed.

Bill

 

[Covenanter]

I posted a link about directional cables on another thread. It was from a cable manufacturer and they didn't believe in directional cables but were happy to sell them. What they found was that cables all cut from the same reel were thought to be directional in different directions and in a purely random fashion by "believers". I thought that was particularly telling.
Chris

 

[SiUK]

That's akin to selective hearing.

There's a really good article by Audioquest called 'Cable Theory. Theory vs Evidence'. I read it some time ago and found it to be a very balanced and intelligent examination of this topic considering their position. But they design and sell cables so what would they know?

I tend not to read the religious-style rants as they are invariably circular and you end up just going round and round someone else's prejudices. ..fruitlessly. Balanced examination does it for me.

 

[cheeseboy]

But they design and sell cables so what would they know?

they'd know that they will say anything to sell more cables. It's called advertising.

 

[CnoEvil]

But they design and sell cables so what would they know?

they'd know that they will say anything to sell more cables. It's called advertising.

It's nice to see a reasoned and balanced argument with no sweeping statements........Shisters, the lot of 'em

 

[cheeseboy]

But they design and sell cables so what would they know?

they'd know that they will say anything to sell more cables. It's called advertising.

It's nice to see a reasonable and balanced argument with no sweeping statements........Shisters, the lot of 'em

of course, a paper funded and written by a company that supports their sales is not going to be biased in the slightest is it? Unless you care to show me a paper written and funded by a cable company that says all cables are the same to show some kind of balance ??

 

[andyjm]

That's akin to selective hearing.

There's a really good article by Audioquest called 'Cable Theory. Theory vs Evidence'. I read it some time ago and found it to be a very balanced and intelligent examination of this topic considering their position. But they design and sell cables so what would they know?

I tend not to read the religious-style rants as they are invariably circular and you end up just going round and round someone else's prejudices. ..fruitlessly. Balanced examination does it for me.

In the spirit of balance, on one side we have the work done by Cavendish, Ohm, Volta and Ampere in the late 1700s and early 1800s on basic conduction, followed by the work on electromagnetic radiation by James Clerk Maxwell in the mid 1800s. On the other side of the balance we have:

http://www.audioquest.com/pdfs/aq_cable_theory.pdf

 

[andyjm]

You are of course quite at liberty to believe whatever you like - even in the absence of any scientific proof.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance

Oh well; it looks like I'm going to have to stop hearing what I'm hearing, until science catches up. :shifty:

Cno,

I admire your staying power. At just over 10,000 posts, you must be WHF's most prolific poster. At the very least, you should get a free subscription to the mag. As you pass this milestone, perhaps you could reflect on:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occams_razor

In essence, it suggests the simplest explanation is most likely to be correct. My view is that given the lack of technical basis for the cable effects described on this forum, that it is most likely that the listeners are subject to some form of bias, and the differences that are heard are not real.

 

[Covenanter]

But they design and sell cables so what would they know?

they'd know that they will say anything to sell more cables. It's called advertising.

It's nice to see a reasoned and balanced argument with no sweeping statements........Shisters, the lot of 'em

Yes the sweeping statements aren't helpful but you aren't going to see "We make directional cables. They don't work but we'd love you to buy them."

Chris

 

[CnoEvil]

Cno,

I admire your staying power. At just over 10,000 posts, you must be WHF's most prolific poster. At the very least, you should get a free subscription to the mag. As you pass this milestone, perhaps you could reflect on:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occams_razor

In essence, it suggests the simplest explanation is most likely to be correct. My view is that given the lack of technical basis for the cable effects described on this forum, that it is most likely that the listeners are subject to some form of bias, and the differences that are heard are not real.

My primary aim on here is not to argue about cables, but if possible, help where I can with (hopefully) interesting and appropriate system suggestions / advice.....and learn about products that I haven't come across.

If people ask my opinion on cables, i will give it (and will qualify any advice with the suggestion to try before buying).......and it will be based on many hours of listening to a good variety of brands (on many different systems) and at a large range of prices.

 

[SiUK]

of course, a paper funded and written by a company that supports their sales is not going to be biased in the slightest is it?

If that doesn't sum up the idiom, 'throw out the baby with the bath water' (for andyjm, there's a Wikipedia page for that I think) I don't know what does!

Really? Are some of you here so myopic you willing choose to elliminate anything that doesn't exactly fit in with your own limited (from what I have read here) knowledge? Wow! Are you really that arrogant? Talk about 'dark age' thinking! You could hardly consider that a proper scientific approach.

I suppose if I'd worded my post more carefully I may have avoided (probably not) the fundamentalists jumping in with their ridiculing nonsensical explanations...if you can call them explanations. So perhaps it is actually my fault for not being more explicit. I should probably have asked for contributions from open minded people ...you know, ones that don't start with an insult, and then link to a wikipedia page at the end of almost every reply.

Anyhow, pointless to continue this amongst such esteemed company so please feel free to have the last vapid word.

 

[cheeseboy]

of course, a paper funded and written by a company that supports their sales is not going to be biased in the slightest is it?

If that doesn't sum up the idiom, 'throw out the baby with the bath water' (for andyjm, there's a Wikipedia page for that I think) I don't know what does!

Really? Are some of you here so myopic you willing choose to elliminate anything that doesn't exactly fit in with your own limited (from what I have read here) knowledge? Wow! Are you really that arrogant? Talk about 'dark age' thinking! You could hardly consider that a proper scientific approach.

I suppose if I'd worded my post more carefully I may have avoided (probably not) the fundamentalists jumping in with their ridiculing nonsensical explanations...if you can call them explanations. So perhaps it is actually my fault for not being more explicit. I should probably have asked for contributions from open minded people ...you know, ones that don't start with an insult, and then link to a wikipedia page at the end of almost every reply.

Anyhow, pointless to continue this amongst such esteemed company so please feel free to have the last vapid word.

hypocrite.

 

[matt49]

This thread has descended into personal insults.

Mods, a quiet word with some of the more hot-headed posters perhaps?

 

[andyjm]

of course, a paper funded and written by a company that supports their sales is not going to be biased in the slightest is it?

If that doesn't sum up the idiom, 'throw out the baby with the bath water' (for andyjm, there's a Wikipedia page for that I think) I don't know what does!

Really? Are some of you here so myopic you willing choose to elliminate anything that doesn't exactly fit in with your own limited (from what I have read here) knowledge? Wow! Are you really that arrogant? Talk about 'dark age' thinking! You could hardly consider that a proper scientific approach.

I suppose if I'd worded my post more carefully I may have avoided (probably not) the fundamentalists jumping in with their ridiculing nonsensical explanations...if you can call them explanations. So perhaps it is actually my fault for not being more explicit. I should probably have asked for contributions from open minded people ...you know, ones that don't start with an insult, and then link to a wikipedia page at the end of almost every reply.

Anyhow, pointless to continue this amongst such esteemed company so please feel free to have the last vapid word.

SiUK,

I have provided clear and simple explanations about the jumper and wiring questions you posted, with which you seem to disagree. In response to my asking for clarification, you referred to a manufacturers brochure (the link to which I posted). Perhaps if you could explain where I was going wrong with my understanding of jumper plates and associated wiring, we could then have a reasoned conversation.

 

[Latinaudio]

Hi everybody.

I came to this forum by accident. Lucky me.

I have been collecting music since 44 years ago, listening every detail specially on my favorite records.

I have a turntable, cassette deck, tuner, cd player, streaming player, DVD, VHS, you name it. And more than 3500 lps, 1000 cds, etc.

Looking for bi-wire links to my JM Labs Electra 926, I found this forum.

No more than 30 days ago I received my brand new (expensive) speakers wire... and use the same Sewell bananas SiUK used (look at the pictures). Let them "burned in" for more than 10 days.. and was disappointed with the results. Loose bass, agressive treble. I came back to my old cheap cables, without the bananas, recapturing some of the lost sound. Then I begun to try biwiring with the old and new cables. Bi-wiring made things clearer, open, but still the agressive treble concerned me. So I used again the new cable BUT connect it to the hi terminals and the metal jumper to connect the lo section.

Things were better, by good margin, until I read -by accident, I repeat- this forum.

I was hearing music, stand up from my chair, set the volumen of my T+A amp to minimum, and make the "Nordost" wiring. No more than 5 minutes after that, I played the same record I was listening.

SiUK: K-Boom!!!!!!!! I found what I was looking for: right away I heard the focus, clean bass and clear but no agressive treble I was expecting of my +20.000$ rig!!!!!!! Why? Bias???? SiUK: +40 years listening to music are experienced ears, no more but no less.

This is my grain of salt: always trust your ears. I´m a MD, and in medicine as in life, not all the scientific facts explain the whole truth. Sorry folks who made nasty comments, try it at home... and we´ll speak. It worked for me, my wife and sons heard the same thing. But I never told them what were the changes or if I had made anything at all, I simply called them to hear music and ALL asked: "what did you bought now? It sounds terrific"

Case closed. Thanks again SiUk!!!!!

 

[andyjm]

This is my grain of salt: always trust your ears. I´m a MD, and in medicine as in life, not all the scientific facts explain the whole truth.

With your extensive medical experience, I am sure you are familiar with the problems faced by drug companies when using subjective patient feedback to evaluate the performance of drugs.

It was established that even if the patient didn't know which drug was real or placebo, if the clinician administering the drug was aware if the drug was real, the unconcious cues given by the clinician to the patient were enough to skew the results. This is sugestion bias one stage removed, and resulted in the use of 'double blind' tests in drug trials where neither the patient or the clinician knew whether the drug was real.

Given the clear and well documented problems of suggestion bias in subjective evaluation, I wonder why you think you are immune from this effect.

 

[hifikrazy]

And I thought the one good of the site redesign was to get rid of this bunch of *censored*, which has at least made this forum a lot more pleasant lately. But alas, no.... It only takes one post about cables to get them crawling out of the sewers again.

 

[abacus]

Old thread resurrected, let it RIP.

Bill

 

[chebby]

It worked for me, my wife and sons heard the same thing. But I never told them what were the changes or if I had made anything at all, I simply called them to hear music and ALL asked: "what did you bought now? It sounds terrific"

If I 'called' my wife 'to hear music' she would just know I had changed something and she would naturally want to be complimentary in order to make me feel happy.

Assuming that you also got married to someone who likes to see you happy (and knows all of your moods and expressions and body language inside-out), then it's not a meaningful test.

My wife once returned from work and could tell - even before stepping into the living room - that I had bought a new system just from the type of music I was playing and from the untypically louder than usual volume.

 

[andyjm]

And I thought the one good of the site redesign was to get rid of this bunch of *censored*, which has at least made this forum a lot more pleasant lately. But alas, no.... It only takes one post about cables to get them crawling out of the sewers again.

Ahh, the reasoned argument to put it all to bed...

If you scroll through the thread, I spent some time trying to explain why the claims made about replacing jumper plates with cables was nonsense. Equally, the suggestions about how to plug speaker cables into the speaker connections were equally daft.

The best response anyone had was to 'trust your ears'

It is unfortunate when a website dedicated to a technical pursuit decends into mystical beliefs to justify human subjective perception.

 

[steve_1979]

And I thought the one good of the site redesign was to get rid of this bunch of *censored*, which has at least made this forum a lot more pleasant lately. But alas, no.... It only takes one post about cables to get them crawling out of the sewers again.

*bye*

 

[Overdose]

of course, a paper funded and written by a company that supports their sales is not going to be biased in the slightest is it?

If that doesn't sum up the idiom, 'throw out the baby with the bath water' (for andyjm, there's a Wikipedia page for that I think) I don't know what does!

Really? Are some of you here so myopic you willing choose to elliminate anything that doesn't exactly fit in with your own limited (from what I have read here) knowledge? Wow! Are you really that arrogant? Talk about 'dark age' thinking! You could hardly consider that a proper scientific approach.

I suppose if I'd worded my post more carefully I may have avoided (probably not) the fundamentalists jumping in with their ridiculing nonsensical explanations...if you can call them explanations. So perhaps it is actually my fault for not being more explicit. I should probably have asked for contributions from open minded people ...you know, ones that don't start with an insult, and then link to a wikipedia page at the end of almost every reply.

Anyhow, pointless to continue this amongst such esteemed company so please feel free to have the last vapid word.

Ironic post of the week!

I'm guessing, from the lack of any reasoned argument in your post, that you might be in the 'cables are the best form of EQ' camp.

 

[pauln]

And I thought the one good of the site redesign was to get rid of this bunch of *censored*, which has at least made this forum a lot more pleasant lately. But alas, no.... It only takes one post about cables to get them crawling out of the sewers again.

You come across as a really unpleasant person. You would have fiitted in pretty well with the Spanish inquisition, they burnt people that didn't agree with their way of thinking as far as I recall.

Hey ho, takes all sorts to make a world.