What annoys me today in marketing and media that too often today then talking on hi-fi, science is replaced by bizarre belief structures and marketing fluff, leading to a decades-long stagnation of the audiophile domain. Science makes progress, pseudo-science doesn’t. Hi-fi world is filled by pseudoscience, dogma and fruitloopery to the extent that it resembles a fundamentalist religion. Loudspeaker performance hasn’t tangibly improved in forty years and vast sums are spent addressing the wrong problems.
Business for Engineers: Marketers Lie article points tout that marketing tells lies — falsehoods — things that serve to convey a false impression. Marketing’s purpose is to determining how the product will be branded, positioned, and sold. It seems that there too many snake oil rubbish products marketed in the name of hifi. It is irritating to watch the stupid people in the world be fooled.
In EEVblog #29 – Audiophile Audiophoolery video David L. Jones (from EEVBlog) cuts loose on the Golden Ear Audiophiles and all their Audiophoolery snake oil rubbish. The information presented in Dave’s unique non-scripted overly enthusiastic style! He’s an enthusiastic chap, but couldn’t agree more with many of the opinions he expressed: Directional cables, thousand dollar IEC power cables, and all that rubbish. Monster Cable gets mostered. Note what he says right at the end: “If you pay ridiculous money for these cable you will hear a difference, but don’t expect your friends to”. If you want to believe, you will.
My points on hifi-nonsense:
One of the tenets of audiophile systems is that they are assembled from components, allegedly so that the user can “choose” the best combination. This is pretty largely a myth. The main advantage of component systems is that the dealer can sell ridiculously expensive cables, hand-knitted by Peruvian virgins and soaked in snake oil, to connect it all up. Say goodbye to the noughties: Yesterday’s hi-fi biz is BUSTED, bro article asks are the days of floorstanders and separates numbered? If traditional two-channel audio does have a future, then it could be as the preserve of high resolution audio. Sony has taken the industry lead in High-Res Audio.
HIFI Cable Humbug and Snake oil etc. blog posting rightly points out that there is too much emphasis placed on spending huge sums of money on HIFI cables. Most of what is written about this subject is complete tripe. HIFI magazines promote myths about the benefits of all sorts of equipment. I am as amazed as the writer that that so called audiophiles and HIFI journalists can be fooled into thinking that very expensive speaker cables etc. improve performance. I generally agree – most of this expensive interconnect cable stuff is just plain overpriced.
I can agree that in analogue interconnect cables there are few cases where better cables can really result in cleaner sound, but usually getting any noticeable difference needs that the one you compare with was very bad yo start with (clearly too thin speaker wires with resistance, interconnect that picks interference etc..) or the equipment in the systems are so that they are overly-sensitive to cable characteristics (generally bad equipment designs can make for example cable capacitance affect 100 times or more than it should). Definitely too much snake oil. Good solid engineering is all that is required (like keep LCR low, Teflon or other good insulation, shielding if required, proper gauge for application and the distance traveled). Geometry is a factor but not in the same sense these yahoos preach and deceive.
In digital interconnect cables story is different than on those analogue interconnect cables. Generally in digital interconnect cables the communication either works, does not work or sometimes work unreliably. The digital cable either gets the bits to the other end or not, it does not magically alter the sound that goes through the cable. You need to have active electronics like digital signal processor to change the tone of the audio signal traveling on the digital cable, cable will just not do that.
But this digital interconnect cables characteristics has not stopped hifi marketers to make very expensive cable products that are marketed with unbelievable claims. Ethernet has come to audio world, so there are hifi Ethernet cables. How about 500 dollar Ethernet cable? That’s ridiculous. And it’s only 1.5 meters. Then how about $10,000 audiophile ethernet cable? Bias your dielectrics with the Dielectric-Bias ethernet cable from AudioQuest: “When insulation is unbiased, it slows down parts of the signal differently, a big problem for very time-sensitive multi-octave audio.” I see this as complete marketing crap speak. It seems that they’re made for gullible idiots. No professional would EVER waste money on those cables. Audioquest even produces iPhone sync cables in similar price ranges.
HIFI Cable insulators/supports (expensive blocks that keep cables few centimeters off the floor) are a product category I don’t get. They typically claim to offer incredible performance as well as appealing appearance. Conventional cable isolation theory holds that optimal cable performance can be achieved by elevating cables from the floor in an attempt to control vibrations and manage static fields. Typical cable elevators are made from electrically insulating materials such as wood, glass, plastic or ceramics. Most of these products claim superior performance based upon the materials or methods of elevation. I don’t get those claims.
Along with green magic markers on CDs and audio bricks is another item called the wire conditioner. The claim is that unused wires do not sound the same as wires that have been used for a period of time. I don’t get this product category. And I don’t believe claims in the line like “Natural Quartz crystals along with proprietary materials cause a molecular restructuring of the media, which reduces stress, and significantly improves its mechanical, acoustic, electric, and optical characteristics.” All sounds like just pure marketing with no real benefits.
CD no evil, hear no evil. But the key thing about the CD was that it represented an obvious leap from earlier recording media that simply weren’t good enough for delivery of post-produced material to the consumer to one that was. Once you have made that leap, there is no requirement to go further. The 16 bits of CD were effectively extended to 18 bits by the development of noise shaping, which allows over 100dB signal to noise ratio. That falls a bit short of the 140dB maximum range of human hearing, but that has never been a real goal. If you improve the digital media, the sound quality limiting problem became the transducers; the headphones and the speakers.
We need to talk about SPEAKERS: Soz, ‘audiophiles’, only IT will break the sound barrier article says that today’s loudspeakers are nowhere near as good as they could be, due in no small measure to the presence of “traditional” audiophile products. that today’s loudspeakers are nowhere near as good as they could be, due in no small measure to the presence of “traditional” audiophile products. I can agree with this. Loudspeaker performance hasn’t tangibly improved in forty years and vast sums are spent addressing the wrong problems.
We need to talk about SPEAKERS: Soz, ‘audiophiles’, only IT will break the sound barrier article makes good points on design, DSPs and the debunking of traditional hi-fi. Science makes progress, pseudo-science doesn’t. Legacy loudspeakers are omni-directional at low frequencies, but as frequency rises, the radiation becomes more directional until at the highest frequencies the sound only emerges directly forwards. Thus to enjoy the full frequency range, the listener has to sit in the so-called sweet spot. As a result legacy loudspeakers with sweet spots need extensive room treatment to soak up the deficient off-axis sound. New tools that can change speaker system designs in the future are omni-directional speakers and DSP-based room correction. It’s a scenario ripe for “disruption”.
Computers have become an integrated part of many audio setups. Back in the day integrated audio solutions in PCs had trouble earning respect. Ode To Sound Blaster: Are Discrete Audio Cards Still Worth the Investment? posting tells that it’s been 25 years since the first Sound Blaster card was introduced (a pretty remarkable feat considering the diminished reliance on discrete audio in PCs) and many enthusiasts still consider a sound card an essential piece to the PC building puzzle. It seems that in general onboard sound is finally “Good Enough”, and has been “Good Enough” for a long time now. For most users it is hard to justify the high price of special sound card on PC anymore. There are still some PCs with bad sound hardware on motherboard and buttload of cheap USB adapters with very poor performance. However, what if you want the best sound possible, the lowest noise possible, and don’t really game or use the various audio enhancements? You just want a plain-vanilla sound card, but with the highest quality audio (products typically made for music makers). You can find some really good USB solutions that will blow on-board audio out of the water for about $100 or so.
Although solid-state technology overwhelmingly dominates today’s world of electronics, vacuum tubes are holding out in two small but vibrant areas. Some people like the sound of tubes. The Cool Sound of Tubes article says that a commercially viable number of people find that they prefer the sound produced by tubed equipment in three areas: musical-instrument (MI) amplifiers (mainly guitar amps), some processing devices used in recording studios, and a small but growing percentage of high-fidelity equipment at the high end of the audiophile market. Keep those filaments lit, Design your own Vacuum Tube Audio Equipment article claims that vacuum tubes do sound better than transistors (before you hate in the comments check out this scholarly article on the topic). The difficulty is cost; tube gear is very expensive because it uses lots of copper, iron, often point-to-point wired by hand, and requires a heavy metal chassis to support all of these parts. With this high cost and relative simplicity of circuitry (compared to modern electronics) comes good justification for building your own gear. Maybe this is one of the last frontiers of do-it-yourself that is actually worth doing.
1,275 Comments
Tomi Engdahl says:
Audio Hygiene 1: power cables
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5lHPjcXhK4c
Why do audiophiles think that the last meter of high quality power cable does make a difference in sound while it is preceded by perhaps hundreds of meters cheap cable in the grid? This question is often asked with an undertone of skepticism. Time for some clarification.
Video comments:
“If you’re like me you have to take turns at the luxury budget committee.” I think that’s the best line I have ever heard from an audiophile
and yes, that describes me as well. Thank you Hans! Very methodical look at how power cables can really make a difference to your sound.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Do Audiophile Power Cables Make A Difference?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rgun97VK7y8
We are sometimes asked our opinion of exotic power cords and cables and whether or not they are beneficial or worth the added cost over the stock power cords that come with A/V electronics. With the help of Blue Jeans Cable, we explore the importance of properly designed power cords while simultaneously debunking the myths and bogus claims perpetuated by many exotic cable manufacturers and A/V review magazines. Always remember the Audioholics.com mantra “only poorly designed cables can be sonically distinguishable” and you will never make a bad purchasing decision. Once all of the nonsensical claims are peeled away, only three very basic and essential metrics are left to ensure quality power transfer from your wall outlet to your A/V gear which we discuss in detail in this Youtube video and related article.
For the full written review, please visit:
Audiophile Power Cords – Do they really make a difference?
https://www.audioholics.com/audio-video-cables/power-cables
The problem with rectified AC is that our DC circuits still won’t work well on it, because they are designed to take an input of a constant voltage, not a continually fluctuating one, and audio circuits in particular will sound awful if we feed them a power supply that carries a loud, low buzz like this. Somehow we’ve got to smooth these fluctuations out, and this is where filtration comes in. A power supply will typically have a filter capacitor, which allows power to store up during peak voltages and be drawn down when the supply voltage drops, and may also have chokes, which are large, heavy coils whose inductance discourages the rate of current flow from fluctuating. To this may be added a voltage regulator, which typically is a solid-state device designed to prevent the voltage from exceeding a certain value. Assuming that the design of the power supply has been done right, by this time we have taken the nasty up-and-down, humming wall current and turned it into nice, usable, clean, quiet DC at whatever voltage, positive or negative, our circuits require.
When Power Cords Go Bad
There’s not a lot that can go wrong with a power cord, but there’s one thing in particular which can be of importance. An undersized power cord (that is, a power cord of inadequate gauge for the current running through it) can be dangerous, because it can overheat and start a fire. Apart from being dangerous to life and limb, interestingly, an undersized power cord can, under just the right sort of conditions, have an adverse impact upon audio quality as well.
The power supply of an amplifier relies upon the filter capacitor to hold enough charge to provide the desired voltage at the power supply output when the incoming rectified voltage is at a low point, and so the capacitor is drawn down when the rectified voltage is low and charged up when it is high. Some things can draw that power faster than others, and heavy bass is one of those things. Let’s say that we have a badly undersized power cord, and are playing bass-heavy music on a power amp. The bass draws down the filter capacitor, and the power supply draws current to try to replenish that charge; however, the more current the supply demands, the lower its impedance, and with an undersized power cord, this means that the supply voltage drops. If the voltage drop is strong enough, the filter capacitor will not fully charge up on the next cycle of high voltage, and this means a reduced supply voltage to the amplifier circuits. This phenomenon will occur in direct relationship to how much of this loud bass is being produced, and what does that mean? The bass note is now modulating the entire output of the amplifier which can in turn increase intermodulation distortion.
Now, this is an unusual scenario. There are any number of reasons why, in any particular system, it may not happen. The filter capacitor may be amply sized; the power cord may be of perfectly adequate gauge; the power supply may be delivering a slightly high voltage into a regulator anyhow and so the voltage fluctuations are stopped at the regulator. But if the factors are all right, it is indeed possible for a power cord to have a negative impact upon sound quality.
But what would fix this? The answer, of course, is simply that a power cord of adequately large gauge would fix it, if anything will. If that won’t fix it, the problem is in the power supply design and no power cord, of any sort, is going to help. No exotic design, full of silver conductors, braided wires, shielding, Teflon, or what-have-you, is going to help resolve this sort of problem any better than any other cord of similar gauge because the one and only problem is that the resistance of the cord is too high.
Tomi Engdahl says:
HiFi Power Cables £4 VS £4000 Compared and Blind A/B Demo USA Version Very interesting
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1adNVJSHrw
In this video I do a Blind A/B demonstration between a very cheap and very expensive HiFi Power cable so you can hear the difference it makes to the sound of an amplifier.
This has been done by using studio grade recording equipment with stereo microphones placed at ear height at the main listening position in my listening. All volumes are kept identical and everything identical except the power cable that is changed and you can hear the difference between the 2 power cables very clearly for yourself.
The system is just the KEF Reference 3 Speakers Playing – the subwoofers you can see are not in use
Video comments:
Listening on my cheap bluetooth speaker… A is brighter, edgier and flatter, B is smoother, fuller and more three dimensional, surprisingly big difference.
What electrical cable is in your wall? 4000 bucks a meter or 4 bucks a meter?
This is really interesting question , sure 4 bucks lol
What EXACT cable was the “freeby” – what gauge, what configuration, was it the cable supplied BY the manufacturer, and if so WHICH manufacturer. This test is meaningless without more data on the “freeby” cable. Also what components did you switch the cables on?
I use the cables that recording studios use. What’s good for them is good for me. They produce the music that you listen to, after all.
A sounded thinner.
I don’t know, my friend has spend about 250k on his system, and said he would never spend more than $10 on a power cable. his speaker cable and interconnects for for almost 10k, but doesn’t believe in anything power related (cables, conditioners)
A sounded alot more detailed. B sounded underwater, not so revealing and droning bass
I love every criticizing comment is followed by an explanation of why they’re wrong and that a $4,000 power cable is justified
I much preferred the sound of B. Better texture, micro details, more natural.
The A cable is congested the B cable let the music through properly. Congested means it’s all squashed in the middle sounding which adds “fat” to the sound. B is not boomy its impossible to be boomy in my room with all the acoustic treatment how the system is dialed in with the best dsp on the market Dirac Live
I thought about why a pretty short piece of cable between your power outlet from the wall and the amplifier would make any difference and the solution i came up with is “Capacitance”. Cables, powercables too, have capacitance and in this case it might A. Clean up (smooth) the electricity going through the cables like the filter capacitors on the powersupply of your amp. B. Act as an extra “storage well” again just like the filter capacitors of your amp (or whatever hifi component) does.
To create your own “audiophile” power cable you could do the following then.
1. use multi strand and also solid core wires together
2. twist them around each other (minimize interferences)
3. use ground cable even if your amplifier doesnt use one. then just connect it to the part that goes into the wall (more capacitance)
4. use thick insulation between the different cables “live, neutral, ground”, which in theory increases capacitance
5. shield the cable (minimize interferences)
And theres (most likely) your super duper audiophile powercable for a fraction of what audiophile companies want. Don’t electrocute yourself
I’d say cable B was the expensive one (typed that before the reveal). But whether I’m right or wrong, I still can’t wrap may head around the fact that an expensive AC cable sits in series with – and on the end of – hundreds of feet of mains wiring cable in the walls of the house. So? What does it mean? How does it improve something that has already gone through shit wire? I can hear the improvement, but I feel the need for a sensible explanation.
Going by the comments a lot of people who consider themselves to be audiophiles are actually tone deaf. I had a quick listen on my tablet which doesn’t have the best sound but even so right away from the first track I could tell cable B was the expensive and better sounding one.
I think a lot of the comments are from people who either didn’t really listen and or just wanted to be negative, not all of them, def not all
This is ridiculous. Your wiring in the house from your junction box make up 90% of the run. If the expensive cable somehow filters the bad signals then fair enough but I am sure that would effect the sound also.
The problem is that even though you hear differences, the mind gets used to the sound after a while. B is clearly better in my opinion but i would be happy with A if I never heard B
Yes but once you have heard the difference and improvement you can never unhear what is missing – you can re-adapt of course
I’m an audio reviewer and a DIRAC Live calibrator“. Nice! As if this exceedinly long title was acquired by doing a Masters thesis. You are much too illiterate to be a reviewer, I can promise you that. Your so-called reviews have no substance or form of any kind. They are merely a collection of superlatives and adjectives that describe nothing. I suggest you read some older, and to you probably irrelevant reviews, written by Mr. Alvin Gold and then compare them to your own. Anyone can switch on the camera and start talking but you Sir, you couldn’t put two sentences together that’d be worth reading. Cheers!
How short a power cable could you use to make a significant difference? I mean the shorter the cheaper I imagine and I really don’t want to spend 4.5k on a power cable. The cable behind the power outlet is grey twin and earth so you can obviously extend that out from the wall without causing any loss of quality then add the expensive cable inbetween the HiFi component and the 1 or 2 meters of cheap extension cable. Would a 6inch HiFi power cable make a difference? It would only be a several hundred pounds instead of several thousands.
The theory is that the power cable effectively becomes part of the primary on the transformer. If the cable is attenuating high frequency noise (in both directions) which some are proven to do, longer can be better.
Watch the interview with Galen Gabriel on the San Francisco Audio Society channel for a discussion.
But the sound panel on the right sitting ion the sub is moved between A and B. What is that about? What else got moved , and why?
its funny because the sound panel movement would contribute a bigger difference in sound than any cable power cable in the universe.
Yeah I can hear a difference, when A switch to B, I can hear part of the frequency got filter away. anyway, spend that kind of money to upgrade your speakers. That could make a much bigger difference. or got get a tone control, DSP. you can tune any tone you want just like the record engineer in the recording studio. Don’t be stupid.
I agree. There is a difference, absolutely, but it’s so minor I had to keep rewinding to pick it up. Granted this is over a YouTube video so you can only expect so much. But, if that $4k is MUCH better spent putting toward a new component or new speakers. Hell even toward interconnects (analog interconnects).
If you have more expensive speakers, you probably need to buy even more expensive power cords to match.
One Question….When you’ve spent so much money on that Beautiful Amplifier! I’m guessing it comes with it’s own Power Cord?! Yes, No…
So, the Power Cord, NAGRA supplies, is Trash?!
If I spend $40k on an amplifier, it better come with a power cord that doesn’t need replaced!!
people spend that much money on high end gear tend to choose their own or already possess high end cables. Stock cables are supposed to be thrown away.
NOT worth the (£4000!!!) price difference. Actually, A sounds AWESOME for the price
Just for fun : The audio you hear during a YouTube video will usually be 126 kbps AAC in an MP4, not that audiophile…
And there’s no info about this A/B test procedure….
hmm yes i can hear the difference between the two, so much so that i can tell just by hearing that cable B has a much heavier sound than cable A. However this also has an effect (to me at least) that cable A has a more open sound which makes cable B to sound a bit muffled in comparison.. but this could just be a limitation on the mic.. imagine re-cabling the wires from the wall socket to a generator.. lol
A sounds bigger but looser, kinda like a bit more air … B is tighter and more defined. Low end is more defined on B.
I prefer B. But difference is not really that huge listening on YouTube. Perhaps the difference is a lot more in real life auditioning.
“B” makes the bass seem blunt and the middle muffled, as for me
To me the difference was really small and hard to hear. On my system not worth the huge amount of money ..
Tomi Engdahl says:
Audiophile Cable TRUTHS: Power Cords
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNKRWvbIwUw
Video comments:
A few hours into this series, and there is still not a shred of scientific evicence that support the idea that high end cables makes an audible difference. Meanwhile at the “other camp” some of the best measuring equippment is being used to very clearly disprove that these cables have any chance of making an audible impact. Anything that is possible to measure tells us that it doesnt matter. You are also suddenly doubling down on your opinion that blind listening tests are somehow not valid or necessary, which kind of tells us that you tried it and could not discern a difference.
If you can hear the difference between power cables, then the PS section in your amplifier sucks ass… ;-). It’s supposed to convert everything it sees at the AC side to clean DC to power the amplification circuitry…
If you’re filtering out HF/VHF noise out of AC mains, how is “too much filtering/conditioning” a thing? Unless the filter designers are chopping the sine wave at 50/60hz. I mean, isn’t that just a bad conditioner design? Show me AC mains straight to a scope, and then show the scope on the end of the fancy cable/conditioner/regenerator. THAT should be your selling point.
You would be amazed how much a simple 0.1uf ceramic capactor across a power line can filter out for you… Total cost, about $0.12.
And before you get all excited, most amplifiers already have that either right on the power connector or right before the power supply mains.
Seriously … engineers do think about this stuff, you know.
With the power available from wall sockets (or Danny’s big batteries) filtering too much will draw a lot of current and likely fry your filtering system long before it ever affects the sound of your stereo system.
Oh dear. Yes cables CAN make a difference – if there is insufficient gauge or poor connectors. But a $5.00 cable will have the necessary gauge and it is trivial to make a good connection. Spend your money on speakers. The reason this is so sad is that Danny is right up there when it comes to speakers – but now he descends to snake oil.
Alternating current can be “dirty” due to modern electronic devices, vacuum cleaners, microwaves, chargers, florescent lights, dimmers etc etc.
The only real thing that any decent power cord might need is a thicker gauge.
You see this is why it’s always “some guy from Canada with some forgettable product” that gets mentioned along with the anecdotal bedtime stories.
Because there are no disinterested parties in the audio industry. The amount of backdoor excuses baked into the cable claims are there for a reason. “Like the fact that there’s no ONE SIZE FITS ALL”.
Because if it was measurable and substantial it could be patented!!!
Otherwise you will just have to trust the fact that it opens up the whatchamacallit and deepens the doohickey and smells so much better than lesser power cables.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
But they will just make you think that you simply cannot hear it. What a shame to be you. If only you had good ears and a fat wallet, then all of your sonic dreams could come true.
Comparing water filtration to a power cable doesn’t work, they are two different things.
Water from the city pipes will not get cleaner by replacing your in home pipes. You incorrectly compared it to adding filters which would clean the water. Replacing the pipe won’t filter the water so the water will be the same.
Power from the wall will not “get better” by replacing the cable, it can only be “less bad” as the cable eats up electricity due to resistance, and using 12awg over 14awg would assist in that.
The only way to improve the power quality would be by running through power conditioner, which would be similar to a water filter. At that point you’re trying to “clean it” using actual tools and not just a cable. The only thing a cable can do is hurt the signal.
If you want to claim that it makes an IMPROVEMENT, and not a negative change to signal that you perceive as “better” eg: HF roll off, then prove us all wrong and runs the tests between cables. Gene at Audiobolics does, and he’s an electrical engineer on top of that. Sound is easily measurable, so if you want people to believe what you say, then prove it.
Sorry, but if the bass response of your power amplifier changes because of a different power cable, you should have a serious conversation with the manufacturer of that power amplifier. A quality amplifier must have quality internal voltage circuitry that is independent of noise, RF reception and whatever the power line does. Period. If equipment sells as “high-end” but you can hear the neighbors washing machine switch on or a Russian opera station via the power supply, the equipment is not high-end. Somebody screwed up in the design.
Audio equipment should not be designed to only operate correctly in a military-grade Faraday cage listening room with filtered power supply.
Most “Audiophiles” don’t have any conception how shitty their systems are. A $400 2 chn 60 MHz 8 bit FFT oscilloscope and a little DIY knowledge is worth more than $10,000 worth of cables! It is simple to convert solid state electronics to lithium battery power. It is simple to measure and fix your room. Instead of expensive speaker cables – BIAMP/biwire @ the speaker… Cables are a crutch for underlying design flaws and commercial ‘bean counting’ .
The old cable controversy at it once again. Let me ask you a question. If the power cable makes such a difference then you should be able to measure it, right? Here’s the problem, you cannot as there are no differences between snake oil power cables vs the ones that came with your components. Furthermore, if, and that’s a HUGE if, there was a difference, even a small one, don’t you think that major players such as McIntosh, Musical Fidelity, Bryston, Rega, and Naim just to name a few, would offer a choice in power cables? They do not! Why? Because they know full well that it does not make a difference. Also, if you call any of those manufacturers, they will all tell you to stick with what the equipment came with. There’s no need to buy cables that cost an arm and a leg.
I can just imagine going to McIntosh or Bryston and tell them that their $10, 000 amps and preamps would sound so much better with a better choice of power cable. You guys manufacture and test your equipment up to wazoo but clearly, you need to fire the one suggesting that a $20.00 power cable is enough…right? That with a $250.00 dollar cable, your equipment would be so much better? I wonder what their answer would be?
By the way, let’s not forget the blind test. Funny how not one of the so called pro’s selling those cables, refuses to participate in blind tests. I’ve challenged someone who makes speaker reviews online and in magazines, to blind test 3 speakers ranging from $4000 up to $10,000 and compare the result with previous reviews of his. Guess what? He refused! It’s easy to sit down and make reviews based on high quality and expensive equipment when you are aware of the brands but not so much when you are in the dark.
By the way, all REL manual says ‘Only use the power cord supplied’.
“It’s easier to fool someone than to tell them that they’ve been fooled.” Mark Twain. Cables are the biggest scam in the audio industry.
If you look at the wires behind the power outlet even if it’s a direct circuit with quality wiring and outlet components… you will realize how absurd overpriced power cables are.
I do own $100+ power cables but it’s more for aesthetics.
I really like the people with the passion – even if I don’t believe at all in what you say I still like your passion
I agree that power source can really affect the sound. I recently connected my system to an APC UPS and the system sounded terrible – there were no high frequencies in the sound.
Cables DO definitely make a difference! I remember when I first upgraded my speaker cables and my speakers literally came alive! That’s not to say theres not plenty of BS when it comes to cables! And the law of diminishing return does apply! A £4000 system doesn’t need £5000 speaker cables, a pair of £200-300 speaker cables will be more than adequate for your system! If you are lucky enough to own a £50,000 system then a pair of £5000 speaker cable may squeeze just a little more from you system! 20k + cables are complete BS IMO. For people with more money than sense!!
Tomi Engdahl says:
Is this the Best DIY Power Cable on the Planet? (& cheap too!)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRkZEAYwIGA
In this video we discover what is maybe one of the best power cables available on plaet earth. Ready to revolutionize your power supply?
Construct your own Audiophile Power Cable from £15 (no soldering)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfVYfC6tmcc
A quick tutorial on how to construct your own Audiophile Power Lead for as little as £15. I walk you through the process, step by step. It it a lot simpler than you may realise and a worthwhile upgrade from using the generic, freebie IEC cable you get with your equipment.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mr Tarun, seems that there still are issues of ground problems in equipment causing noise and hum problems. If this is an issue, it is usually internal of the gear proper in my experience. If there is nothing that can be done by a tech, the method of not connecting the ground on the IEC power connector at the equipment end as you stated in your video is the ticket for all low current draw gear like preamps, tuners, cassette decks and CD players. On the power amp, the shields and ground should be connected on both ends. I’m with you on the color of the conductor insulation rather than the two black conductors numbered one and two as these could more easily be confused if notes taken are not followed. I am unfamiliar with EU wiring other than the standard colors used for mains hot, the neutral wire and ground. Both in EU and the States, the ground wire is green. Not having all conductors hooked up on both ends could potentially end up violating equipment warranty. This may or may not apply, but it is worth mentioning to the viewers if it is applicable. Hope this may help viewers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfVYfC6tmcc
Tomi Engdahl says:
Audiophile Supreme Reference Power Cable Test With AC Voltage Detector (Buzz Sound Review) | odear
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXzLKDhuWsE
I am an audiophile. It’s almost like a virus. I’m completely crazy about the quality of sound. It’s interesting and painful at the same time. Last but not least… music first
AC Voltage Detector
- Green Light (slow buzzing): Low Voltage
- Yellow Light (moderate buzzing): Moderate Voltage
- Red Light (fast buzzing): High Voltage
Video comments:
So please educate me, which one perform best in this test ? The Furutech ?
I am glad that you are pursuing the best performance, however it is difficult to say which is the best in one word. It depends on your settings, music preferences, tube/solid-state, etc. I do agree that Furutech does a good job of materials. Trial and error
Tomi Engdahl says:
Audiophile power cable comparison!! Hear it for yourself !
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntU3vb0e4Y4
The age old argument. Its silly. Of course cables affect your rig. Because they can EQ it. Depending on how they are constructed the speaker cables can roll off frequencies same with interconnect.
With power cable according to the school books, it should not make a difference. But when you consider the power supply is responsible for much of the components noise due to leakage current. Leakage current gets on the signal ground causing l sorts of issues, so if you just think about the last 5 feet of power wire to your component as an AC filter then it will make sense that all the wire in the wall out to the
pole, Etc does not matter. Its filtered on the last 5 feet. in the last part of the vid we try RCA interconnects and speaker cables.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Should power cables be shielded?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekR5-tUk0tA
The opinions are flying in all directions. Power cables should and should not be shielded for best sound! What’s the truth behind the question?
Video comments:
Just show measurments on osciloscope with antena (just a meter or two of wire will do) or something.
The shield gets rid of the power company hitchhikers. If you have a power regenerator does that get rid of the shielding problem between it and the equipment? The cables from the regenerator to the equipment can be regular unshielded?
The concept of grounding a cable (or wire pair) shield at one end only has been known for many years. The “gap” has also been known in coax cable used for RF signal. Just look at how, say, RG6 cable is constructed. The center conductor is inside a thick insulator which gives it a specific “gap” between it, and the outer shield. The gap in (older) RG58/59 is smaller and why RG6 is preferred for TV signals. Now I am going to have to experiment with this for the AC cables on some of my equipment! I am sure the results will be for the better. Thanks again Paul for the insight.
I have shielded power cables, and they don’t restrict dynamics. On the contrary, it’s very good for dynamics. Supra from Sweden.
@Brent Knoerl Ferrites is some of the worst things you can do to analog sound signals. Careful use on digital cable might help. But it’s a no go on all analog signal equipment.
@Brent Knoerl The electric chord lose dynamics by using ferrites. It’s better to be using shielded power cables. But it’s not as been using them in the signal path. But I guess you could clean up some noise, but you are increasing the input impedance of all the devices which could lead to a bit less dynamics.
@Brent Knoerl If you already have a high power Furman Power conditioner, you should be ok. Just get some better power cables, and you should be ok. The problem is to find power cables that fits to the outputs to Furman. They don’t use standard output so you either have to make your own cables, which is usually illegal to do. At least in my country.
No, the subject is very very simple: Shielded power cables (or speaker cables!) are pure nonsense invented by clever sellers.
You need not much knowledge of communications engineering to accept that.
Same goes for “Directional Cables”, “Bi-Wiring” or all that other BS about Cables…
Total bloody snake oil
Shielding only helps to protect conductors from induced noise and where is this noise going to come from in a listening room?. Most noise will conducted via house wiring due to switching psu’s on other electrical outlets, the switching of outlets (in the UK we have switches on our electrical sockets) and via inductive loads from appliances that include motors and pumps. Shielding does nothing to help with conducted noise.
It not going to hurt anything to use shielded power cords but they are largely unnecessary. They might be used to further reduce EMI and RFI egress from large switch mode power supplies. I have seen them supplied on commercial devices that have these hundred amp plus switching power supplies. As for home HiFi, just keep power cords away from your audio cables, especially turntable cables, by at least 6 inches and you should be fine.
I should mention about the worst thing you can do is to coil excess power or signal cables near each other. A coil of wire is just that, a coil, an excellent low frequency antenna.
“constrict the sound” huh… i really wonder if there’s any of his videos that isn’t full of this gut feeling thing.
i guess it’s his technique of gaining a fan base. easy to understand and conforms to the audience’s own gut feelings confirming their preexisting beliefs so they click. he’s a salesman after all.
If messing with your power cord is having an impact on your system’s performance then there’s something grossly wrong with your power supply… the only way that should be possible is if the power supply is seriously undersized; and unable to keep the voltage rails up under dynamic loading. Adding a tiny bit of capacitance to the input side of the power supply (which is what you get as a side effect when you shield a cable – the shield forms one plate of capacitor to ground) should not reduce the power supply’s dynamic response capability. And I haven’t even gotten into PSRR…
Good quality DC power supplies for analog applications (digital is a lot less sensitive) should have a lot of rejection of anything that isn’t DC in their output stages; if EMI being picked up from the AC input is making it through then the proper way to deal with it is to fix the power supply design.
At the other end of things – emissions – shielding the power cable will help; but only in the immediate proximity of the power cable. However, as with the other factors mentioned above; the proper approach is to start with the power supply (by adding line filtration to the AC input, etc). As soon as it reaches the wall, the power line transitions to either THHN or Romex; neither of which are shielded.
All signal cables should be shielded; especially those driving a high-impedance voltage-mode input (as all your line-level interconnects are). Low-impedance current-mode devices (like speakers) take a lot more energy to shift the signal by any given amount than high-impedance ones do; so for pickup concerns, shielding here isn’t as important (but, running all that power thru an unshielded cable can be an emissions issue).
You don’t have to spend a lot on a shielded power cable, either – conductive braiding is readily available for not much money; and slips right over a standard power cord. Just ground it at the wall plug end, and make sure that the ends don’t short to the hot or neutral lines (some heat shrink tubing helps with that).
Pauls is pretty much on point here. There are specific FCC rules and regulations for radio emissions of any electronic device that contains a 10Khz oscillator and above. Pretty much any electronic device today contains a 10Khz oscillator in it. Keeping all that shielded within the chassis can be a challenge.
The input power cord does operate as an antenna for rf emissions generated from within the chassis. Switching power supplies are one source. This is all Black Art electronics keeping it all buttoned up inside. Power cord shielding, ferrite beads placed as close to the chassis as possible, where the shield is grounded is all part of the process to pass FCC Certification. And of course as Paul said, keeping those RF emissions from getting into other audio components and degrading the sound of the overall system.
paul I really can’t see how shielded power cables could affect the sound in any way, the power supply isolates the noise created by the amplifier from mains at the filter caps, plus most high end amplifiers have such low impedance power supplies that none of that matters in the first place. You didn’t explain why the distance of the shielding from the power cables matters, and unless I’m missing something, that has to be of no influence for the sound quality.
Is the wiring in your walls shielded? Are the big power lines from the power plant to your house shielded? If not, then you are just passing along whatever noise is already there. I guess it can’t hurt to have your power cables shielded, but I doubt that it helps, either.
Still, surely the guy who designed your gear knew what he was doing and thought enough of his product to include an appropriate cable.
Are Pass cables shielded? Are Esoteric cables shielded? I really don’t know.
There is a lot to like about PS Audio and nobody really beats Paul. He gets our passion for audio to reach new heights. However, one thing that bothers me is when things that can be precisely understood and measured end up being claimed using vague terms of how it sounds different. Everything about power cables is completely measurable and scientifically explainable. If a power cable does something better that’s audible, please explain what happens. When I listen to digital FLAC music I might have > 100dB of dynamic range and equipment noise is not audible at all. Any noise that is emitted or received on a shielded power cable is not audible to me even at low volumes. What frequencies of noise at what point in the signal path doing what can make me hear the effect of a shielded power cable? Of course I have had cases in the past of getting EMI issues through the power cables but modern equipment rarely suffer from it when the power supply inside has proper filtering. An old amp with dried out Vcc filtering capacitors might sound better by using a shielded power cable, but the right cure would be to fix the caps.
Tomi Engdahl says:
DIY Speaker Cables – How to Build Your Own High Quality Speaker Wire (w/t Canare 4S11 Made in Japan)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9V095ChQ_Y
How do you make speaker wire cables for around $60-$70 that can rival cables costing hundreds of dollars?
Tomi Engdahl says:
Stereo – Let’s talk about high end power cable for Stereo!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAh1p17cSXo
Comments:
$3000 is better spent on room acoustic treatments or a new sub, etc.
Basically, a 10-minute video explaining expectation bias.
I expect from a powercable to stop interfearences and looks stylish. That’s i
The only difference a power cable can make is negative. Under-gauged power cable can choke the power supply which can degrade bottom-end response.
Tomi Engdahl says:
How I Made Better AC Power Cable
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1E7Olxsocw
Quiet AC Power Cord Part(s) List
AC Connectors: https://amzn.to/3foEqCb
Mogami W3104: https://ebay.us/b7fXP8
Southwire 12AWG Stranded Ground Cable: Best Place to buy is Home Depot (U.S)
Copper Shield: https://amzn.to/3bxQtMh
5/8” (16mm) Braided Nylon Sleeving: https://ebay.us/avFyUY
Ferrite Core(Mix): https://amzn.to/3fnl0gV , 13MM: https://amzn.to/3ycLdaF
16mm 4:1 Heat Shrink Tubing: https://amzn.to/3ygxOhH
Heat Gun: https://amzn.to/3eWr4ha
Tomi Engdahl says:
How to build your own world class audiophile power cable
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaBvDwdAubw
Hyperspace Supernova 2m Power cable
http://audiophile.rocks/supernovapower.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN HI-END POWER CABLE: The fundamental role of power cables in amplification
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlQXmQlBaVA
This video highlights the importance of high quality power cables in powering pre-amps and amplifiers/receivers. In the second part of the video we learn how to make our own high quality power cord!
ATTENTION!: If you want a safe cable you should connect the GROUND to the external SHIELD/braid. This will avoid electric shock.
Tomi Engdahl says:
PROOF that HIFi Cables work !
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=541K7aK8hfE
First off I own the company that makes the best sounding cables in this comparison. I am however about truth, and If mine did not sound the best, I would concede this . all 3 of the cables used for this demo were just metal wire or foil with no other B.S. added, no batteries, no circuitry, nothing Quantum, nothing Black, nothing even super duper or extra special. Simply high quality raw materials and excellent craftsmanship. Jeff Rowland electronics were used and Buchardt S400 speakers used. If youve come to piss on the cable parade, you are not welcome to post. There is no reasoning with you. Yes I know this does not prove crap, so move along now. We have fun without you.
Video comments:
I’ve been trying to find the name of your company, and I appreciate that you do not advertise during these test.
The Verastarr cable was clearly better to my ears, even over YouTube. Amazing stuff
Yes. Cables do make a difference. But everyone has to realize that they make a DIFFERENCE because they are DOING something to the signal to give you the illusion of more air, more soundstage, more bass, etc.
Yes I believe cables make a difference But not because they’re getting out of the way of the music like so many audiophiles claim. That’s my number one biggest complaint with audiophiles. Different cables don’t get out of the way of the music. They sound differently from one another because they’re doing different things to the signal. They’re manipulating the signal to make cable A sound different from cable B. You have to use some common sense here.
… And let the hate begin. I’m ready.
LOL, got to use “common sense” kind of invites it. But I’m not biting.. Let me show you how what you think is not possible actually is. whats “doing something” to the signal is distortion. Round wire adds distortion to the signal. Its born there . Verastarr AudioFoils birth far, far less distortion than round wire does.. This is what I call “getting out of the way” . Let me put it another way. Every cable has losses in one way or another. Verastarr Cables just have far less loss than round wire, so you are now not hearing round wire byproduct , which means you can hear more of the equipment and more of the music.
Is not hate we have to listen what the artist wanted the remix in the studio to listen the remix we have to go to the studio put the master tape to his speakers then we are going to listen the original sound the artist like
Round wire has a much higher skin effect than foil does. It causes smearing in the time domain. High frequency is fighting for the outer skin, which just so happens to be the part of the wire in contact with the dielectric, you know the plastic that absorbs signal into it , then re releases it milliseconds later, well thats an error, and we call that error noise because its loss. That is eliminated with foil, and my foils have a dielectric so thin it absorbs and re releases so fast its immeasurable. Now I can sit here and talk till I’m blue in the face but I’m selling better sound, I’m not selling facts or measurements. so all this back and forth arguing is complete BS, let me show up with my cables and smoke the life out of whats in the rig. The proof is in the listening and thats it. period.. you heard it right here in the vid, and I’ll keep hammering the point home with many different types of cables..
Not the cables only are all amplifiers sound the same are all the speakers sounds the same are cd players sound the same are all the turntables sound the same the only way to listen to the original sound you have to go to the studio that the artist recorded his music and tell him can I listen please your cd from your master tapes speakers and cables please iam going to pay you for my audition thank you
Oh believe me, I’m not arguing with you…I just enjoy reading your explanations..
@poserwannabe right on. You gotta understand I’m slightly trigger happy with audio trolls. The cables dont make a difference is so old and boring. Its clear they do or so many cable companies would not be in business. Half of the stuff cant be measured, like the amount of emotion a singer has. You know the drill
Very good comparison, I like these kind of tests. I like the FOIL cables the best by a BIG margin. The other two were DULL and strange.
No DOUBT Mikey they sounded in their order of play 1, 2 3,. Even here online I can easily hear the quality level differences.Your foils are just AMAZING, and although not cheap, but less, than the other touted “brands”. Obviously the real 99.997% silver metallurgy has a lot to do with it. Another thumbs up for your efforts. We ALL thank you.
Wow! The foils blew away both of the other two cables. It was clear as daylight. Not even close. The mid bass of the other two cables was a bit annoying. Yes, the $6k pair was better than the $4k competitor, but both were not in the game against the foils. You mentioned the decay of the tambourine – the decay with your cables just hung in the air – like the impossible 6 second punt in the NFL. WOW. WOW……..WOW. I heard a pair of $32,000.00 Nordost ribbon cables at Axpona 2018 – what I heard, with headphones, on this video…….was better at less than 10 times the money!
The difference was night and day!! The flat cables do indeed bring more realism. Not still a fan of spending a fortune on cables.
Recording audio of speakers with a non-stationary microphone does not prove anything…
Great video. Keep up the good work. Too many naysayers spreading the gospel of ignorance. I hesitated to make a judgment based on what I hear here through headphones. It is quite obvious that the cables sounded different. The snake oil screamers and the E,Eeee’s are going to be besides themselves. Who cares. One thing to keep in mind is that cables are system dependent. What sounds best here may not sound best in the systems of those watching. Choose the cables that sound the best with your own gear.
The cables make a difference and speaker cables and interconnects absolutely I am not talking prices I am talking differences the 2nd cables more bass and detail the 3d the voice more precise and the tambourine the same
People who are able to hear this kind of differences belong to the happy thew.. Any cable sits between two components and can make the sound only worse. It can not better come out as it went in. In my situation “air”-cables work the best. Silver for the equipment and brass for the speakers.
If one hears differinces one also has to know what is the best option. Visit a lot of live acoustic concerts. That can help.[
Its Impossible that huge diference in sound, i bet my life there is some equalization going on in these tests. Or some cables are trully damaged ( burned )
OCD HI-Fi Guy
1 year ago
LOL, give me a break, you think I would knowingly completely bullshit the public, are you nuts ? Its 100% against my beliefs, I would never do that. Im proving something so I can sell my product.. Clearly its not impossible , because I just did it. Dont believe me ? tell me what show and what room to embarrass you .
@OCD HI-Fi Guy You have to bullshit them in order to make money! You sell power cables and claim all sorts of benefits when there can be none. Surely don’t think the likes of Nordost make an honest product. They, like you, are chasing the clueless with too much money so you can rip them off. I have to admit, a large number are willfully ignorant, they deserve it. But decent people of more modest means may also be deceived.
I believe if you have a good quality amp and good 16 gauge wire you need nothing else period 4000 dollars for speakers cables come on people…
Really not trolling here, but weird that this dude sells his own massively expensive cables without any pricing structure via the comment section of youtube videos. Just sayin… One of the main issues with the great cable debate is that the people pushing exotic, overpriced cables based on pseudoscience are fun and cool and crazy, and the engineers who consistently debunk cable theories with concrete analysis are boring engineers, so they lose sway. I do believe there are areas to our sense perception that probably cannot be shown with current measurement methods, but the exotic cable thing is a bit out of hand. I’d bet most audible differences in cables are just a bit of tone shaping to the signal. I keep an open mind though. If anyone around NYC wants to prove me otherwise, I’m down to listen. Otherwise really fun channel and great gear.
OCD HI-Fi Guy
1 year ago
Well Kevin, how much are my cables ? You dont know. So to guess they are “massively” overpriced is actually incorrect. In fact the users of my cables always compare them with the cables made by the physicists, engineers, etc. My cables compete at the level 4 times my cost. And this is not embellishment. These are steeped, dyed in the wool, tough to please audiophiles.
To point out something I said in the vid, you already mistrust me because you have an Anti-hifi cable bias. My cables make people so utterly happy they call me on the phone while still completely flabbergasted that a cable is capable of breathing such life into thier rig. This is my best reward. My personal creation stokes another persons life experience to a higher level. This is my career and given talent. Theres no way I would want to upset that balance. I consider myself lucky, blessed, fortunate whatever you want to call it. My cables have never been marketed ever. I am only known by word of mouth and personal referral. Ive had a price sheet since my inception, yet when individuals call, I simply dont have it in me to charge twice. So rather than collect retail, I collect wholesale and give customers 50% off the list price. This is how the whole discussion we are having came about. whether I supply a dealer network or sell direct for wholesale i get the same price. Id rather stoke many users than one dealer. Most buyers are completely out of touch with what owning a business costs or what goes into a build. They can only guess and assume just like you did. Clearly you are a glass half empty guy. If im in New York, ill put my money where my mouth is. I prove rather than pitch.
Trying to spot differences in various components over the YouTube compression algorithm is pure comedy gold.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Trying to spot differences in various components over the YouTube compression algorithm is pure comedy gold.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnMd9L_pwqE
In this video I discuss my testing of various interconnect cables I owned or had purchased for comparison. Very interesting what I discovered, always learning. I’m still testing more cables in search of one that is superior to the Ruby’s, look for a future video about this effort.
Comments:
When you are connecting two sets of cables to dual output jacks they are in fact connected in parallel and the capacitance of both cables adds up. So you would be listening to one set but with capacitance that could be more than double of a normal one.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Comments from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnMd9L_pwqE
Copy this link into the search bar to find Paul McGowan’s explanation of balanced circuits:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzEmKPTb18g
The balanced RCA cables I refer to in this video is unrelated to and not used in such balanced circuits. Nonetheless, I suspect the balanced topology of RCA cables aids in noise rejection when compared to unbalanced RCA cables.
Here’s another really good video explaining the differences between an unbalanced vs balanced input stage:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2uHaQ5OY9ew
The balanced input requires three connectors, whereas the balanced RCA cable design I address in this video involves just two connectors which is used for an unbalanced input stage.
There is no such thing as a balanced RCA connecter. I suppose you could ground the shield to the negative part of one connector but you would introduce the capacitance and noise of the shield with only negative(lesser) results or no difference at all. 3 conductor connectors, XLR, are the only way to get true balanced shielded cable . What you are probably noticing is the twisted pair and better connectors in the high end cable which the Telcos have known for years, no shielding needed with twisted pair or 1,000 pairs in a cable.
The problem with testing cables this way to my view is that it’s mandatory that the listener is not aware of the cable type that he is currently listening to. Otherwise, you’re hearing adapts to your expectation and renders your findings unusable. I have 30+ years of studio experience and I know by experience that for a large amount you hear what you think you hear. The easiest one to fool is yourself!
The only reason in pro audio we use balanced signals is for noise cancelation, these weak microphone signals run through tens of meters of cable. For short cables with a line level signal, balanced signals are useless. On top of that you have to make the balanced signal unbalanced again before further processing which means more components in your signal path… I see the advantage of not running the signal through the cable shielding, but also for very long cables with weak signals, I’m not convinced it makes any difference on a 2 meter cable with line level signals. To be short, I would be very impressed (and surprised) if someone could tell me which cable brand I’ve used in a hearing session without knowing beforehand. So far I haven’t met anyone who can pull that of, I doubt very much if someone ever will. Moving around your couch or changing the carpet or curtains will have so much more effect on the sound of your system that all this nitpicking on details are a waste of money in my opinion… Great channel by the way, I love all this speaker design info.
A simple question here. I’ve heard (and read) so much about the fact that balanced cables are better than unbalanced. So that brings up the question that If you are using components that do not have balanced inputs (or outputs), does getting balanced cables have any effects? I say this because all of my DAC units have unbalanced RCA outputs. If I were to get balanced RCA audio cables, would I still reap the benefits of cleaner sound? Or would the cables not function with unbalanced inputs? I know I’m a year or two late here, but I hope somebody can answer this?
That’s a great question. Folks have hammered me here for calling traditional RCA cables as balanced. Some of the cables I have purchased have stated so on the cable. My intent was to distinguish between cheap RCA cables that use a single signal send conductor in the center and a shielded outer core that carries the return, the same design as TV coax cable. The higher quality “balanced” RCA cables on the other hand use two identical signal conducting cables (both send and return) with an outer shield that is connected to the ground of just one of the two components (either the sending or the receiving component) and have an arrow to indicate signal direction (although direction of signal makes very little difference). A true balanced line is used mostly in pro audio, where a signal input source on stage is sent down a very long (100+ feet) snake cable to a mixing board which processes the signal and sends it back another 100 feet or so to the amplifiers on stage (I have set up and run such systems for many years). In such a case, esp in a commercial building, many sources of electromagnetic interference inevitably penetrate the long signal runs causing all kinds of noise. The solution is to run two of the same signal, one generated 180 degrees out of phase by the sending component and then reversed by the receiving component. With this arrangement, any noise that penetrates the input signal gets cancelled out when the out of phase lead is reversed and mated with the in phase signal. Big question: is this feature needed in a home high fi system? Not at all, certainly not when the longest signal cable is one meter (unless you are locating your signal components in another room away from your amps), and in a residential setting where very little EMI exists. The greater concern is the noise sneaking through the AC line, but that’s another matter. Nonetheless, if one wishes to utilize balanced lines, both the sending and receiving components must offer balanced outputs and inputs respectively via XLR connectors. Also, consider the limited number of XLR cables available, whereas, given the degree of variance I have discovered among various RCA cables and the very real albeit small differences they make in the quality of the sound of the system, having a great many brands of RCA cable to choose from (and I am talking about cables costing no more than $130 a pair) has enabled me to find just the right cables for my system, having just found another great sounding cable, sadly now discontinued, by Oyaide, thanks to a tip for a fellow viewer.
Speaker Builder, If you are designing cables, I hope you have picked up a good function generator and scope. Having frequency swept cables, tested dielectric absorption, DC resistance, and impedance, blind A/B testing won’t reveal much. Cable that isn’t fragile and quality connections are the important parameters for most cable. If you want the ultimate RCA cable for sonic performance, simply pick up some sweep tested RG-59 quad shield cable. It is very uniform in distributed capacitance, inductance, impedance, and quite flat well into RF frequencies well beyond any human or bat hearing. It is 75 Ohm impedance. Before you knock that, pick up a time domain reflectometer and impedance test your other interconnect cables. You might be surprised. I have sweep tested and TDR tested many audo cable and RF cable.
That’s all great stuff, but does not explain how two cables that measure identically can sound so very different. The design experts in the field all come to this conclusion that we cannot (as yet, perhaps) measure everything we hear. Knowing that, I chose to focus exclusively on a comprehensive strategy of A-B testing, limiting myself to cables that cost up to @ $150.
How they sound different? There are several reason and all reasons but one are actually measurable. Dielectric absorption at higher voltages create discharges internally in the wire creating a hiss type noise. This is the result of random areas of charge discharging to the conductor. Cables with low or no absorption does not have this color.
The one item that can’t be measured in cables is the placebo effect. More expensive cables sound better. This is measurable only when the listener is aware of the cable under test. In a double blind test, there is no statistical difference in picking the cable. In your testing you were fully aware of the cable under test. The results if performed by a friend swapping cables based only on a coin toss between tests is the way to identify this result. Fully unplug all cables between tests and place both in a box. Use a coin toss to pick the cable for each trial. Have a friend toss the coin and install the cable and record the cable used and your pick. You should have no knowledge of the coin toss and cable under test. Do at least 100 trials. Did you pick the correct cable more than the statistical random choice? This is the way the tests were performed on early MP3 vs lossless encoders and is the only listening test that is valid. It is easy to fool yourself.
Try the test again as described with the cheapest and most expensive cable. Can you really tell them apart in a double blind test? Try again with a couple other cables. If you have some EM fields in the vicinity you might be able to identify the cheapest cables with less than 100% braid and foil shield, but you won’t be able to identify the difference between a balanced and unbalanced RCA cable unless one has really poor dielectric or poor connector.
If the cables have a large difference in impedance as measured on a TDR, the lower impedance cable with higher capacitance per foot may be a little duller in sound, and believe it or not, the lower impedance cable is the 4 core microphone cable. Take some to a good RF shop and ask them to use a TDR to find the nominal impedance. Low impedance cable is only flat when terminated into it’s nominal impedance or is very short. Yes impedance of wire is measurable.
Hope this helps. Yes I am a tech from the ISM field. Yes I do measure cables. I do recommend making some reference cables with RF cable of various impedances for comparison. RG-174, RG-58, RG-59, and for balanced, some DMX-512 data cable at 120 Ohms make excellent reference cable. Wire the DMX wire to audio standards, not DMX standards when testing the wire. The difference is the shell connected or not connected to the shield. Pin one is always connected at both ends. In a double blind test, you might be surprised at the performance of RF coax. Some expensive audio cable perform very poorly and the difference is the placebo effect.
Anyone who is serious about this stuff is above placebo effect. It requires, first, having no emotional attachment to any one cable, then doing rigorous testing back and forth between two cables with many program sources over and extended period of time. This takes hours of time over many weeks. But if you are serious about hearing the differences in cables, you will go to this trouble, and the differences, however small, will emerge. I appreciate all the info, but I suspect that most of the viewers, like myself, have neither the training, nor the money, nor the interest to go to the trouble to learn all this stuff, buy and learn how to use all the equipment, and then do all the measurements. I’d rather leave all that to the designers, and just listen, which is the bottom line anyways.
@Speaker Builder
If you want to be taken seriously then do blind testing. If you have someone else connect your cables without you knowing which is which and can identify the cable then I would be more prone to believe you. Otherwise you are being arrogant. You can’t fool your own brain. The placebo effect is real. Its proven. You cannot provide unbiased testing in the manner you are using.
That blind testing is essential to make determinations about the value of any product is absolute foolishness. The so-called proven tests of bias, while true, do not speak of the entire population, but only of certain individuals. The real bias in this sometimes wacky world of audiophiles is in some of these extreme views. According to this view, one can never trust a review of a vehicle, since blind tests would result in a whole lot of accidents. The other wacky view that started this thread says that all audiophile variables are measurable. Some of you folks ought to stop spending time writing these comments and start doing your own A-B testing of various hi fi components. Every component an audio signal travels through effects (or colors) the quality of that signal in some way. I had no dog in this fight, whatever sounded better I kept. I wanted the most expensive cable to sound better, but it didn’t.
No one talks about capacitance that is what changes the sound high capacitance cable reduces the high frequency response some have more per foot than others the resistance has nothing to do with it if you have a ohm meter and try to measure the resistance it would be NIL on a 1 meter length of cable.
I believe you are correct. Others I have read talk about both resistance and capacitance as important factors in wire. I am not the electronics engineer (I looked to my father and others for all that). In these videos, I am setting all the electronics issues aside and just listening, where the rubber meets the road, as it were. Again, there really is a difference in how these interconnect cables sound (there was virtually no differences between some of them). But you cannot detect these subtle differences unless you have a very discerning system, and that takes a lot of money and careful selection of every single component in the signal chain.
The older you are your hearing of the hf audio spectrum goes down hill
I could hear up to 19 khz now more like 10khz. I did try some RG58 coax as used in radio communication spectrum up to 30 mhz this changed the sound less muffled due I think to the very low capacitance its not expensive either far cheaper than those exotic interconnects it will only accept phono plugs its quite thick cable.
The most important factors for an unbalanced interconnect is capacitance and shield resistance.. Low capacitance to reduce high-frequency roll-off and low shield resistance to prevent voltage drops across it (which causes hum and harmonic buzz).. It’s these factors that affect the frequency response and noise of the system. One correction to video, the “hum” heard in unbalanced systems is almost always the voltage drop across the shield, not an issue of the shielding..
Capacitance is one of two components that make up the characteristic of the nominal impedance of a cable. In RF cable and audio too, the full bandwidth is only delivered when the cable is terminated into it’s nominal impedance. For RG-58 that is 50 Ohms. RCA interconnects are most often connected to loads with a specified load of 47,000 Ohms. This leaves the effect of the cable capacitance as a capacitive load and resulting frequency roll off with distance when under 1/10th wavelength. Due to the high impedance load, there is little current so the inductive reactance is nill in a short cable. Most signal sources won’t drive a cable terminated into 50 ohms so adding a termination will not improve sound as the driver will most likely be overloaded and clip.
You many fine a higher impedance cable with less capacitance per foot such as RG-59 a better choice for audio interconnects. An inexpensive alternative is to use shielded CAT-5 cable grounding the ends of one pair and sending the signal on the other wire of the pair. Ground both ends of the remaining pairs. This produces a 110 ohm cable with much less capacitance per foot and with a dielectric rated for 100 MHz, well beyond any audio application.
The capacitance would be unimportant as well, unless you are using it on an MM cartridge.
I don’t get the balanced RCA cable. There is no pos en neg, only signal and ground. I asume the shielding and the ‘minus’ are both connected to ground. Real balanced audio use XLR. Here, only shielding is separeted, but still part of the audio signal.
XLR cables are used in home hi fi exclusively for balanced type inputs. Most home hi fi equipment used unbalanced inputs. So these balanced RCA cables are not the same as balanced XLR cables, two different animals. Having said that, I suspect there is an audible difference between this type of unbalanced RCA where the shielding carries the signal, and balanced RCA where the shielding only carries the grounding from one component.
I think the cable manufacturers want the uninformed consumer the think; hé heard somewhere that balanced is superior, so better buy these!!
Maybe so, but they sure do go to a lot of trouble to create a balanced line, and do a good job at it. You would only know for sure it is balanced by taking it apart, which I have done to them. The whole thing makes sense to me, in that the two wires down the middle can be selected of superior quality for carrying the signal, and a less expensive, lesser quality wire can be used for shielding. Aside from the electronics of it, what I can say is that every high quality RCA cable I have ever seen is made this way (balanced), and only the cheap ones use the shielding to carry signal.
I mostly make my own interconnects, and I have read a lot about the theory of good connects. For unbalanced RCA, it’s mainly the capacitance and resistance that matter and of course decent shielding.
There’s a lot of assumptions and assertions spoken in this video as well as in the comments. “I suspect it’s audible” is neither evidence, nor compelling.
Unbalanced is fine in a hifi when short cable lengths are used (less than 10 metres). The whole point of balanced cables is that hum and noise are cancelled out on low level stuff like microphones. The sound quality is the same on both.
Your major problem with wire is resistive signal loss. Just remember resistance is directly proportional to its length and inversely proportional to it’s cross section. Silver’s conductivity is a little better than copper but it’s just to expensive. Copper is just fine. Good connectors are also a plus.
Any screened cable will work well as an interconnect. Resistance, capacitance and inductance are all so low they will make zero difference to a line level audio signal.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Every aspect of the design of a transformer affects its sound, but as louder signals are applied to a transformer, the core saturates and clipping occurs. This distortion creates more low-frequency harmonics than high-frequency harmonics, leading to a warm, dense sound.
Transformers: Magically Colorize Your Sound
https://www.sonarworks.com/soundid-reference/blog/learn/transformers-magically-colorize-your-sound/
Many audio creators are enamored with the idea of “analog” sound and we receive questions about how to best achieve this analog sound. Most of us work primarily in the digital world, where plugins model analog devices, but there are a certain few physical devices that you should know about that absolutely provide that magic analog sound. It helps to record analog sources with vibey gear in order to capitalize on their analog-ness before any sound hits our DAW. In this article, Barry Rudolph sheds some light on a key component for this effect and how it can also be applied during mixing and mastering. – ed.
In this article, I want to talk about transformers; their practical applications, and their seemingly magical effect on audio signals.
Transformers, nondescript, but important electronic components, are ubiquitous in professional audio gear, both in the power supply and in the audio path. Audio transformers are used in analog consoles, DAW interfaces, most every piece of outboard gear, many microphones, powered monitor loudspeakers, and power amplifiers used for monitor speakers and headphones systems. Here, we will focus on the audio applications of transformers and only lightly touch the power supply uses.
A well-known use of audio transformers is inside a DI or “direct injection” box where a low-level and high impedance unbalanced signal from a guitar or bass is balanced, impedance-matched, and buffered by the DI’s transformer to interface well with a microphone pre-amp. As another example, the Shure SM-57 contains a miniature transformer that balances and matches its capsule’s output to a microphone pre-amp.
History and Theory
Transformers are one of the oldest technologies still commonly used worldwide in electrical power networks and in audio circuits. The basic, original design is little changed and was called a “tension regulator” when it was invented in 1885 by three Hungarian engineers Ottó Titusz Bláthy, Miksa Déri, and Kåroly Zipernowsky.
All transformers, whether they are audio or electrical transformers, work via Faraday’s principles of electromagnetic induction where alternating current and voltage (both power and audio signals) flowing into one coil1 winding (called the primary) induce a voltage into another, nearby coil (called the secondary). Even though the two coil windings are electrically and physically isolated from each other, the metal core magnetically induces, or transfers, voltage or power from one coil to the other. This ability is called galvanic isolation2.
Mixing Color
As a mixing tool, I like my pair of British-made Carnhill transformers on stereo keyboards such as grand pianos or synth pads and usually followed with a pair of Pultec equalizers. These are the output transformers from Neve input (1073/1084) modules used in Series 80 consoles and other products. They are readily available NOS (new-old-stock) for about $50 each.
Since transformers react to signal level, in all my transformer projects, I add switches so I can manually change the primary windings for either 1:1 or 4:1 ratios. With the 4:1 ratio, you’ll have about 6dB of gain and some additional saturation. Technically speaking, in one setting, the primary is wired at 600-ohms, and with the switch flipped, the primary becomes 150-ohms. You can see that in more detail in the project schematics included with the link to them at the end of this article.
“Explain Like I’m 5″: Audio Transformers
https://www.diyrecordingequipment.com/blogs/news/explain-like-im-5-transformers
What do audio transformers do?
A lot of things! I guess that’s why we keep them around, primitive and expensive as they are.
Transformers do a lot of different jobs in audio gear, including:
Stepping voltages up or down: increasing output level of microphones, bringing instruments down to mic level, etc.
Providing balanced inputs and outputs
Impedance matching
Eliminating ground loops
Blocking DC while passing audio signal
How do transformers match impedance?
Sometimes it’s important to match the impedance of two devices that are being connected (see “ELI5: Impedance” for more on that). For example, your guitar won’t sound very good if you plug it right into a mic preamp—the output impedance of the guitar is just too high to transfer all its signal to the preamp. So we use a DI box to step the guitar’s output impedance down to mic level.
And guess what’s in a passive DI box—a transformer! Transformers can step impedance up or down in the same way they do with voltage and current. Except whereas they change voltage by the turns ratio and current by the inverse of the turns ratio, they change impedance by the square of the turns ratio.
So let’s look at a DI box as an example. A typical passive DI box transformer has a turns ratio of 12:1, which means it will step down the guitar’s output impedance by 144:1 (12 squared). A typical output impedance for a single coil pickup is around 20k Ohms, which our DI box will step down to 138.8 Ohms, which is typical of a microphone. Now we can run that guitar directly into our mic preamp with no impedance issues. Transformers win!
Why do transformers sound so good?
Of course, we don’t just keep transformers around to do technical jobs—they also sound really good. There are a couple reasons for this, mostly having to do with the unique ways in which they “fail” to be perfectly clean and linear.
Like all analog components, transformers clip when given too much signal. Transformer clipping happens when the core saturates and can’t contain any more magnetic flux. This sets a hard limit on the amount of signal the transformer can pass and generates harmonic distortion.
What makes transformer saturation so lovely is that the distortion it creates is inversely proportional to frequency. Which is a fancy way of saying transformers create more warm, gooey, low-frequency distortion and less harsh, bright, high-frequency distortion.
Transformers also exhibit another distortion phenomenon called “hysteresis.” This is where the core, after getting magnetized by a signal, stays magnetized for a short period of time after the signal is removed. Hysteresis creates low-frequency, harmonic distortion at all signal levels, not just when the core is saturated. This same effect is a large part of the desirable sound of analog tape.
Why is transformer inductance important?
Inductance is a measure of how well a component converts voltage into magnetic flux. We’re concerned with inductance in audio transformers because higher inductance in the primary coil translates to better low-frequency response. Inductance can be increased with either more windings or a more permeable core material (see below).
How does core composition affect the sound?
Different materials have different abilities to contain magnetic flux—this is called “permeability.” Core materials with higher permeability create higher primary inductance, and therefore better low-end response. However, more permeable core materials will also saturate faster than less permeable ones. Ah, nature, where everything’s a tradeoff!
The most common core materials for audio transformers are M6 steel (steel with a bit of silicon) and nickel/iron alloys. Cores with high nickel content are more permeable and more expensive, with less hysteresis than steel cores.
In general, steel will have higher distortion at normal signal levels due to hysteresis, while nickel will have higher distortion at higher levels, due to saturation. For this reason, you’ll often find high-nickel cores in high-quality transformers designed for lower signal levels, and steel cores in cheaper transformers or those designed for high signal levels.
What’s a zobel network?
Transformers, like all other parts that exist in the real world, have unintended effects called “parasitics”; ie, extra resistance, inductance, and capacitance that an ideal transformer would not have.
Sometimes these parasitics will combine to cause the transformer to ring in the audio range. That is, if fed a certain frequency, the transformer will keep ringing at that frequency even after the signal is removed.
A Zobel network is a simple, passive filter consisting of a resistor and capacitor placed after the transformer to eliminate ringing.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Q. Why are audio transformers good to have?
https://www.soundonsound.com/sound-advice/q-why-are-audio-transformers-good-have
I have found this a little bit confusing. Some manufacturers advertise the fact that their products have transformer outputs and inputs, but other manufacturers boast when their products have ‘transformerless’ outputs. When is it good to have a transformer and when is it not?
Technical Editor Hugh Robjohns replies: Going back to the early days of professional audio — over 50 years ago now — transformers were used to provide electrical isolation between separate items of equipment, provide balanced interfaces (to help minimise interference), and often to provide signal gain (or loss) to help match levels between different devices. In some power amplifiers, they also provided a convenient means of obtaining an electrically independent feedback signal, and they also made generating multiple independent outputs or combining multiple inputs fairly simple.
However, transformers are inherently expensive and often bulky (especially when used with line-level signals), as you can see from the picture, right. They also tend to have an uneven response at the frequency extremes. What’s more, they introduce significant frequency-dependent phase shifts, can saturate and become non-linear with high-level signals, and they are prone to external magnetic interference. Because of these reasons, manufacturers often make the fact that their product is transformerless well known to potential customers.
Thankfully, as solid-state electronic devices have improved and new circuit topologies have been developed, it has become possible to replace the traditional transformer in most applications with cheaper and smaller electronic circuits. Assuming a good design is implemented, those circuits can now out-perform transformers in almost every respect, matching their efficiency in signal-balancing applications (on input and output stages) and providing any required gain or impedance matching. Electronic circuits also have far wider signal bandwidths with a more linear frequency response, significantly lower distortion, and considerably better phase and transient response.
The only practical advantage that transformers still offer over electronic circuit equivalents is the full galvanic isolation: there is no physical connection between a transformer’s input (primary) and output (secondary) terminations, which means that ground loops can’t occur and electrical faults in one piece of equipment are much less likely to damage other connected equipment.
Audio Transformer
Audio Transformers are designed for use in audio amplifier applications for coupling and impedance matching of amplifiers and speakers
https://www.electronics-tutorials.ws/transformer/audio-transformer.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
Audio Transformers
https://www.jensen-transformers.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/Audio-Transformers-Chapter.pdf
Since the birth of audio electronics, the audio transformer has played an important role. When compared to modern miniaturizedelectronics, a transformer seems large, heavy, and expensive but it continues to be the most effective solution in many audioapplications. The usefulness of a transformer lies in the fact that electrical energy can be transferred from one circuit to anotherwithout direct connection, and in the process the energy can be readily changed from one voltage level to another. Although atransformer is not a complex device, considerable explanation is required to properly understand how it operates. This chapter isintended to help the audio system engineer properly select and apply transformers. In the interest of simplicity, only basic conceptsof their design and manufacture will be discussed
In an ideal transformer, since all flux generatedby the primary is linked to the secondary, ashort-circuit on the secondary would bereflected to the primary as a short circuit. In realtransformers, the unlinked flux causes a residualor leakage inductance which can be measuredat either winding. Therefore, the secondarywould appear to have residual inductance if theprimary were shorted and vice-versa. Theleakage inductance is shown as LL in the modelof Figure 13. Note that leakage inductance isreflected from one winding to another as the square of turns ratio, just as other impedances are.The degree of flux coupling between primary and secondary windings depends on the physical spacing between them and howthey are placed with respect to each other. The lowest leakage inductance is achieved by winding the coils on a common axis andas close as possible to each other. The ultimate form of this technique is called multi-filar winding where multiple wires are woundsimultaneously as if they were a single strand. For example, if two windings (say primary and secondary) are wound as one, thetransformer is said to be bi-filar wound.
Winding Capacitances and Faraday ShieldsTo allow the maximum number of turns in a given space, the insulation on the wire used to wind transformers is very thin. Called“magnet wire,” it is most commonly insulated by a thin film of polyurethane enamel. A transformer winding is made, in general,by spinning the bobbin shown in Figure 10 on a machine similar to a lathe and guiding the wire to form a layer one wire thickacross the length of the bobbin.
In some applications, inter-winding capacitances are veryundesirable. Their effects can be almost completelyeliminated by the use of a Faraday shield between thewindings. Sometimes called an electrostatic shield, itgenerally takes the form of a thin sheet of copper foilplaced between the windings. Obviously, transformersthat utilize multiple layers to reduce leakage inductancewill require Faraday shields between all adjacent layers.
Faraday shieldintercepts the capacitive current which would otherwiseflow between transformer windings.Faraday shields are nearly always used in transformers designed to eliminate “ground noise.” In these applications, the transformeris intended to respond only to the voltage difference or signal across its primary and have no response to the noise that existsequally (or common-mode) at the terminals of its primary. A Faraday shield is used to prevent capacitive coupling (via CW inFigure 13) of this noise to the secondary. For any winding connected to a balanced line, the matching of capacitances to ground iscritical to the rejection of common-mode noise or CMRR
A magnetic shield has a completely different purpose. Devices such as power transformers, electric motors, and television orcomputer monitor cathode-ray tubes generate powerful ac magnetic fields. If such a field takes a path through the core of an audiotransformer, it can induce an undesired voltage in its windings — most often heard as hum. If the offending source and the victimtransformer have fixed locations, orientation of one or both can sometimes nullify the pick-up.
Such magnetic pick-up is usually worse in “input” transformers (discussedlater) because they generally have more turns. It should also be noted that higher permeability core materials are more immune toexternal fields. Therefore, an unshielded “output” transformer with a high-nickel core will be more immune than one with a steelcore.Another way to prevent such pick-up is to surround the core with a closed (no air gap) magnetic path. This magnetic shield mostoften takes the form of a can or box with tight-fitting lid and is made of high-permeability material. While the permeability ofordinary steel, such as that in electrical conduit, is only about 300, special-purpose nickel alloys can have permeability as high as100,000. Commercial products include Mumetal®, Permalloy®, HyMu® and Co-Netic®.
The effectiveness of magnetic shielding is generally rated in dB. The transformer is placed in an external magnetic field of knownstrength, generally at 60 Hz. Its output without and with the shield is then compared. For example, a housing of 1/8″ thick cast-iron reduces pickup by about 12 dB and a Mumetal can by about 30 dB. Where low-level transformers operate near strongmagnetic fields, several progressively smaller shield cans can be nested around the transformer. Two or three Mumetal cans canprovide 60 dB and 90 dB of shielding respectively. In very strong fields, because high-permeability materials might saturate, aniron or steel outer can is sometimes used.
Toroidal power transformers can have a weaker radiated magnetic field than other types. Using them can be an advantage if audiotransformers must be located near them. However, a toroidal transformer must be otherwise well designed to produce a lowexternal field.
To gain size and cost advantages, most commercial powertransformers of any kind are designed to operate on the verge of magnetic saturation of the core. When saturation occurs in anytransformer, magnetic field essentially squirts out of the core. Power transformers designed to operate at low flux density willprevent this. Often a standard commercial transformer, when operated at reduced primary voltage, will have a very low external field
For any given application, a number of parameters must be considered when selecting or designing an appropriate audiotransformer.
The most commonly used audio transformer core materialsare M6 steel (a steel alloy containing 6% silicon) and 49%nickel or 84% nickel (alloys containing 49% or 84% nickelplus iron and molybdenum). Nickel alloys are substantiallymore expensive than steel.
Tomi Engdahl says:
How to make a high quality and inexpensive audio semi-balanced interconnect RCA cable
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3EPL6hI_H4
In this video we will learn how to make our own RCA interconnect semi-balanced audio cables with high quality materials at a very low price (guaranteed!)
Tomi Engdahl says:
The best DIY interconnect
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_jkLCyJFPo
Tomi Engdahl says:
How to make a set of Hi-End ohno continuous cast copper analogue interconnects.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhfPFVUnU14
I show you how to make a very nice set of occ analogue interconnects. Items you will need all from ebay, 22 AWG 0.35 OCC Copper wire, eBay item no:- 123297681105. Star line Silver plated Tellurium Copper RCA plugs, eBay item no:- 252216164406. 6mm Nylon braid, eBay item no:- 163068304648.
8mm heat shrink black & red, eBay item no:- 231531088723. You will also need some silver solder.
Video comments:
I have a question. i made a set of these and have been working great for months, but the other day i suddenly got some RFI/EMI interferance on my system. replacing these cables with another set fixed the problem. the cables were between my Dac and Amp, and i got the interference when the Dac was in standby. the only thing that was new in the room was a old tv and some wifi alarm sensors.
is there anyway you can suggest shielding these cables better for my problem?
Cover them in tinned copper braid, that will fix the problem, you can get it by the metre on eBay, thanks for messaging me.
Will just covering them be enough, or will i need to connect the braid at one end of the cable to the negative wire, and if so to what end, DAC or Amp? Thanks
You will need to connect the braid to the ground at one end only, I hope this is helpful.
When putting together 2 wires for source and 2 wires for earth, does it matter the position within the weave? If you take a square and divide into 4 blocks, upper left 1, upper right 2, lower left 3, lower right is 4, do the 2 source wires need to be in position 1&3, or 1&2? Does it matter?
Hello Vdfsamba, so if you look down at the cable bunch, the signal flow should be opposite each other & so should the earth/ground, so they cross over each other, as you weave them, so signal crosses over signal & the same with the ground, I hope I’ve explained it so you understand, thanks for watching.
Wanting to make some with solid silver .0009 % bare wires and cotton tubes! Wondering at which point do I apply some tinned copper braided shield? I want sensitive high conductivity cables for my phono cartridge connection to my stage! What are your thoughts on using the cotton batting THEN shielding them? After that metal shield, then use that helibrade flex covering or aesthetics, Would that work-using silver RCA plugs and everything wit this project! Thoughts on building that design?
Wanting to make some with solid silver .0009 % bare wires and cotton tubes! Wondering at which point do I apply some tinned copper braided shield? I want sensitive high conductivity cables for my phono cartridge connection to my stage! What are your thoughts on using the cotton batting THEN shielding them? After that metal shield, then use that helibrade flex covering or aesthetics, Would that work-using silver RCA plugs and everything wit this project! Thoughts on building that design?
Take a look at my video, on how to make a hi-end digital interconnect & make 2 of them, they also work well as analogue interconnects, & you can use pure silver rca plugs, if you wish. I will be doing a video on sheilded interconnects for turntables soon, thanks for watching.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Um36ap0kURg
Step 1 wrapping PTFE Tape, Step 2 wrapping Silver Cladded Copper wire, Step 3 wrapping PTFE Tape, Step 4 wrapping Cotton wadding, Step 4 wrapping PTFE Tape, Step 5 fitting Nylon Braid, Step 6 fitting Heat Shrink, Step 7 fitting RCA Phono Plugs.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/speaker-wire-cca-vs-ofc.8267/
As for OFC (oxygen-free copper) vs. CCA (copper-clad aluminum), there are plenty of measurements showing the difference. CCA uses a thin layer of copper over an Al core and thus has much higher resistance than pure copper. In general, you’ll need to buy 1-2 gauges larger (smaller AWG number) wire to provide the same resistance as pure copper. That is, if you need a 12 AWG wire, you’ll need to buy 10~11 AWG CCA. Another issue is that the copper layer is thin enough on many wires that tightening a connection will strip the copper, potentially leading to worse connectivity. There is also an issue with dissimilar metals causing bad connections over time.
Many folk use CCA and it works just fine. I have personally had a few bad experiences with it (mainly for AC power operations, fewer with speaker cables) so tend to not use it. But it is cheaper than OFC if that is a concern. I figure I don’t buy wire that often so don’t mind paying the difference.
https://www.avforums.com/threads/speaker-cable-thickness-and-ofc-vs-cca.1873139/
Tomi Engdahl says:
$30 Audiophile Grade RCA Interconnects, DIY Better Sounding High Quality Cables
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2O0IABhWCMA
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/diy-interconnects-review
FIRST MYTH EXPOSED: WIRE DOES MAKE A DIFFERENCE! Do not allow anyone to tell you otherwise. If they clain wire is wire, then they either have no experience with a decent system, or no experience trying cables.
Someone once said, “keep it simple” and I think this advice fits pefrectly here. It also became clear that a single conductors in each direction was prefered every time over multiple conductors. (One conductor could be multiple stands bound as one conductor) The multiple conductor mock ups tended to be edgier or brighter, so I ended up focused on single conductor designs with 30ga or 28ga positive wires and 20ga to 24ga negitive as my prefered sound. I also determained I much prefered the cotton core to the Teflon.
SECOND MYTH EXPOSED: TEFLON SOUNDS BRIGHT! There has been quite a bit of discussion over the past couple years regarding the posibility that Teflon is adding a brightness, or a ringing to the sound of cables. This was bourn out in my mock ups to hold some validity; so next up was determaining what the best dielactric might be. I tried Teflon plumbers tape, cotton, paper, electrical tape and even wool on bare wire, teflon cased wire and enameled wire.. Again I tended to like the cotton, and it became even clearer that Teflon was an issue. Next step was to determain sheilding (if any) Now I know much has been talked up by manufacturers about sheilding, and I supose if you live next to a radio transmition tower…
THIRD MYTH EXPOSED: INTERCONNECTS DO NOT NEED A CORE! I must be among the dumbest men on this world, luckly I have a lot of company. It finally hit me, interconnects can be flat. This was ground breaking for me. I’m sure everyone else already knew this, but hang in there, I’m a bit slow. I had purchased this 9mm (approx. 3/4” wide when layed flat) cotton sleeving from Audio Consulting. (Way too expenxsive) It comes as a flat sleeve, so I simply took my two wires, now in cotton jackets and sewed them into each folded edge of this tube. This was a sinple easy way to get a constant and repeatable 3/4” spacing for my wires. It also meant the least dieletric interface with material, leaving the majority of the dielectric as air. Air of course is the best dielectric, but bare wire hanging in space equidistant apart is hard to do, so given the makeup of cotton weave, it allows for about 90-95% air, with very little of the cotton even touching the wire. Perfect, NOT! Ever try to attach a cotton sleeve to an RCA connecter with two super fine wires holding it all together? The issue became painfully clear as I began breaking 30ga wire trying to devise a solution.
FOURTH MYTH EXPOSED: THE SCIENCE AND LOGIC OF A CABLE DESIGN IS OUT THE WINDOW THE MINUTE WE TRY TO MAKE THE CABLE INDISTRUCTABLE! Just take a moment and page through your favorite audio magazine and look at all the cables. Heavy outer jackets made from Kevlar, carbon fiber, Poly-something-man-made, indestructible Teflon uncoated… You get the point. Now look at the interface between this less than desirable dielectric jacket and the RCA. Heavy rubber shrink wrap as a minimum is used, often in layers. Air has a dielectric value of 1.0, Teflon is 2.0-2.3, (I know, they say 1.2 but I’m using a scientific table, not “what they say”) cotton is 1.3-1.4 and rubber is at best 3.0, Poly-something –want-a-cracker is 3.0-4.0 and so on. This means they claim to go through all this science and end up using some less than perfect materials because they need to, in order to make them stand up to us, the guys who pull out our interconnects by the wire. “OH YES YOU HAVE TOO, WE HAVE ALL DONE IT!” And yes, it makes sense that any manufacturer would build the product to withstand some abuse. So despite all the careful planning, the connector and wire interface is an issue.
SO NOW WHAT? Well the design is complete, now I needed to determine the wire material and what RCA’s to use. For RCA plugs I tried Audio Note, Cardas, Connex, DH Labs, Eichmann, Monster, Neutrik, Radio Shack and WBT. There is not a great deal of difference between the Cardas, DH Labs, Neutrik, Monster and Radio Shack. The Audio Note and WBT were a bit more natural and certainly less congested, but in further testing I could not find a repeatable difference between Radio Shack’s $5.00 gold plug and WBT’s $70 connector. To my surprise the Eichmann was quite a step up. The sound opened up with clarity and speed not found in the others. (I should add that I used both the Silver Bullets and the standard copper connectors. I could not hear a significant difference between the $20 and $50 connectors) If anything I may prefer the copper, a bit more natural and not as bright. I guess it all makes sense that the Eichmann sounds different in that they are the only one with a different design. They use a pin for both the positive and the negative connection, so rather than a whole circle of signal connection on the negative it comes to single points. I assume this makes for a cleaner, more effortless signal transfer??? At any rate the Eichmann was my choice. I ended up with one set of silver and one copper out of default. If I had not already owned the silver I would have used copper for both sets of interconnects and saved a few bucks.
Selecting wire was a bit tricky, in that it can cost a lot of money and there are still a lot of variables. Rather than go through the entire process I will skip to the wire I settled on and hope you believe if it’s possible, I tried it! As a very quick overview I’ll make some general observations. Copper tends to be full, rich and makes for a nice neutral sound. Silver adds PRaT and dynamics not possible with copper. Silver also adds clarity and extension not possible with copper. Silver is also brighter, edgier and at times has an artificial tonality on the top end. Gold was the best of the copper and silver without the bright thin signature of silver, and the clarity was even better than the silver. I attempted to use silver on the negative run in order to keep the cost down, but the improvement between gold and silver is substantial, and worth the expense (my opinion) I did not try stranding silver and copper together nor did I try silver coated copper, (like Nordost) so there is plenty of room for experimentation in these areas.
I ended up using all gold wire, and because of cost I made some assumptions (meaning I did not try every combination possible) For the positive run I ended up using three strands of 99.99% pure 30ga gold wire (not twisted but loosely bound together in a 2mm cotton sleeve) and for the negative conductor I settled on one strand of 24ga 99.99% pure gold wire. How I concluded this set up was some trial and error and some faith on the articles I had read that fit my experience to this point.
Much has been said about gold having a significantly lower conductance than silver and copper, but given the distance of one meter, it really is not an issue!!! Gold has a very low resistance as do the others, so my selection was based on sonic quality rather than scientific characteristics. The side benefit (but not my reason for choosing gold) is it does not tarnish and therefore sonically degrade like silver and copper.
Sonically gold was clearer, smoother, richer and more natural sounding than the other two. People have claimed gold is slow or too warm. Neither of these comments matches my experience.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=16113.0
https://forum.polkaudio.com/discussion/181536/different-kind-of-cable-thread-maybe-diy-unbalanced-interconnect-strategy-amp-tactics
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/diy-rca-what-to-do.16368/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Do Audio Cables Matter? YES, But Not for the Reason You Might Expect! – High-End Audio Myths
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxAv2r8FLZk
In this video, I want to talk about audio cables. Speaker cables, RCA Cables…excuse me, I mean interconnects ;-).
Tomi Engdahl says:
Audiophile cables? Snake oil? Give it a rest!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRRe3soIZFU
What’s up with the hostility towards high priced cables. Give it a rest, please!
Video comments:
“if you dont believe…”
this is the definition of a religion, not a science
Most recording studios use something like mogami or canare or equiv. Most of this cable in these million dollar studios costs a few dollars a metre and they present excellent audio properties. Spending even hundreds of dollars on an interconnect is plain stupid and it’s performance using real measurement equip can prove it. Put up the evidence and I don’t mean subjective listening voodoo. It can be measured no probs.
$30 will provide all you need in a 1m stereo cable. Above spec cable and decent connectors.
Agree with many of the posts. It’s up to the individual if they want to spend say 300 on a cable that’s no better than a $30 one but don’t try and tell us all it’s superior in audio quality if they are not.
Did I just watch an anti-diatribe diatribe?
Regarding cables, they’re in the signal path. Ideally they should have no effect on the signal. That’s impossible so the next best thing is minimal impact. Spend what you want and enjoy your system
When people ask if I`m “an audiophile”, I always answer “no, I`m a music lover”. I, for one, have never bought into this whole “Gotta have The Best cables out there”. I`m sure the companies that manufacture them are confident that some folks (“audiophiles”?) WILL purchase those hot new $800-a-meter interconnects, on the off chance that they just might be “better” than the $600-a-meter pair they bought LAST month….That being said, I DO have a healthy respect for The Law Of Diminishing Return….
I think of all the cable running from the microphones to the stage box, more cable into the control room and the desk, all the electrics in that desk, the patch cables, cables to and from the patch bay and all the effects processors, the cable into the computer… Don’t think I could ever believe these £10k cables right at the end of the chain are gonna make the difference.
It was designed to run distance while dealing with interference and attenuation. Even the very best shielded twisted pair is a few bucks a metre. Recording studios have to deal with reality not marketing or equipment ego. I think in a sense your point is the same as the post your responding to.
Buying a cable sold for thousands of dollars is virtually as useless has buying a diamond ring; it serves no purpose other than to fulfill the buyers ego. Nothing against the way people spend their money just don’t come preach that a cable because it is crazy expensive somehow should sound better than a plain decent one.
I’ve NEVER met anyone who hasn’t heard a SIGNIFICANT improvement when entry-level cables were replaced with good mid to high-end cables in a mid to high-end stereo system. Yet, I’m always reading comments on YouTube from people who never listened to high-end cables or a high-end system in their life. And those are the ones who always pontificate about double-blind studies, test equipment, scientific data, snake oil, delusional idiots, and the placebo effect. Same old same old, year after year. In the meantime, I’ll continue to enjoy my high-end stereo with high-end cables.
So it stands to reason that wire made with vastly different components and manufacturing methods will have differences in electrical characteristics. Whether the differences are good or bad, improve sound or not, are for the buyer to decide. That being said, as a bottom to middle audiophile myself, my only advice would be that for someone starting to build a nicer system, spend extra on other elements of the system first, before going over the top on cables and wires.
I’m going to start calling this the Dunder-Miflin Effect, wherein apparently erudite, professorial types are persistently and intractably obligated to defend the indefensible on illogical bases. Their premises go something like this: All science is a work in progress; therefore, all things made by man are improving constantly. Second, as perfecting a certain area is going to over time reach levels that satisfy more and more of the population, the distinctions in finer equipment will necessarily be discerned only by fewer and fewer experts. Here’s the trick – convincing rich patrons that they happen to have such rare ears, and that other experts (enter Steve) can show them why they should spend lavish sums purely to appreciate that last tiny nuance us hoi polloi cannot. Snobbery is just that, whether disguised or overt. Cognitive dissonance suggests those who aren’t paid enough to actually lie overtly come to believe more fervently, to narrow the disconnect between what they’re selling, and what they rationalize as truth. In good old fashioned terms: Snakeoil.
Steve, I think most people don’t care what others spend their money on. The question of whether expensive audio cables make an audible difference is the one that should be answered. I don’t think most folks follow your YouTube channel for this sort of gobbledygook.
Like the klipsch engineers say the electrons don’t care
High end audio is a luxury product, and the difference between excellent and spectacular is hard to codify, some is snake oil some is real.
and some videos by steve guttenberg are promoting snake oil and some are no
I’ve NEVER met anyone who hasn’t heard a SIGNIFICANT improvement when entry-level cables were replaced with good mid to high-end cables in a mid to high-end stereo system. Yet, I’m always reading comments on YouTube from people who never listened to high-end cables or a high-end system in their life. And those are the ones who always pontificate about double-blind studies, test equipment, scientific data, snake oil, delusional idiots, and the placebo effect. Same old same old, year after year. In the meantime, I’ll continue to enjoy my high-end stereo with high-end cables.
Very true. There are high-end cables and electronics that aren’t worth anywhere close to what they sell for. But people buy them because they are high-status brand names. And there are other high-end cables and electronics that are worth the money.
Just stop with the nonsense because you’re not convincing anybody with half a brain in their head.
I am with you on buying and pissing away your money on what makes you happy in life. I do it all the time. If you think a pair of $2000 speaker cables sounds better than a pair of $100 speaker cables, well then by all means, spend $1900 more. What makes me mad is when the uneducated general public gets taken advantage of. I am at a local B&M store often and see the average person buy a new 4K TV or a basic AVR and some basic Klipsch speakers and then the sales rep shows them a $200 HDMI cable or some $300 speaker cable that cost just as much as the avr. I think it’s irresponsible to not educate people on the subject. I am in the camp of there has to be a happy middle ground. A well made reasonably priced cable sounds just as good as a well made super expensive cable. Once again, if the person has the means to piss away money on super expensive cable because they think it makes their system sound better, then go for it. If someone asks me for my opinion and they are new to this and trying to build a nice sounding system. Cables is the last thing I would tell them to spend money on. It’s called diminishing returns.
I get that you’re saying cables are “fun”, but that’s like saying the church of scientology, with its death and mayhem, is just about fun. If you end up dead in a bath tub, it’s just for fun!
I imagine that to some people, touting the value of hyper-expensive cables is just as irritating as “snake-oil” comments are to others.
High end speakers work exactly as well with lamp cord as they do with “monster” cables.
Partially they are selling the different visual/tactile features of the cable, selling some story about how much more magic their product is. But the reason that people keep talking about it, because when you they don’t waste money on those things, they can spend it on the things that really matter in making the product better. And with the markup on some of the products, these products can survive a long time on small sales when a single sale will pay for dozens if not hundreds of the product they are selling. I’m all for paying more for quality where it counts and some can afford the luxury for the aesthetics, but it won’t make it sound better.
The first consideration for me in buying at least a decent cable (oyaide, high purity copper, etc.) is durability. Stock interconnects for portable gear for example are just not durable. Secondly, the looks of course. Aftermarket cables look and feel premium. As for the sound, that’s entirely subjective. Some will hear a difference, some will not. That’s fine. I guess buy accessories that will give you much needed peace of mind, then enjoy the music.
Unless you have unlimited funds, it’s stupid to spend too much on cables. You’d better off spending on any other component of your audio system and have an actual improvement in return.
High-end cables look better and are built better. You can’t have Monoprice cables hooked to your Magico speakers. Gross.
First video on this channel I disagree with. People should always have the right to criticise products with poor (or even stupid) value proposition.
The problem is anti cable people sound like vegans. Just shut up about it already (not you), nobody cares about your opinions.
@SMOG you nailed it. Audiophiles treat the cable as an active component that adds to the sound, what doesn’t make no sense. It’s like someone expecting that a power cable will generate more current. The best thing a cable can do is simply to not subtract/diminish the sinal. And that can be easily done with well shielded and thick copper wires that shouldn’t cost no more than 30 bucks given a normal length.
Snake Oil is not just a figure of speech…it was a real thing…a scam. (Google it) In 1917 when the government PROVED that the the stuff being sold as Snake Oil to cure serious deseases not only did not work, but that it actually had no snake oil in it they shut the business down. They could have said, like Steve, that this was being unfair to the poor snake oil salesmen…and that the people bought it with their own money. Fact is, like the snake oil salesman, manufacturers of expensive cable KNOW it does not work. They know that there has never been a blind test or any scientific measurement that showed $1000 cable cures anything. Instead…all of them tell a great story about their exclusive technology, windings, materials, and pseudo science, and depend on that story to sell their products. They are scammers. And they know it. Otherwise they would publish blind tests that prove their product makes a difference. If they did that, they would be unique and gain a huge market share. They don’t, because they are selling a scam and know it.
I used to believe that a stereo system is only as good as it’s weakest link. Time and experience have proven to me that this is wrong. Every part of the system has an effect on the sound. Some have a greater effect than others, and some have an effect that is different than what is expected. All of these differences add up, and what’s more, they also all interact with each other, sometimes in surprising ways. Therefore, all components are equally important in getting good sound, from the quality of the electrical current to the metalurgy of the copper traces on the circuit boards, to the type of coating on those cables that you don’t believe have an effect.
I remember my first experience with interconnect cables. I was listening to a mass-market Yahama reciever (not high-end at all), using the stock cables that came with it in the box. I did have audiophile grade speakers.
I found some Audioquest Ruby interconnects on sale for a good price and decided to try them, just to see if there would be an improvement. I had no expectations or preconceived ideas; it was just an experiment.
When I played music through the new interconnects, I was blown away by how much better it sounded! It was like I had just bought a whole new stereo that was much better!
That was proof enough for me, and I still have those same cables in my system years later.
I know now that in this case I was lucky. Sometimes good cables improve the transparency of the system (not by adding anything, as you say quite correctly), revealing flaws in upstream components. Fortunately for me, that little Yamaha receiver was listenable.
I was reading through a Klipsch brochure and was surprised they recommended simple 2 wire copper 16 gauge wire for short runs and larger gauges for longer runs. No mention of needing ‘ dilithium enriched’ copper/silver wrapped wire shielded with pure lead. Here’s a nice little video on the subject. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyWt3kANA3Q&t=4s
Religions last for milenia and do sell snakeoil so cable companies can also – durability of the business doens’t say a thing about honesty or properties of the products. Apart from this anyone can burn his cash on everything legal, it’s a good thing for the economy. Enjoy your cables everyone!
Steve,..have You ever done an HONEST Blind test on ” Cheap vs Expensive cables to hear if you can tell a difference ?
I made two recordings of the same music changing only the tonearm cable.i posted them on my website and asked readers were the files the same or different and if different how. The vast majority said “different” and were able to describe it. One was clearly brighter. Some found that one too bright and preferred the other one that others considered dull sounding. A snobby graduate student cable skeptic on another site debunked the results claiming the brighter sounding one file was because the turntable was running a fraction of a percentage fast so he matched the speeds precisely and wrongly said they now sound identical. I sent my readers to the site and they were able to identify them there too…..
The difference between a $15k cable and a trip to the bar is that I leave the bar and there’s scientific evidence the money I spent is doing something. But I don’t harass people for spending money on things. I mean, just hope they’re also donating a sizable amount to charity, but sure–let them blow half a teacher’s annual salary in Oklahoma on cables.
Surviving and prospering on audiophiles by the help of reviewers who are so good at describing heaven on earth!
I prefer to buy wire and connectors and solder them on myself. I use a good grade of wire like Mogami, nothing too out there. The limiting factor is always the connectors.
‘You can fool some of the people some of the time’ – yes; but you only NEED some of the people to buy your product. Also, there are psychological factors that come into play when someone has bought an expensive product that makes it seem subjectively better simply because it was more expensive; the only way to really eliminate this bias is with a double blinded study. If you can’t tell the difference between a good quality analog cable and a very expensive one in a double blinded study; then at your level of perception there is no functional difference.
FWIW, when creating recordings we don’t use $15k cables. Expensive mics, mic preamps, mixing consoles and signal processing equipment? Yes! ADCs? Oh yeah. Monitor speakers can range from the multiple hundreds up to many, many thousands of dollars – and any serious setup will have multiple sets to test a mix on.
But cables… nope; just good quality professional-grade ones. Might be $20 for a typical XLR cable… more of course for a long one, or a snake (er, the kind that carries multiple signals, not the kind from whence oil is – or isn’t, as the case may be – extracted from).
Also; you literally, physically cannot get better objective results with expensive digital cables: a properly working cable will deliver the exact bitstream to the other end with no bit errors. Timing jitter, edge sharpness, etc, doesn’t matter once the signal gets to the other end; because it goes thru numerous buffer stages (often in a block of RAM) before being converted to analog. It is possible to get correct transmission of certain digital signals using a coat hanger (not that I recommend it, for practical reasons, but you get the idea)…
Power cables are similar: don’t forget that that power came from the wall, thru standard THHN or ROMEX wire – and promptly goes into a power supply circuit where it’s either run thru a transformer, bridge rectifier, and stored in a big capacitor; or run thru a switch-mode power supply where it’s chopped into hash before being smoothed out. Inserting a few feet of theoretically perfect wire in between the wall and that power supply won’t help at all… and expensive power cables aren’t theoretically perfect either.
I’ve noticed some 3.5mm headphone cables that I use to hook up my phone to does make a difference. I have a cheaper one and it lacks bass and very fine detail. I have a $40 high quality cable and it has better bass, and a little finer detail. Other than that I use plain copper speaker cables from Best Buy and it sounds great
Looks like Steve hit a sore spot with cable trolls. Do they feel that way about Clothes? Booze? Watches? Vacations? Cars? Schmucks.
Dip the ends of your cables in actual liquid snake oil.
Opens up the soundstage, lifts a veil over the music, palpable imaging.
I’ve had countless experiences where I give a cable (or other product) to someone (“Here, take this with you and then tell me what you think”) and they have the exact same comments about how it sounds as I do. That’s more than enough proof for me to know that it’s not just me tricking myself. The only other possible explanation would be that the cables have such a strong visual impact that they affect the hearing of anyone who sees them equally. That seems much more absurd…
I remember a few years back when I bought a pair of analog interconnect cables in an audio store for $50 and just 2 months ago bought the same cables from a store that specializes in selling only cables for just $1.85 a pair. Talk about the margins here, but also realize that copper is worthless. Cables are worthless. Invest in decent electronics and some decent speakers. You will be a lot happier.
I’ve NEVER met anyone who hasn’t heard a SIGNIFICANT improvement when entry-level cables were replaced with good mid to high-end cables in a mid to high-end stereo system. Yet, I’m always reading comments on YouTube from people who never listened to high-end cables or a high-end system in their life. And those are the ones who always pontificate about double-blind studies, test equipment, scientific data, snake oil, delusional idiots, and the placebo effect. Same old same old, year after year. In the meantime, I’ll continue to enjoy my high-end stereo with high-end cables.
What I want to know is when did “audiophile” go from meaning someone who likes building hi-fi systems to someone who buys only the most expensive and sketchy accessories? The fact that people proudly proclaim that they are not audiophiles means the word is now useless. Back in the day it meant anyone who went to the trouble to set up a custom sound system at home. What do we call someone who searches out great sounding products today? To me the main difference is that a casual listener will purchase a convenient product for listening to music without putting much effort into the selection process and an audiophile will research his/her options with a goal of maximizing sound quality even at the expense of convenience. Those people cover a broad spectrum yet every time I see an “audiophile” rant, it’s always against someone who has spent more on their system than the poster is willing to. Even when I couldn’t afford much, I still went into hi-fi shops to see what the fuss was about. Sometimes I was impressed and sometimes I wasn’t, but why is no one curious anymore?
I have a degree in Engineering Physics, and spent some time working for one of the big aerospace companies. Cables and wiring in general have to be designed for the type of signal they’re going to carry. Not to mention dealing with EMI, material considerations (is your cable going to around sea water/mist?) and a bunch of other things. The more experienced guys I worked with could tell when a cable was about to go “bad” for whatever reason just by listening to test signals thru it. Usually it was mechanical strain. Testing the all cables (or as they’re called “wiring harnesses”) on a plane is part of it’s standard maintenance cycle. In the physics lab, I had professors that were always complaining about fighting wave-guide effects in their cables like back reflection.
So cables are important; however, even on the most critical of applications, I never designed or used a cable that cost $10,000-$15,000 dollars. So there’s that.
The most important things about a cable I learned were: connectors, shielding, and grain structure of the conductor. Connectors are important because a connection by surface contact is non-ohmic and can even function as a shitty diode, so we ALWAYS soldered everything in the physics lab to avoid headaches. Shielding is pretty obvious. OD and 1D defects in the grain structure didn’t really matter, but 2D and 3D defects could cause problems because of the wave-guide effects I mentioned before.
i find that it’s usually older audiophiles who try to defend this type of bs. i guess if you have been fooled for decades you have to somehow try to justify it. it’s harder to admit that you’ve been wrong if you have been for so long. especially if you’re so knowledgeable and have so much experience in the field
Actually it’s just that older people come to realise the truth of Mark Twain’s aphorism: It’s not what you know that’s dangerous, it’s what you know that ain’t true. I’ve never listened to a system with a $10,000 cable and compared it to the same system with a $1 cable. Therefore I refuse to pass judgment. If I did hear a difference, I would confine my remarks to what I heard and certainly not demand the fellow sitting next to me to hear the same things I did.
harris brunx: “Jonathan Sturm most people will definitely hear a difference if told it makes a difference, its called placebo.”
You clearly don’t know what placebo means. It’s a real effect that can’t be attributed to the physical properties of the cause. An excellent example is a friend of mine who had a patient in the UK who used to request diamorphine (heroin). He would inject her with saline and she would experience the same effect she would have when receiving diamorphine. Researchers have recently discovered that epileptic dogs administered a placebo will experience fewer epileptic fits at a similar rate to those administered an anti-epileptic drug.
The placebo effect in sound reproduction would be when you substitute a signal cable containing the usual screen and centre conductor with one that, while it has RCA plugs on each end, they are connected with a cable consisting entirely of plastic insulation.
I’ve NEVER met anyone who hasn’t heard a SIGNIFICANT improvement when entry-level cables were replaced with good mid to high-end cables in a mid to high-end stereo system. Yet, I’m always reading comments on YouTube from people who never listened to high-end cables or a high-end system in their life. And those are the ones who always pontificate about double-blind studies, test equipment, scientific data, snake oil, delusional idiots, and the placebo effect. Same old same old, year after year. In the meantime, I’ll continue to enjoy my high-end stereo with high-end cables.
some of us tried expensive cables and prefer cheapo copper cables with good connectors. The same debate goes on with guitar players and their amps. My favorite guitar players prefer copper speaker cables from Radio Shack. I had my system loaded with incredibly expensive silver cables made by Nordost. It sure changed the tone but not for the better. Much too bright. Copper sounds much better and more “natural” IMO. I bet I can tell the difference in a blind test but different isn’t better than copper IMO.
Like I said, different is necessarily better. There is a good chance that I would listen to your system, notice a difference between your cables and my shitty copper cables, but still prefer the copper. My cables aren’t really that shitty, costing in the hundreds, not thousands. But if you notice the difference and think it’s an improvement, all the power to you.
I believe in cables but what I DON’T BELIEVE is the exponential correlation between cable quality and price !
Something that cable manufacturers want us to believe !
No a $10000 pair is not better than a $1000 pair… and is not better than a $100 pair that match your system.
The important is not the money, it’s the matching.
In hifi, money is a tool but knowledge is everything…
I care when a reviewer thinks cables improve sound. It leads me to question their ability to judge sound.
Quality interconnects are important,but spending ridiculous amounts of money for them outs you
just as a semi-clever one with deep pockets. The dealers will love you as long as you are affluent…..
I can hear the difference between two 10euro interconnect/rca cables…with my vintage Stax electrostatic headphones. And only with particular songs.
I connected an Analysis Plus power cable to my Rega Brio and noticed a big difference in the sound. Suddenly, Ringo Starr sounded like Dave Grohl (Nirvana years)! But everyone says that changing the power cable does nothing. Not true for the Brio. It may be that some electronic components are more effected by cables than others.
Or it could be that the people who say that changing cables does nothing are wrong. ~_^
I Think you don’t go in that buisness as primary buisness, more when you can add a second brand to your primary activity.
No snake oil is not about buying 10 dollar cable instead of a 15k one, it’s more about buying 200/300 ones.
Of course, selling snake oils is not easy. In fact making big money is not easy, period. Thus that’s not the point. But as an audio reviewer, you have an obligation to report the truth on audio products. If you are not sure about audio cables, just say so. Do not pretend to hear differences.
Why do you assume there is not a difference? Why do others always try to tell ius audiophiles how stuipid we are?
Seems to me it’s the people who don’t hear the difference between cables that always have something to say about the people who CAN hear the difference —
The question is – why one cares about what the others are doing SOOOOO MUCH…
I believe because I’ve heard the difference between cheap analog cables and good quality ones but digital cables carry a digital signal which to me at least a £10 hdmi cable sounds the same as a £100 hdmi cable.
I was thinking of getting in touch with some old clients of mine that work in the cable manufacturing business and making some speaker cables. I would come up with some bullshit story about the amazing detail they would produce, I would talk about how they’re hand made and only in small quantities, and then I would give them names after snakes. I would brand it as SOA Cables. (Snake Oil Audio Cables.) I’m sure someone would buy them if the price was high enough. LOL
Excuse me but selling placebo to believers and using false arguments isn’t ok.
But you are right on one thing, people are free to spend their money on whatever.
If your justification for audiophile cables includes drawing parallels to extreme gambling and drinking because “they’re just having fun” then your examples are only hindering your argument. There is a reason those things are so looked down upon.
Steve, thanks for putting some perspective to the cable issue. It is sad to think so many people miss out on the benefits cables provide due to poorly set up systems, inferior equipment or badly recorded music.
I can say from my experience cables do matter. A lot. Now, what is the delta between a 1000$ cable and a 10,000$? A lot of snake oil there… Its like in every product you buy. Subaru are great cars but Porsche are great cars as well. Cables matter, to my ears. Marketing is a big thing, as well. Cheers!
Sorry Steve but BS is BS and calling it out is just fine. You’re defending of them is pretty disappointing.
It gives me faith in the audio community (and humanity in general) that 90% of the people leaving comments strongly disagree with Steve. The fact that some people are highly suggestible and reluctant to double blind test (especially after purchasing and risking buyers regret) will keep the expensive cable industry alive for many years to come, sadly.
Stagger Lee
9 kuukautta sitten
Back in the 80s I stated making cables for fun. As usual with me being a fourth standard deviation hobbiest, I started selling them under the Music Metre label. You can google that name and find some really nice reviews on the cables. It was a second business with me and as Steve said, it was hard. No internet direct sales back then, you had to beg for dealers and reviews. Some of the dealer were great, some were not so great. Some were thieves.
After spending thousands of hour working on cables for the twenty years I was in business, I can assure you that cables make a big difference, If your system is not revealing or your ear are not revealing, maybe you cant hear it. I used to do a test for friend playing playing three cables blind test. Everyone had a preference. All they were listening to was the difference in solder used to put the cable together. To make a great cable, you need to get the best conductor material possible, use a good compatible dielectric, use the best solder, I always preferred Wonder Solder. Use plugs with no ferrous metal in them. Either silver on brass or brass plugs with silver to bind then gold to the brass. Use no nickel to hold the gold to the brass. Silver sounds better and doe the job. It works. You can hear it. Back then the main makers were Monster, Audioquest, Cardas, MIT, VanDenHul, Kimber and some others. and it was still tough. These people are still around and I’m not. I just looked up on a cable selling web site. Over eighty speaker cables were listed!!!.
The magazine no matter what they say, want advertising money to do reviews. You buy ads and suddenly the door was open.I I only got a fair shake from the smaller publications.
Why did I quit? Big guns in the military caught up with me and if you can’t hear the highs, you are out of business as a manufacturer. Sure I could have hired a pair of ear but then I guess I was tired of the game. It was fun, I loved going to CES and elbowing with the big boys. And I still occasionally get an email from someone still using my cables after twenty year. Not a bad compliment.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Graphic demonstration of cable frequency response:
http://www.ovnilab.com/articles/cables.shtml
Advertisers and consumers talk about different cables performing differently in the highs, lows, and so forth. Spectrum analysis shows the actual frequency response of the cables, proving or disproving those statements. For this analysis I used TrueRTA software. The audio converter I used has an output impedance (z out) of 50 ohms, which is about the same as an active instrument; and an input impedance (z in) of 1 Meg, which is typical for most amp heads, both vintage and modern. I found that with those impedances, all of the cables had totally identical frequency response–meaning they do exactly the same job of conveying lows, mids, and highs, without variation, from 10 Hz to 20 KHz.
That single line is actually ten lines that overlap. The spikes at 60 Hz and 180 Hz are artifacts from the power wiring in the room.
In order to show a visible difference in cable performance, I had to raise the z out and lower the z in. I raised the z out by running the test signal (pink noise) in series with a passive P-bass pickup, and I lowered the z in by putting a 1 Meg resistor in parallel with the input. This also shows an exaggerated view of the type of tone changes that can be heard with a passive guitar. Here is the new analysis of the same ten cables
These charts demonstrate that with a passive instrument a cable’s capacitance has a direct correlation to the amount of high-frequency content it can carry effectively. Also there is a significant spike in the frequencies just below the point where the highs drop off. The shape and frequency location of this spike and rolloff will change when you adjust the volume or tone knobs on your passive guitar. This graph also shows that even in an extreme case, the cables perform identically in the lows, and the mids never drop relative to the highs and lows. In other words, claims about a cable having “deeper, stronger bass”, “scooped mids”, or “polite low mids” are all completely false. In the case of a musician testing with their ears, these qualities are just in their imagination, a trick of our brains hearing what they want to hear–it honestly happens to the best of us.
In the case of a company that makes or sells these cables, those descriptions are not entirely honest. Sometimes they even use tone-describing terms like etching, glare, smearing, resolution, and so forth, but these descriptions are just meaningless garbage in the context of instrument cables.
Here’s a page where I tested those claims. They will also try to snow you with a bunch of scientific-sounding claims about inductance, skin effect, current bunching, and resonance–but those don’t have any measurable or meaningful effect on audio frequencies in instrument cables. They are only relevant in the MHz and GHz ranges, at lengths of over a mile, so don’t be fooled by the fake “science” in cable marketing.
In spite of those brain tricks or marketing voodoo, there can be some times when swapping different cables into your rig really will cause an audible difference! Here’s how: a guitar’s pickups, their vol/tone wiring, the cable, and the amp or pedal at the other end all interact to form a passive filter (a simple EQ). The cable variable that changes the shape of the filter is its total capacitance. As shown in the “visible difference” graphs above, this filter can roll off the highs, and boost a narrow hump just below that rolloff. The closer the z out value at one end of the cable is to the z in at the other end, the more exaggerated and audible the filter becomes; the graphs show an extreme example of this. Even small adjustments of your volume or tone knobs can have a noticeable impact on that filter shape.
However, with an ideal impedance relationship between two pieces of gear, the filter has no effect at all: the frequency response is perfectly flat, as shown in the first graph. A good-quality buffer (an active gain stage) creates an ideal impedance relationship. That’s precisely why onboard preamps were invented. Additionally, a buffered output electronically isolates the cable from the pickups and pots, so the cable cannot interact with them.
There are a few active guitars and basses where the powered/buffered part (an EQ stage, or active pickups) is followed by passive vol/tone wiring going to the output jack. In those cases it’s a bit of a gray area
How do different cables handle transient spikes?
http://www.ovnilab.com/articles/cablewaves.shtml
After I posted the results of spectrum analysis of several cables, various “defenders” of high-end cables responded “oh well spectrum analysis doesn’t show how a cable handles the notes, how cleanly it transmits transient peaks, how accurately it retains harmonic detail, how quickly it recovers after a big spike of amplitude, the impact of the notes…” They also talked about how inferior cables will “smear” the tone, they will lack resolution, sound muddy, or otherwise do a worse job of transmitting your signal. So I decided to test those claims.
What we’re talking about is distortion. The technical definition of distortion is when the output of a device is in any way different from the input. It doesn’t mean “distortion pedal” buzzing sounds, or even soft clipping necessarily. It just means “was there any change at all”. A cable that handles transient spikes better, or retains harmonic detail better, would by definition have lower distortion. Distortion can be measured.
First I tested the cables with a Hewlett Packard 8903B Audio Analyzer, using an amplitude of 6 volts and three different frequencies. The cables were coiled inside a grounded mu-metal container with 1 mm-thick walls, to minimize external influences on the reading. All but one of the cables measured the same: 0.0029% at 20 KHz, 0.0017% at 5 KHz, and fluctuating around 0.0025% at 30 Hz. These are incredibly low amounts of change to the signal. At lower test-signal voltages, the distortion was a bit higher, but it was the same at all frequencies. The one exception was the Atlantic Zerocap, that had higher distortion when its active (powered) component was switched on; with that component switched off, the cable had the exact same distortion as all the others. So just with the readings of this analyzer we could reasonably suggest there is no difference in how any of the cables transmit signals.
Next I ran an electronic kick-drum beat through the cables at about 30 V p-p. This is a huge signal spike, much higher than any bass or guitar will put out, and it tests all of the claims about low-frequency handling, transient response, recovery time, and so forth. I recorded the results with an oscilloscope, with channel 1 (yellow) being the signal at the beginning of each cable, and channel 2 (blue) being the signal at the other end.
Clearly, they are all identical, and the signal at the output is identical to the signal at the input–the blue line exactly overlaps the yellow line, to the point that in some cases we can’t even see that there are two separate lines. These images show a close-up view of milliseconds of wave peaks. Any variation in the delivery of the signal would result in the blue line separating from the yellow line.
On the Analysis Plus website they have a video titled “Make me prove it”, purporting to give proof that their cable performs better. In this video they show the waveforms of two tracks recorded in Protools, one with the Analysis and one with some other cable. They show that the Analysis track has bigger waves, and as the salesman puts it, “more dynamics in between the notes!” Looks great, right? But the tracks were recorded separately.
The only thing it proves is that either they consciously made the choice to try to fool you with a fake demonstration, or they have so little actual scientific understanding that they didn’t realize they were giving a fake demonstration. The “white paper” they produced raises the exact same either/or question: do they genuinely not know that transmission-line theory doesn’t apply to non-transmission-line situations, or are they deliberately counting on the fact that most people don’t know the difference?
Tomi Engdahl says:
Audio Cables Compared and Recommended:
http://www.ovnilab.com/articles/cablechoice.shtml
Tomi Engdahl says:
I also measured the resistance and distortion of these cables, but the values were generally much too small to be meaningful in comparison. One interesting exception is the Zaolla Artist, which has resistance (2.34 ohms) about 10 x higher than most of the other cables! The whole point of the Zaolla is that it’s made of silver, because silver is supposedly more conductive than copper. Well, I can tell you for an empirical fact that the Zaolla is less conductive than even the cheapest of the copper cables. That difference is probably not audible though. The other exception is the Atlantic Zerocap, which has much higher distortion than any other cable.
http://www.ovnilab.com/articles/cablechoice.shtml
Tomi Engdahl says:
This high-end dealer doesn’t recommend expensive cables! #highendaudio #audiophiles
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4G_mhAbSs8M
Sound By Singer’s Andrew Singer recommends against spending a lot of money on cables, especially in under $10K systems.
Video comments:
Cable manufacturers must love when you put a $1000 cable on an external connector which is attached to a $0.5 wire inside the chassis…
My point is simple: Designers of systems know that the external cabling is a variable and must be accounted for in the overall audio quality produced by their designs. As such, they do not expect replacing a cable to dramatically affect their equipment, or they would provide them themselves and make BANK…
Most better audio companies don’t include cables because they know they make a big difference and it can be a personal choice. Some companies did include a decent cable but most did not.
Bob Carver explained the need to keep costs down during large production runs, so putting expensive components inside speakers adds up, and increases the retail price of the speaker. Buyers can always upgrade the internals after purchasing including cabling, fuses and fuse holders, etc., themselves, if they feel the mods would offer real benefit.
Personally, li think that using better interconnects between components makes a bigger difference than upgrades to speaker cables (unless your current speaker cables are dead common ones).
there is a bit of physics involved here, the cable inside the speaker is much shorter than the speaker cable unless your speaker cables are under 0.5m, in most speakers the internal wiring is short this means less voltage drop. In most decent brands the wires inside are calculated properly, and the external wire that has 1-5m does make a difference(big or small, that is another discussion). it is the same issue with power cables, the cables inside are basic but they are really short. the big impact is on the longer power cable.
So, the argument that “of course cables matter” relies on a comparison of Monster Cable to zipcord more than 35 years ago.
Way back when when I worked at Circuit City everyone wanted to sell Monster Cables because that was one of THE best things to sell in the ENTIRE store in terms of commission. There was so much markup in those cables it was ridiculous.
I was one of those that bought into them. Circuit City was where I started my journey into home theater
although I knew very little aside from what the sales people told me
A good moment of audiophile sincerity. Liked it!
The kind of cable that was tested in 1983 can be had today for less than a hundred dollars. Cables with decent gauge and high quality copper are common nowdays. Just one more reason to not throw money away on over engineered cables that have no solid evidence about performing better.
This idea that you should use speaker cables to be “compatible” with your system is total nonsense. Not that it can’t be done, but because it makes no common sense to employ a wire as an equalizer to “tune” your sound to what you think it should sound like. You can use a low-cost equalizer like the Schiit Loki or better yet the Bellari EQ570 to make these small changes in frequency response and a lot more for less or MUCH less than using high-end speaker cables that achieve the same thing. Audiofoolishness.
Genelec dont provide a special cable with there speakers so it cannot be that important.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ray Kimber and Kimber Kable’s Audio and Video Cables
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL2Zo27vRg0
Kimber Kable makes the finest audio & video cables and ships them all over the world. Since starting his business in 1979, Ray Kimber has been an innovative industry leader and has an inspiring team that supports him and his business right here in Ogden, UT. We have been privileged to have Ray as a member of Wasatch Peaks Credit Union.
Video comments:
Awesome. Been using Kimber cables for 30 years, don’t plan to stop this lifetime! Ray is an original hi-fi pioneer. But I didn’t know about Wattgate or Heatshrink.com It’s a delight to see Ray in person after 30 years of listening pleasure. All the best, Rob in Switzerland
Pure Snake Oil…the definition of snake oil could be these products…super expensive for zero benefit!
Tomi Engdahl says:
Exotic speaker cables:
Nordost Heimdall 2 Speaker Cable
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhOdbyoANRo
https://nordost.com/norse2/heimdall2/heimdall2-speaker-cable.php
Tomi Engdahl says:
Kimber kable Vs nordost
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqPqNW8MwE4
Video comments:
This video sold me on Nordost.
There’s no real difference. If anyone think otherwise you’re brain playing up.
They sound the same.
Tomi Engdahl says:
van den hul vs cardas vs nordost
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXjUowz4IVM
trying to understand best speaker cable with vitus audio ri101 and marten oscar duo speakers.
listening order: vdh cs122, cardas golden reference, nordost baldur
Tomi Engdahl says:
Do cables make a difference? What they don’t tell you
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7khI3cPi9ng
Video comments:
“Cables are losing more information than any other part of the system”…. sorry you lost me there. That’s just not true unless you’re dealing with long runs of really crappy cables. After a certain point, the signal is good and any extra money you spend is the same as pouring it down the drain. The speakers, your ears, your brain, the mastering of the original recording, and even the amplifier lose much more information.
Great vid easy to understand. Tried a few different ones over the years. In the end settled on solid core silver with oversize air dielectric ptfe insulation. Not expensive at all. And the performance in my system is excellent. Get get copper plugs from a reliable source though, thats important.
I’ve messed with many different cables over the years and have never really been convinced these expensive cables make a difference. And these days it can easily be measured and we can see that many of these expensive cables actually intentionally or not act like tone controls. Hence why some do cause a noticeable change. But when we look data we can see this causes the cable to lose any transparency when its effecting the sound. Cables should never be used this way its what EQ is for. As for signal and power cables decent quality should work perfectly fine given the gear was properly engineered. Many of these nonsense issues they try to convince people of can be solved by such and such cable is BS. These issues are solved internally in properly engineered gear so it works at its best with almost any cable. These expensive exotic cables aren’t used in music production or equipment engineering and testing but only in playback because this crap doesn’t fly in the professional area of audio. These old geezers will say science can’t explain what we’re hearing but then turn around and praise the science behing analog and vinyl. Sorry ya can’t cherry pick what science you want to believe. Most people also have NO clue what advances have been achieved in audio. Maybe read Dr Floyd Toole’s book or many of the Harman research papers. Blew my mind too.
The thing is that the cable can be measured with basic electrical parameters plus some shielding. So resistance, inductance, capacitance..etc. A lot of these values are published by decent bulk cable manufacturers such as Canare, Mogami..etc. Often times audiophile cables do not disclose this info – at least from what I’ve seen.
Again, because no answer…:
Great video! Yes, cables takes away! But which ones takes less away? That is the question!
Is Nordost Blue heaven do that?
Or Van Den Hul?
Or… what?
Which is the best buy? For 2 meters long on each sides…
Thanks for answering.
Well done! You tackled a very difficult/complex issue and simplified it. I’m surprised more people haven’t focused on the “subtraction “ factor while trying to explain expensive options.
I think cables do add but only in an interference way. By picking up radio signals. So good cables try to take less away and try not to add stuff as well.
High dielectric constant would give high capacitance between the two conductors which, I think, would reduce high-frequency parts of the signal. Whether it is noticeable or not is another question. I don’t think it would have much to do with the resistance of the conductors as such.
The thing is that electrical conduction in short distances are extremely easy to do effectively. Any cable that is built properly will send the sinal with unperceivable losses.
Im usually much more worried about the connector being mechanically reliable, having a good a fit than if the copper atoms are aligned in some magical way.
Expensive cables are Audiophoolery or snakeoil.
You can make superb DIY cables at home, the wires, solder and connectors are readily available and a great OCC pure silver RCA can be made for under 150 euro.
Or you can just attach some banana plugs to some reasonably thick copper lamp cord and be done.
I have no problem hearing differences. Its working out if that difference is a good one or not.
Great controversial topic put across intelligently
You mention frequency spectrum being affected by a cable but don’t mention clarity..? Surely you can just use eq to add warmth etc to a system and upgrade the cable to restore clarity previously lost..
You wouldn’t pay hundreds of dollars just to avoid a few pokes of an eq…!?
The most common understanding when talking cables is that, speaker and interconnects is the first thing to get right. I also thought that for years, but after trying out some power chords, i reversed my point of view. A good power cable can in fact work miracles, like anything else, because shielding is much better, and “other things” i can’t explain
But it works very good in my system.
Wrong ! The speaker loses much more information than any cable !! Show me a speaker that does the same job as the cheapest cable ?? Also what do you think the crossover in the speaker is made of ?? There are rolls of copper wire and aluminium foil in the inductors and capacitors as well as nichrome wire used in the resistors. Just because you can’t see it inside the speaker doesn’t mean it is not there. Worse still is the design of the crossover which has a much greater bearing on the sound than a speaker cable.
Just use Mono Price cables it all in the setup there’s no difference in cables. The more expensive cables look cool and cost more so your mind thinks it sounds better
Without conducting blind listening tests along with scientific evidence to support your opinion, you’ve done nothing more than present an uninformed opinion based upon subjective or wishful thinking that performs a great disservice to the viewer.
You’re connected to an audio showroom that makes money off of selling cables, so it behooves you to not perform any kind of reasonable side by side blind comparisons in which to present an informed statement to the viewers.
Studio, TV station or home environment. The weakest link is the sound reproducers, speakers or headphones. The least important are the cables (analog) provided they are short and of the right type needed for the application. You can test this easily in a double blind test on the very best ears in the world. Anyone can hear the difference between 2 pairs of $500 speakers, can anyone tell the difference between 2 sets of $500 cables, not what they perceive but which cable they are listening to!
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hosatech.com/press-release/do-audio-cables-affect-sound-quality/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Can expensive audio cables improve the sound of a hi-fi?
Sure, the naysayers “know” cables don’t make a difference, but what if you could prove them wrong?
https://www.cnet.com/news/can-expensive-audio-cables-improve-the-sound-of-a-hi-fi/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Debunking myths about audio cables
Save yourself some money: in audio, “basic cable” is a good thing.
https://www.soundguys.com/debunking-myths-about-audio-cables-13093/
Taking the plunge into home or personal audio is daunting, and there’s a lot of confusing marketing material out there. What’s real? What’s hogwash? How much is enough to spend on cables? Well, I have to tell you that price… really doesn’t matter all that much, and spending a lot of money on cables is almost always a waste of money.
If price doesn’t matter, why is there so much expensive stuff out there? The cynical answer is also the real one: marketers have had great success in parting people from their money by over-hyping basic components. No accessory outside of the Blackbody (or its successor, the Firewall) has seen as much of this naked swindling than audiophile cables.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Now, there’s plenty of first-hand user testimony about audiophile cables—analog and digital—improving experiences. However, that’s another grumpy article for another time: psychoacoustics is a whole different ball o’ wax, and tackling confirmation bias and other common problems is going to result in hurt feelings.
What I want you to take away from this article is that you shouldn’t feel pressured to spend a ton of money on cables if you aren’t sure you need them. Ask for a layman’s explanation at your local shop if you’re on the fence, and if your salesperson can’t give you one without any flowery unquantifiable adjectives: Walk away.
https://www.soundguys.com/debunking-myths-about-audio-cables-13093/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cable myths: reviving the coathanger test
https://www.soundguys.com/cable-myths-reviving-the-coathanger-test-23553/
We often harp on the fact that nobody needs audiophile-grade… anything around these parts, but where we make our name is proving it. Today, we’re going to try to prove one way or another whether or not high-end cables make a difference for your equipment.
Editor’s note: This article was updated on June 13, 2019 to add survey results on a blind test of audio samples using both a high-end cable and a coathanger.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Audiophiles: Does the audio cable make a difference in terms of sound quality?
https://www.quora.com/Audiophiles-Does-the-audio-cable-make-a-difference-in-terms-of-sound-quality
First, let me say that “audio jewelry” is quite an industry. In most industries, there is high-priced status stuff which only satisfies the ego of the buyer, offering no meaningful difference in the listening experience, or whatever the thingie does.
Someone here wrote about cables making NO difference, and making the speaker the most important component. Ten minutes in a good hi-fi store, listening to real-world, quality, but affordable components, will give you the answer you can live with. The differences between source components, everything from the delicate physics of extracting accurate musical data from a black disc, to the various approaches to D-A conversion, to the various processes used in the amplification of line-level signals to those large enough to drive a speaker, reminds me of “garbage in, garbage out”.
It has been decades since it became normal procedure, even among some mid-level brands and dealers, to at least match speakers to amplifiers, and never, ever skimp on the machine that handles the music source. A turntable with good mechanical design, with a cartridge and tonearm that can trace the wiggles in a groove accurately enough to bring music from them, offers a difference that is glaringly, immediately apparent. Speakers change the character of the sound. And even less sophisticated speakers that don’t have the last word in slam or resolution can be tuned and matched so as to communicate what is essential to a satisfying musical experience – but they can’t replace what isn’t there in the source.
And that is why “spend the bulk of money on speakers” is naive to the extreme. An unbalanced system with great speakers, in which the purchaser chooses the CD player/DAC, turntable, and electronics to be of lower priority, will never be a special music system…at least nowhere near what you can make of a system which pays proper attention to the definitive and essential task of getting the music-bearing signal out of the source, and sending it to properly chosen and tuned electronics and speakers. Mass-market – even expensive -home theater, power-amplifier based stuff can sound impressive, make for good background music, give sizzle and pop to movies…but what makes music special, sound like live music, is a whole-’nuther ballgame.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Do expensive cables/wires REALLY make a difference
https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/do-expensive-cables-wires-really-make-a-difference
Short answer, yes. Even inexpensive cables/interconnects can make a big difference. It’s good to read stuff, but with cables, etc. it’s best to identify what aspects of sound are important to you and what you’d like to improve in your system and use that to choose some cables to try and see what happens. Cables and interconnects tend to sound different in different systems, so it’s kind of a moving target so especially with these components there’s really no substitute to just start auditioning some and find your own way. Don’t rush to judgement — when I swap wires it usually takes a few minutes for them to settle into my system before they sound their best, and that’s assuming they’re fully broken in already. By the way, you won’t find too many audiophiles using Monster Cable. Nuff said.
The good news is you can get very good performance for not a whole lotta $ if you do some research and especially if you buy used or direct from a manufacturer.
Short answer, no. Even expensive cables/interconnects can make no difference. It’s good to read stuff, but with cables, etc. it’s best to identify what aspects of sound are important to you and what you’d like to improve in your system and use that to choose some cables to try and see nothing happen. Cables and interconnects tend to sound different in different imaginations, so it’s kind of a moving target so especially with these components there’s really no substitute to just start auditioning some and find your own way. Don’t rush to judgement — when I swap wires it usually takes a few minutes for them to settle into my system before they sound the same, and that’s assuming they’re fully broken in already. By the way, you won’t find too many audiophiles using Monster Cable. Nuff said.
The good news is you can get very good performance for not a whole lotta $ if you do some research and especially if you buy used or direct from a manufacturer. My analogy with wires is putting cheap tires on a Porsche — it undermines a lot of the potential you paid for when you bought the car. So it is with cables. Oh, and if this isn’t infuriating enough, power cords make no difference too. You can get some good feedback and advice here to help narrow things down if you’re specific with what you’re looking to improve/accomplish, your tastes/preferences in sound and music, and also let us know what other equipment you have, you too can find they make no difference.
Congrats on entering this nutty hobby. Is it too late to return your high-end pieces?
Double blind tests conducted by many of our ‘authorities’ over the last fifty years prove ‘expensive’ doesn’t make the difference, its the material, connectors etc.
Agree with Buconero117 that materials make the difference, e.g., OCC silver, OCC copper, teflon dielectric, connectors of OCC copper, silver-plated, gold-plated. These features cost more.
Well-constructed cables of sufficent length are what is really needed. Spending uber-dollars on cables is not a wise decision – you would be far better served by upgrading your speakers and optimizing the speakers/room interaction…
Alexwgoody, first you said that all of the cables sound the same and power cords make no difference. Then you use an analogy about a Porsche needing better tires. So I don’t get it.
Cwby8115, I would say first get the equipment that works well with the type of music you will listen to. That may take you on a journey of tubes, solid state or a mixture of both. It may take a while and cost some bucks but it really is a fun process. .. huh ? We are all searching for that Holy Grail.
Review the Audiogon archives for sure and buying used will allow you to get some high quality equipment for a good price.
However, when it comes to cables, I am probably the poster child. What I can add to your question is that the right cables will make your system perform its best. And that DOES include power cables.
The better the systems quality the easier it will be to pick out the differences in cables.
All cables will sound different, not necessarily better. If the cables don’t have any impact then this isn’t your weakest link. What the buyer has to decide is if the difference in sound worth the price. I have owned Porsches in the past and you wouldn’t see a 911 owner buying $35 tires on a $100k car. Sure the $35 will get you from point a to point b, but there is quite a bit of difference between a $35 tire and $600 tire. You don’t see people claiming: it is just rubber!
Tomi Engdahl says:
Does speaker wire affect sound quality? No Myths, Just Facts
https://soundcertified.com/does-speaker-wire-affect-sound-quality/
Audio accessories like cables and especially speaker wire are one of the most commonly overpriced and hyped things you can buy. But what’s the truth? Does speaker wire affect sound quality?
Should you spend a lot of money on “special” speaker wire? What do you need to know for the best sound for your car or home speaker systems?
I’ll tell you this and more in clear & simple to understand terms – along with all the facts you need. Read on!
Speaker wire & sound quality fast facts
Under normal circumstances, the answer is NO: speaker wire does not affect sound quality. However, in some cases, (explained in further below) sound quality or volume can be affected somewhat.
There’s no scientific test data to back up the (misleading) idea that “special” or “audiophile” speaker wires provide better sound than a regular good quality speaker wire of the correct size.
Using non-standard wire or cables instead of speaker wire can result in sound changes, although very minor. Excessively long or other high-resistance wire can affect the sound by causing a drop in speaker volume.
For best results, do not coil long lengths of speaker wire as this can create inductance that reduces some sound frequencies as a crossover does.
The wire between speaker crossovers and the speakers should be kept fairly short. Excessively long wire to the crossover & at the speakers can cause the crossover’s behavior to change & alter the sound response of the speaker.
Fancy audio cables & wire are based on nonsense
Often claims are made by companies & audiophiles that their highly-priced cables offer better sound because of some type of technical advantage over standard wire or cables. The problem is that there’s no scientific test data to back it up. Most of the time it’s just for making a larger profit.
In fact, when it comes to electronics, audio accessories like cable and wire are one of the most profitable categories for retailers!
Here’s a list of reasons why you won’t notice any difference with sound quality due to speaker wire. There are a few exceptions that aren’t typical which I’ll explain later.
It’s important to explain one thing, though: for the sake of this article we’re referring to normal cases where the correct size & good quality wire of a reasonable length are used.
Speaker wire sound quality facts:
While it’s true that many electrical components & conductors do have capacitance and inductance that can affect the sound, the speaker wire has very little. Far less than what is needed to have a real impact on sound quality & the frequency response of a speaker system.
Things like speaker performance, voice coil inductance, speaker crossovers, and more have a much more significant impact on the sound quality of a system – hundreds of times larger, in fact.
Speaker wires are made up of a bundle of thin conductors that touch each other which keeps capacitance and inductance to a level so small it’s negligible for audio. Other types of cable (like individually insulated conductors) can have an impact on sound – but they’re not speaker wire.
The electrical conductor phenomenon known as skin effect doesn’t apply to the audio frequency range. It’s not a concern until dealing with much higher frequencies (megahertz and higher ranges). Audio frequencies span about 20Hz to 20kHz in range.
While it’s true that blind listening tests have been done to try and “prove” that special audio wires or cables sound better to people, they’re never able to prove it. In fact, the tests are almost always badly flawed and have no hard scientific audio test data to back them up. To make matters worse, the placebo effect has an impact on the test along with people have different levels of hearing.
Speaker wire electrical resistance, capacitance, and inductance explained
You can think of speaker wire – much like other electrical conductors, as being made up of a resistor, an inductor, and a capacitor, as nearly all conductors have at least a tiny bit of each. Resistors oppose the flow of electrical current and cause some voltage to be lost.
Capacitors and inductors are sort of like resistors but their “resistance” (called impedance in this case) changes with frequency. Because of it, they’re bad to have in wires that carry an alternating current (AC) signal like music, but extremely useful in things like speaker crossovers.
You might be thinking, “If speaker wire has some inductance and capacitance, wouldn’t that hurt the sound?”
The answer, in this case, is no.
That’s because unlike speaker crossovers where we use large values of capacitors and inductors to filter out or block certain sound ranges to speakers, speaker wire has an incredibly tiny amount. Not enough to have any real effect in most cases.
For example, we could use a capacitor in line with a tweeter to block distorting & damaging bass from reaching it. That’s possible because the impedance (or resistance to electrical current flow) decreases with the frequency, meaning that lower frequencies get reduced a lot and effectively filtered out.
Even basic speaker wire is good!
In the case of speaker wire, if the capacitance were a high value it would be possible for higher frequencies that reach the speaker to be greatly reduced & cause a poor sound quality.
Likewise, if the inductance were high enough to matter it could affect sound quality too. As I mentioned before, however, speaker wire has very low values of each. Ordinary lamp power wire (extremely similar to 18AWG or 16AWG wire) has only about 10-20pFarad capacitance per foot, give less than 1% loss in the audible range for a 50 foot length.
Speaker wire is made up of fine strands of wire, usually copper or copper-clad aluminum (CCA), that are bundled together and electrically separated from each other inside flexible insulation. Other kinds exist too, like those that are also bundled with a thin shield or other special features.
The insulation usually has a thin section in the middle which can be torn easily for separating the wires when stripping it, connecting it, and so on. Most of the time one wire is marked with a positive indicator of some kind.
Adding a connector to speaker wire by splicing, either by soldering, crimp connectors, or other ways doesn’t normally affect sound quality. It can’t – it’s just another electrical path for the electrical current & audio signal to flow through.
However, it is possible for an unusually poor connection to have a bad enough resistance that the speaker could have noticeably less volume & power loss. That’s because when a very bad connection causes a high amount of resistance to the flow of current, it also causes a large voltage drop across it, too.
Does the length of speaker wire affect the sound?
It’s definitely possible to lose speaker sound quality a little bit by using an excessively long wire that’s not large enough.
That’s because:
Very long lengths of speaker wire (say 50+ ft in length, especially 100ft or more) have more resistance and will cause a small volume & power drop especially at maximum amplifier power levels.
Very long lengths of wire will have more capacitance that can slightly affect the frequency response at the speaker. It depends on the particular wire.
Unfortunately, even if you’re technically inclined, almost no speaker wire makers offer any technical specs to help you figure out what you can expect for very long lengths. We can, however, use the American Wire Gauge (AWG) standard to know the resistance per foot for most stranded wire.
Copper clad aluminum (CCA) wire has, in the last few years, become more and more common as the price of copper wiring has gone up. It’s one of those “little things” you might not know when buying that companies aren’t telling you.
Unlike pure copper wire, copper-clad aluminum uses an aluminum wire core with a thin copper plating. From the outside, it misleadingly looks the same because of the plating.
Aluminum offers a lighter weight and lower cost than copper, so it’s at first glance it may seem like a great way to replace more expensive copper wiring. However, there’s an important difference that wire makers often won’t tell you!
How good is copper-covered aluminum speaker wire?
The good news is that CCA wire has the same sound quality as copper wire, meaning it’s fine for great sound. The problem is that aluminum isn’t as good of an electrical conductor as copper.
Aluminum has only 61% of the conductivity of copper (in other words, it has 39% more resistance) meaning it will take larger aluminum wires to get the same wire quality.
What to know before buying CCA speaker wire
In most cases like average listening & typical power levels, it’s not really a problem in day-to-day use. However, if you’re going to drive speakers at higher power levels or want the absolute best for your money, you’ll need to be sure to look for packaging that clearly states 100% pure copper.
Otherwise, copper-clad aluminum will work just as well if you follow this rule: when buying CCA speaker wire, to get the same quality as true copper wire go up one gauge in size.
For example, to replace 18 gauge copper wire use a 16 gauge CCA wire.
There are some cases where using wire the wrong way (or using the wrong kind of wire) lead to bad sound quality:
Using non-standard wire or cable as speaker wire
Winding long lengths of wire into a loop, creating a coil (creating an inductor basically)
Breaks or cuts in speaker wire that cause problems with power flow
Poor connections like twisting wire together instead of using a proper connector or solder
Heavily oxidized wire
Loosely connected speaker box posts or terminals
To avoid nicking the wire inside, avoid using a razor or utility knife to strip wires. Use a stripper or other tool instead.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.quora.com/Do-Hi-Fi-interconnect-cables-affect-the-sound
Cables will affect the sound but not quite in the way the salesman would have you believe.
Inadequately shielded cables can pick up noise and in some cases even AM radio, though most often it’ll be RF induction from nearby mobile phones. Also speaker cables can suffer from stray capacitance or inductance if too thin and/or too long. This phenomenon particularly affects vacuum tube amplifiers.
Your basic $5 interconnect with the red and white plastic phono connectors for analog connections will in most cases give a completely indistinguishable result from something costing much more (and the sky really is the limit with how much you can spend on interconnect)
Many of the hyper-expensive hi-fi cables you can buy make spectacular claims as to their performance, but these claims if examined turn out to be based on pseudoscience. Typically they don’t offer statistical data based on double-blind listening tests to determine how many critical listeners can discern the difference in effect from one cable to another.
There is a reason for this – these cables are sold not to satisfy the buyer’s ears, but instead his ego (and excuse the gender-specific pronoun, but in my experience women are generally far too intelligent to fall for these types of scam!). The reasoning is that the buyer is buying bragging rights about how much they spent on their system, rather than any kind of measurable improved performance.
Also in the hi-fi store, the salespeople are part of this psychological mind-warp. “Since you’ve just spent [insert sum here] on a good [insert component here], surely you will want to spend just a few more dollars and get some decent interconnect for it?!”… it’s called persuasion by implied guilt, and it works very well. Don’t fall for it! Cables are the easiest to sell and highest margin item in the store!
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://forum.psaudio.com/t/interconnects-why-they-affect-the-sound-so-much/2078/2
So, I have learned a lot recently about cabling. My premise was always that audio, sorry, analog audio signals, are simple in respect to propagation down a wire. We sent them down Radio Shack RCAs for years, why bother with anything else? Then that “anything else” arrived in the form of high-end cables. BS! Just trying to take my money. Then I heard a set of better interconnects and got my ass handed to me. Turns out, I was wrong. I’ll bet we’ve all had the same or similar experience at some point. Back to the premise of “simple” analog audio signals: wrong again!
They are a hot mess of differing frequency and phase. Screw with any of them too much and you audibly degrade the signal. A “cable” is not a “wire” any more than an amp is not a straight wire with gain. A nice lofty goal, but many gremlins inside. Even a solitary wire can screw up audio when the skin effect comes into play (higher frequencies tend to travel faster down the exterior of the wire). Add in multiple wires and “insulation” (dielectric) and you now have inductance and capacitance to deal with. Maybe not a big deal if the cable is 2mm long, but 1m, 2m or more and you have a rather impressive, unintentional filter going. Oh yeah, I forgot DCR.
If you measure cables from end to end you get numbers for R,L and C. These tell you virtually nothing about how the cable will sound by themselves, assuming that their values are not crazy high. What DOES matter is that the electrical environment that each individual wire in the cable sees is identical AND that the overall values for R,L and C are as low as possible at the same time. The designs for RCA, balanced and speaker cable are very very different. A little bit is shared, but by and large that are different. The RCA uses a solitary 25ga copper wire and is shielded very differently than the balanced interconnect, which has a double pair of conductors in a unique arrangement. These cables are all copper, btw. It turned out that the design of the cables trumped the contribution of other materials. I have heard this myself and found that these same cables made with OF single crystal copper sounded marginally different (better?). Are they worth whatever the additional cost will be? That is for you to decide.
Tomi Engdahl says:
So, Do Audio Cables Make a Difference? They certainly can, but it’s important to note that cables don’t “improve” your sound. Their purpose is to translate sound from the source as transparently as possible.
https://hosatech.com/press-release/do-audio-cables-affect-sound-quality/