Author Topic: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects  (Read 18694 times)

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Offline HalcyonTopic starter

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"A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« on: August 23, 2021, 04:29:00 am »
Yes, I know. The whole audiophool thing has been done to death, but I still can't help but shake my head at these people who can trick themselves into hearing differences that don't exist.



He compared cables and was apparently able to hear a difference in "where instruments were located", how "woolly" the bass sounded. He was also able to determine that some of the cables had more "presence" and could determine the "leading edge of the notes" better on some cables. I could go on. Apparently interconnect cables play the role of "filters" in an audio system.

What's interesting is that there seems to be a distinct lack of negative comments or criticism calling out his bullshit... could he perhaps be deleting comments that aren't favourable?

Secondly, surprise surprise, the most expensive cable (which he apparently paid £800 for) scored the highest in his tests and the cheapest performed "worst", but he claims that "he couldn't care less if the cheaper cables sound better" (of course, we all know the cheaper cables never come out on top in these kinds of biased and unscientific tests, so he's safe there. Money well spent!)

 |O

« Last Edit: August 30, 2021, 12:07:25 am by Halcyon »
 
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Offline MazeFrame

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #1 on: August 23, 2021, 11:55:04 am »
In theory, a cable could be made to have higher resistance after a set point (skin effect).

Would be nice if someone with access to a 20Hz to 20kHz LCR meter got his hands on one of these cables, just to see what the numbers say.
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Online bd139

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #2 on: August 23, 2021, 11:59:24 am »
These things always remind me of my father who was a "wine expert". Or that was until he didn't realise a bottle was thoroughly corked, drank half of it and got everyone else to taste how good it was. Then everyone knew he was talking bollocks to obtain intellectual status.

In this scenario I would love to see coat speaker replaced with coat hangers wrapped in sticky tape which is what I had to use for my first HiFi set up. When I bought some proper cables I couldn't tell the difference at all.

Perhaps I should start selling audio grade coat hangers 🤔
 
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Offline SeanB

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #3 on: August 23, 2021, 12:00:35 pm »
Well, I picked up some of the braided PTFE cables, and am using them, suitably undone, as test leads, as they do have a reasonable amount of copper in them. Not too flexible, but fine for power supply use.

Did use the Van Del Hul as interconnects, but they are no different to the others, except they are much better shielded than the original cheap came with cables, which came as about 5 strands of possibly wire for inner, and 3 strands of almost metal as braid, not even foil wrapped. Just had to resolder the dry joints on them, they rely on solder to provide mechanical support and contact for the inner core.
 
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Offline xrunner

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #4 on: August 23, 2021, 12:13:18 pm »
Same BS different day. They bias themselves towards the appearance and price. The best looking and most expensive will win. The tests need to be blind comparisons. I'd pick a roll of Radio Shack wire and build it up with pretty coverings and say it costs $12,000. It would win hands-down.
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Online MrMobodies

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #5 on: August 23, 2021, 12:48:36 pm »
What's interesting is that there seems to be a distinct lack of negative comments or criticism calling out his bullshit... could he perhaps be deleting comments that aren't favourable?

... When he feels like it.

We'll see how mine will do:
Quote
MrMobodies 14:39 23/08/21
Can you demonstrate these differences or results through an oscilloscope and also tear the cables down to show us what's inside and measure stuff? I'd only be believe it when I see it.

Quote
MrMobodies  14:41 23/08/21
I'd like to see you get yourself a hearing test and show us that you have superior hearing in these sorts of things.

 
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Offline xrunner

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #6 on: August 23, 2021, 01:01:18 pm »
Me too -

Quote
Where are the objective measurements of the cable responses? The cables pass audio frequencies, so where is the comparison of the input and output audio spectrum? Cable resistance measurements? Quality of wire-to-connector joints? It's also best to do these subjective listening tests by doing a blind test and having a helper connect each cable so you cannot be biased by the look and price of each one.
I told my friends I could teach them to be funny, but they all just laughed at me.
 
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Online themadhippy

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #7 on: August 23, 2021, 01:49:20 pm »
Quote
Apparently interconnect cables play the role of "filters" in an audio system
A perfectly  valid ,and correct claim as every cable will have a  measurable inductance,capacitance  and resistance value. These might combine to make a  filter that only cuts the signal above 472Mhz by 0.000000000000000032dB with a 0.0000000005dB slope,but its still a filter.
 

Offline mc172

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #8 on: August 23, 2021, 01:52:11 pm »
Erm, the cables in the video are not speaker cables, they're phono interconnects.
 
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Online MrMobodies

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #9 on: August 23, 2021, 01:54:55 pm »
I was looking briefly at some of his videos, not his words and he shows some stuff:

Iota VX SA3 & PA3 review
youtube.com/watch?v=UTrYCGtSWY0


Construct your own Audiophile Power Cable from £15 (no soldering)
youtube.com/watch?v=gfVYfC6tmcc


Shame he resorted to audiophoolery.
 

Offline madires

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #10 on: August 23, 2021, 02:00:09 pm »
Classic cognitive dissonance. The higher the price, the better the sound. >:D
 

Offline BBBbbb

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #11 on: August 23, 2021, 02:07:15 pm »
Classic cognitive dissonance. The higher the price, the better the sound. >:D
If I paid 800 GBP for a piece of cable I'd be going around saying that it sounds the best.
Better that than admitting I'm an absolute idiot...  |O
 
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Online bd139

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #12 on: August 23, 2021, 02:28:34 pm »
Lets see how long this takes to disappear.

 
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Offline magic

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #13 on: August 23, 2021, 03:33:08 pm »
Oh noes that's hate speech :scared:

BTW, some audiophile cables are absolutely real ;D
I remember reading about an optical cable which was supposed to remove harmful interference and whatnot by galvanic isolation. It just so happened that their optoisolators proved to have terrible frequency response too, when somebody set out to investigate the thing closely.
« Last Edit: August 23, 2021, 03:37:13 pm by magic »
 

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #14 on: August 23, 2021, 03:39:13 pm »
Looking at his speakers sarcasm: I see he puts the fireplace in place of the television and the television above the fireplace.



It's like the speakers surrounds the fireplace.

I would find the flames of that fireplace rather distracting and notice it more than the television.
 

Offline CJay

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #15 on: August 23, 2021, 04:21:27 pm »
Sneaky bugger, replies to every positive comment giving the commenter their little dopamine hit, reinforcing the sycophancy and ignores or deletes the negatives/non praise comments.
 

Online bd139

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #16 on: August 23, 2021, 04:24:36 pm »
You can fuck that up easily by replying to his positive comments. That wrecks the entire thread :)
 
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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #17 on: August 23, 2021, 05:04:19 pm »
I was looking briefly at some of his videos, not his words and he shows some stuff:

Iota VX SA3 & PA3 review
youtube.com/watch?v=UTrYCGtSWY0


Construct your own Audiophile Power Cable from £15 (no soldering)
youtube.com/watch?v=gfVYfC6tmcc


Shame he resorted to audiophoolery.

What a fucking clown. No fire insurance for him!

You do NOT use SY cable in a BS1363 plug-top, because there is neither space nor provision for safely connecting the braid to earth, which effectively leaves it as a floating conductor, which is a big no-no.

SY should only be used with IEC 60309 (commando) or similarly rated industrial type plugs and couplers.
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Online themadhippy

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #18 on: August 23, 2021, 05:14:51 pm »
Quote
You do NOT use SY cable in a BS1363 plug-top, because there is neither space nor provision for safely connecting the braid to earth, which effectively leaves it as a floating conductor, which is a big no-no.
Remember this is audiofoolary so the screen is only connected at one end to stop noise being transferred,the connection from braid to earth will be made on the other end of the cable
 

Offline madires

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #19 on: August 23, 2021, 05:27:27 pm »
Looking at his speakers sarcasm: I see he puts the fireplace in place of the television and the television above the fireplace.



It's like the speakers surrounds the fireplace.

I would find the flames of that fireplace rather distracting and notice it more than the television.

Based on the size of the speakers their frequency response should start at about 35 Hz. :-DD
 
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Online helius

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #20 on: August 23, 2021, 06:05:10 pm »
Remember this is audiofoolary so the screen is only connected at one end to stop noise being transferred,the connection from braid to earth will be made on the other end of the cable
It's certainly "foolary" to blindly repeat practices from one area (balanced circuits) to another (power), cargo-cult style, with no understanding of the reasoning behind either. Hum loops are a direct result of the lowest-impedance path to ground not being the shortest path. There is no "noise being transferred" by a power cable that can be fixed by doubling its effective ground path length!

In theory, a cable could be made to have higher resistance after a set point (skin effect).
The skin effect is one of those bits of jargon that audio-scammers throw around to mystify and confuse. It has no relevance to audio applications because it happens at microwave frequencies.

Quote
Would be nice if someone with access to a 20Hz to 20kHz LCR meter got his hands on one of these cables, just to see what the numbers say.
Do "20Hz to 20kHz LCR meters" exist? A few minutes with the LC equations will show you that the size of components resonating at those frequencies are quite rare and unusual... Of course it's not the case if you add R. LCR meters generally measure at line frequency (50/60 Hz), twice line (100/120 Hz), 1kHz and maybe 10kHz. If you want to measure impedance through the audio band you need to use a bridge with external input from a signal generator.

He compared cables and was apparently able to hear a difference in "where instruments were located", how "woolly" the bass sounded. He was also able to determine that some of the cables had more "presence" and could determine the "leading edge of the notes" better on some cables. I could go on. Apparently interconnect cables play the role of "filters" in an audio system.
Those are all differences that exist in sound reproduction, but not from cables. I guess it's comforting to believe that you can fix these problems by buying a cable, rather than doing something real like treating the room with acoustic material (which would ruin his perfect Edwardian decor).

Based on the size of the speakers their frequency response should start at about 35 Hz. :-DD
The sad thing about "debunking audiophools" is how much ignorance is on display by the debunkers. Acoustic suspension speakers do not need to be large.
« Last Edit: August 23, 2021, 06:11:28 pm by helius »
 

Offline langwadt

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #21 on: August 23, 2021, 06:20:15 pm »
Remember this is audiofoolary so the screen is only connected at one end to stop noise being transferred,the connection from braid to earth will be made on the other end of the cable
It's certainly "foolary" to blindly repeat practices from one area (balanced circuits) to another (power), cargo-cult style, with no understanding of the reasoning behind either. Hum loops are a direct result of the lowest-impedance path to ground not being the shortest path. There is no "noise being transferred" by a power cable that can be fixed by doubling its effective ground path length!

In theory, a cable could be made to have higher resistance after a set point (skin effect).
The skin effect is one of those bits of jargon that audio-scammers throw around to mystify and confuse. It has no relevance to audio applications because it happens at microwave frequencies.

skin effect happens at all frequencies, the skin depth at 20kHz is about 0.45mm, at 50Hz about 9mm
whether it has any relevance is another matter

 
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Offline madires

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #22 on: August 23, 2021, 07:29:54 pm »
Based on the size of the speakers their frequency response should start at about 35 Hz. :-DD
The sad thing about "debunking audiophools" is how much ignorance is on display by the debunkers. Acoustic suspension speakers do not need to be large.

Please check a few datasheets of similar sized acoustic suspension speakers. ;)
 

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #23 on: August 24, 2021, 12:40:08 am »
Got this reply in the alert box:

Quote
entity279 replied: "It's really not about you believing or not. Not even a little bit There's really so few cable comparisons around so obviously they can't please everyone. For people like you, interested in this ..."
3 hours ago

Looks like it was edited to this:

Quote
entity279 3 hours ago
It's really not about you believing or not. Not even a little bit
There's really so few cable comparisons around so obviously they can't please everyone.

Transcript quotes:
Quote
16:34 there's some interesting results here these cables do not sound the same and for reasons I can't explain I don't think an adequate explanation exists when it comes to science I take a slightly philosophical approach our auditory system and the neurology of our brain have developed over eons...

Quote
17:41 Don't forget to check me out on Patreon where I offer some Patreon only videos and some consultancy services

So he offers consultancy services for things he can't explain and believes that an adequate explanation doesn't exist and that's why I don't believe it.

Youtube transcript:
Code: [Select]
0:06 hello everybody welcome to a british audiophile for those of you who don't
know me already my name is Taran a little while ago i asked the company
here in the uk called designer cable to send me out some pro audio interconnects
you know the type that you find in studios all around the world
and the reason is that when i'm generally asked by people who are
getting into this hobby as to what interconnects or speaker cables they
should go for i always recommend going for a decent pro audio cable

00:32 so i've got three of those cables here as well as two of my audio file brands
and i want to answer two fundamental questions can i hear a difference
between these interconnects and if i can is it worth paying the many multiples
more for the audiophile brands i have to declare right from the beginning i don't
have a horse in this race i couldn't care less whether the cheaper pro audio
cables sound better than the audiophile cables or vice versa in fact if anything
if the cheaper ones sound better i'll probably have a little bit of a smug
smile on my face at the end of this video

01:05 so let's get started and have a look at what i have here
first up is the Vandam Xke Star quad that retails for 45 pounds for a stereo
pair on the designer cable website for just over 50 pounds you can get the
belden 8402 and for a similar price you can get the Mo gaming Negflex 2534
my Van Der Hull the first will set you back the best part of 200 pounds and if
you're feeling flush for the best part of 800 pounds you can get the Chord
Company signature i did a video on cables when i started

01:42 this channel over a year ago so i'm not going to go over that all again but I
think it is important to summarize the key characteristics of the cable so you
know what to look out for and by far the most important
characteristic is dc resistance all three of these pro audio cables have
very low dc resistance below 100 ohms for a kilometer that's a kilometer not a
meter and audiophile brands don't generally publish full specs which is shocking
really and just adds to this speculation of snake oil
but as far as my crude measurement device my multimeter could tell there
was no discernible resistance from the Cord company signature cable so it's
below obviously 0.1 of an ohm for a meter so it's likely to be in line with
these but there was quite a significant resistance on the Van Der Waal that
affect the dc resistance other than poor quality termination is the type of
conductor and the thickness of that conductor.

02:43 Now i don't know the thickness of these conductors because they're not
specified but all three of these pro audio cables have a thickness between 25 gauge
and 20 gauge remember as the number goes down the thickness actually increases
and all three of these are also pure copper construction with the exception of the
Van Damme that has a few silver plated strands in there.

03:02 silver has a slightly better conductivity than copper the van de hul the first is quite
unusual because that's actually a carbon conductor and that might be the reason why the
resistance is higher and the cord company signature has strands which are
all silver plated if you're looking at copper cables there are differences in
the grade of copper that can be used now all of the cables here with the
exception of the Van Der Hall the first which uses carbon are oxygen free copper
that's fairly ubiquitous it has an impurity level of about two to three
hundred parts per million and the next grade of copper that you
might want to look out for is [B]linear [b]crystal[/b] oxygen free copper that's a
process that was patented by hitachi in the 1970s and it involved annealing
which is reheating the copper after it's extruded it drops the impurity level
down to about 20 or 30 parts per million and the highest grade of copper is occ
ono continuous cast copper and that has one continuous [b]crystal boundary[/b]
which basically means that there's no impurities at all [b]now this is where objectivists
will be jumping up and down and claiming snake oil[/b] because there's nothing to suggest
that if you go beyond the oxygen-free copper that it makes any
difference certainly doesn't show up in the measured performance a decent
interconnect should have vanishingly low levels of capacitance and inductance if
you have too much of it it will cause high frequency roll off all three of
these pro audio cables have very low capacitance and inductance.

04:33 I can't confirm it for the Vanderholt and the Chord because they don't publish their
specs and you should think of capacitance inductance as forms of stored energy
within the cable that you don't want capacitance being stored energy within
the electrical field and inductance being stored energy with the associated
magnetic field you can't have one without the other there are three factors that affect the
actual amount of capacitance and inductance you have within a cable the
insulator that wraps around the conductor is known as the dielectric its
job is to separate out the charges and it affects the speed at which the signal
passes down the cable itself something known as the velocity of propagation
which is expressed as a percentage of the speed of light the ideal dielectric
would be a vacuum which has a dielectric constant of one and a velocity of propagation
of close to 100 air comes fairly close as well but neither of those are practical if you're
looking at cheap cables you tend to find pvc used as a dielectric that has a
dielectric constant of 5 and a velocity propagation of around 50 percent the
three pro audio cables here use the next grade that's commonly found which is
polyethylene pe and the Chord Signature uses the next grade up that's commonly found
which is ptfe also be referred to as teflon that has a dielectric constant of around 2
and a velocity of propagation of around 70 there are aerated versions of that where
they try and inject a little bit more air into the density of the ptfe and
they can get dielectric constants down to about 1.4 and a velocity of propagation of
around 80 percent.

06:12 I couldn't confirm what dielectric was used in the Van Der Waal again there's nothing to
suggest that these fancy dielectrics produce results that are audible when it comes to the
measured performance of a cable the geometry of the cable has an effect on the capacitance
and inductance of the cable as well that's how many conductors you have how they're spaced
apart and how they're arranged the Van Damme and the Mogami both have a star quad configuration
which is actually quite beneficial if you're using a balanced interconnect because of its noise
rejection properties the Van De Hul is a coaxial cable design the belden and the Chord Signature
use two conductor pairs the third thing that's worth mentioning here is whether the cables are
shielded or not shielding is generally considered beneficial when it comes to interconnects
because it can reduce the amount of rf and emi external noise that's picked up by the cable
although that can be debated to some extent in any case shielding also does add capacitance and
that shouldn't really be an issue over the cable lengths that we're talking about here all the
cables here are shielded with the exception of the Van De Hul the first this is an earlier version
of the cable that was unshielded terminations at the end of your cables are also important you
want good quality connectors with enough contact pressure there isn't then your dc resistance
goes up also if they're soldered as are these pro audio cables you want that connection to be done
properly as well otherwise that's an opportunity to induce noise all of these pro audio cables came
already terminated with switchcraft connectors which are good quality and audio grade solder but if
you want to do it yourself you can save yourself about 20 pounds and buy the individual parts from
designer cable the van to hold the first and the Chord Company Signature are solderless terminations
because they believe why introduce another metal in the signal part if you don't have to for those
objectivists out there there was a blind test performed during this evaluation.


08:14 I didn't do it myself for reasons I'll explain in a moment but i was able to get my wife to sit down for about an
hour and a half and i played one track repeatedly Flamenco Sketches by Miles Davis it's one of her favorites i just
basically got her to listen to that track for 15-20 minutes and then I switched the cables sometimes I'd pretend to
switch the cables and I didn't actually switch them I made sure that I wasn't in eye shot and I just asked her to
tell me which cable she preferred and whether she noticed a change every time without fail she noticed a change and
she picked out the cable out the two that she preferred so take from that what you like. u

08:53 Unfortunately I couldn't get her to do the same for me for two reasons she's very loving and very supportive.
I can barely get her to pick up the right remote control for the tv leave alone here to switch cables at the back
of my amplifier and the other reason was that I repeated these tests over two weeks again and again so that I could
have some kind of reliability as to what was going on and there wasn't someone here that I could rely on to do that
if you're going to evaluate cable where the differences can be quite subtle I have some advice for you in fact it's
generally good advice if you're evaluating any hi-fi gear don't try and evaluate five cables like i did at the same
time i'm not doing this again it took forever just pick out two cables and also avoid the temptation to do quick a b
switching that's where you listen to a cable for three or four minutes and then switch over to the other our short-term
auditory memory isn't reliable enough.

09:46 It's a bit like buying houses the first time you go and visit you notice general
stuff the second time you go and visit you notice much more specific stuff and that's how it works when we're listening
as well first time you'll hear that track you'll hear the general stuff and even if you change nothing the second time
you play the same track you'll hear more so listen for at least 15 20 minutes before you switch and pick demo material
that you know well that is well recorded you don't want to learn what's on the track you need to know what's on there
and pick tracks that basically demo different aspects of the music so pick something for good bass extension or good
top end extension or good male vocals or good female vocals you get the general picture repeat the test over a number
of days because there's a lot of factors that affect how we hear things including our mood how tired we are how much
background lighting there is how much background noise there is believe it or not how much electrical noise there is
coming through the mains as well can have an effect so you need to repeat over a number of days so you can get some
reliable results just before I start looking at the evaluation results let's talk about the system that i use to form
the test itself most of which I happen to own myself but not all of it my Aurelik Aries Mini Streamer that's powered by
an external [b]mciu linear power supply that was then fed into the Denafruits Pontiff Stack[/b] that recently came in
for a review and that in turn was fed into my exposure.

11:14 21 pre and 18 super monoblocks that's still the most resolving amplifier that i've come across since I started reviewing
on this channel they then fed my Prac Response 1SC speakers which are also very resolving supplemented by my Rel Strata 3
subwoofer enough chit chat time to look at the results I evaluated the cables in 14 different categories the kind of stuff
that all efrs typically tend to consider certainly the kind of stuff that i tend to consider and I scored the cables in each
category from one to five one being abysmal five being excellent so the maximum score that any cable could get was 70.

11:56 So let me share with you my results i've got them here on a notepad and I'll post something up on the screen so that you can
actually have a look at what i'm looking at down here so let's get started let's start with sound stage the Van Dam had the
narrowest sound stage it was pretty much between the speakers the Vanda Hull and the Mogami extended it a little bit more left
and right and the cord and the belden were the only two cables that gave you a bit of soundstage depth all the cables had
reasonable imaging you could make out where the instruments were located but there was a touch of vagary except for the Mogami
which was a little bit more rock solid the Vanderhall, had the williest bass, the chord and the Belden fader quite a bit better
but it's really the Magami in the Van Damme where you could follow phonetic bass rhythms bass speed sometimes comes at the
expense of base weight and that was the case here with the Megami and the Van Damme the chord and the Beldum have a bit more oomph
but it was the Vanderhull that hit the hardest in terms of base extension I couldn't tell the cables apart.

12:54 So I gave them a three across the board a lot of audiophiles look for that warm rich sound which primarily comes from the lower mid
range and that's what the Beldum and the Vanderhull have the Mogami and van dam sit on the leaner side with a cord somewhere in the
middle if you crave a little bit of excitement it's usually the upper mid range that's responsible between a thousand and five thousand
hertz all the cables did well here but it's the chord the magami in the Van Damme that had a little bit more presence that area can also
be responsible for a bright and harsh sound if gone unchecked and the mogami and Van Damme fell down a bit here they are a little bit bright
sounding the ability to pick out leading edges of notes probably differentiated the cables more than anything else the Van Der hall fell
down a little bit here the Belden less so the cord and the Van Damme did a very good job the leading edges of notes on the Mogami were
crystal clear the Van Damme had the thinner sound in the mid-range this is also referred to sometimes as the body and the release of a note
the megami fared a little bit better but not much and it was the Van Der Hall the Chord and the belgium that gave you the most tonal richness
many audiophiles love to hear the decay of instruments the Van Der Hall and the belden suffer in this area they're full sounding cables but
lack a little bit of clarity in this regard the van damme does a little bit better it's really the Megami and the Chord that give you a black
enough background for those decays to really shine through if you're looking for that airy quality on top.

14:20 You'll be happy with the Megami and the Van Damme the Chord and the Beldum in comparison are a little bit more recessed it's the Vander Gull
that rolls things off the most there's no point having that high end extension if sibilance isn't well controlled otherwise that's quality can
get quite annoying the most rolled off cables here have less to do so they fare fairly well but the Megami and the van damme do a reasonable
job if tonal accuracy matters to you it certainly matters to me because I listen to a lot of acoustic instruments vanderholt is the most warm
sounding cable and colors the sound the most on that side of the spectrum that's why it gets a two the beldum's still warm but less so and the Chord
is the most neutral sounding cable and that's why it gets a four the Megami in comparison is distinctly leaner but it's the Van Damme that colors the
sound the most on the other side of the spectrum and that's why that gets a two for those of you who are interested in the results from my subjective
listening tests the Van Damme came in last place in fourth place was the Van Der Hull with 42 points there was joint second place for the mogami and
the beldum even though they have very different sound characteristics and the chord signature came out on top with 50 points I didn't know what to
expect but there's some interesting results here these cables do not sound the same and for reasons I can't explain I don't think an adequate explanation
exists when it comes to science I take a slightly philosophical approach our auditory system and the neurology of our brain have developed over eons.

15:48 There might be all kinds of subtle windows and doors to our perception that we haven't uncovered yet that seems quite likely we know a lot about our
auditory system there's an awful lot that we don't know as well and i'm not alone industry insiders designers will regularly tell you they switch out
components and they measure the same but sound different there either is a massive conspiracy going on or they're all incompetent and then there's the
electron itself the fundamental particle that's responsible for all of this we think of it as a tiny subatomic particle with a negative charge because
that's how it's generally observed apart from when it isn't when you get into the realm of quantum mechanics it's described as a wave because it exhibits
the behavior of a wave something called wave particle duality which sits at the heart of quantum mechanics and if you think that's science voodoo well
that's the reason why you're sitting here being able to observe me now a lot of our technology is based on our understanding of quantum mechanics so if
we don't know the actual nature of electron itself I think it's a little bit arrogant to assume that we've got everything figured out my advice for those
of you getting start in this hobby remains the same.

16:57 Don't go and spend a whole load of money on audiophile cables when there's decent pro audio cables like this that exist you've got to think of cables like
a filter on your system and spending more money doesn't necessarily mean that you're going to prefer the sound you might not like the filtering effect that
that cable is having on your system for those of you who've got bright sounding systems that you want to tone down a little bit i'd go for something like
this belden 8402 and for those of you who have dull sounding systems that you want to liven up a bit well that's when you'd opt for something like this
Mogami Negflex 2534 audiophiles out there that got highly resolving systems that are chasing the last bit of performance don't worry about what the naysayers
say by all means you should be investigating the audiophile cable brands.

17:41 Well that's it from me for today all that remains for me to say is if you like this video please hit that like button please share it if you like what
i'm doing with this channel and you haven't subscribed already please consider subscribing and don't forget to check me out on Patreon where I offer some
Patreon only videos and some consultancy services but for today for now a british audio file signing off.



Found this objective comment down the list and yes there don't seem to be many:

Quote
Jim Brown 1 day ago
The standard line of BS.
Why is it that NO-ONE has come up with a way to quantify,
or even half-way measure these differences, EVER.
That's because they don't exist,
« Last Edit: August 24, 2021, 01:26:17 am by MrMobodies »
 

Offline SL4P

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #24 on: August 24, 2021, 12:54:40 am »
The thing that bothers me, is that his ‘premium’ cables must be adding artefacts to the signal, because I’ve only ever used Belden and Canare cables when wiring up high-end studios.
Don't ask a question if you aren't willing to listen to the answer.
 

Offline TERRA Operative

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #25 on: August 24, 2021, 01:14:36 am »
Quote
Would be nice if someone with access to a 20Hz to 20kHz LCR meter got his hands on one of these cables, just to see what the numbers say.
Do "20Hz to 20kHz LCR meters" exist? A few minutes with the LC equations will show you that the size of components resonating at those frequencies are quite rare and unusual... Of course it's not the case if you add R. LCR meters generally measure at line frequency (50/60 Hz), twice line (100/120 Hz), 1kHz and maybe 10kHz. If you want to measure impedance through the audio band you need to use a bridge with external input from a signal generator.

My HP 4145A does 100Hz to 10kHZ, and my HP 4275A will get you from 10kHz to 10MHz, so that is a good range to work with.
I don't currently have anything that will go below 100Hz though. I just checked my Der-ee DE-5000 handheld LCR meter and it does 100Hz to 100kHz. Might be a little difficult to go below 100Hz.
Where does all this test equipment keep coming from?!?

https://www.youtube.com/NearFarMedia/
 

Offline vk6zgo

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #26 on: August 24, 2021, 01:29:39 am »
Remember this is audiofoolary so the screen is only connected at one end to stop noise being transferred,the connection from braid to earth will be made on the other end of the cable
It's certainly "foolary" to blindly repeat practices from one area (balanced circuits) to another (power), cargo-cult style, with no understanding of the reasoning behind either. Hum loops are a direct result of the lowest-impedance path to ground not being the shortest path. There is no "noise being transferred" by a power cable that can be fixed by doubling its effective ground path length!

In theory, a cable could be made to have higher resistance after a set point (skin effect).
The skin effect is one of those bits of jargon that audio-scammers throw around to mystify and confuse. It has no relevance to audio applications because it happens at microwave frequencies.

No, skin effect comes into play well below microwave frequencies, even being present at medium frequencies, but is effectively non-existant in the audio region!
Quote

Quote
Would be nice if someone with access to a 20Hz to 20kHz LCR meter got his hands on one of these cables, just to see what the numbers say.
Do "20Hz to 20kHz LCR meters" exist? A few minutes with the LC equations will show you that the size of components resonating at those frequencies are quite rare and unusual... Of course it's not the case if you add R. LCR meters generally measure at line frequency (50/60 Hz), twice line (100/120 Hz), 1kHz and maybe 10kHz. If you want to measure impedance through the audio band you need to use a bridge with external input from a signal generator.

He compared cables and was apparently able to hear a difference in "where instruments were located", how "woolly" the bass sounded. He was also able to determine that some of the cables had more "presence" and could determine the "leading edge of the notes" better on some cables. I could go on. Apparently interconnect cables play the role of "filters" in an audio system.
Those are all differences that exist in sound reproduction, but not from cables. I guess it's comforting to believe that you can fix these problems by buying a cable, rather than doing something real like treating the room with acoustic material (which would ruin his perfect Edwardian decor).

Based on the size of the speakers their frequency response should start at about 35 Hz. :-DD
The sad thing about "debunking audiophools" is how much ignorance is on display by the debunkers. Acoustic suspension speakers do not need to be large.
 

Offline YetAnotherTechie

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #27 on: August 24, 2021, 01:39:12 am »
Secondly, surprise surprise, the most expensive cable (which he apparently paid £800 for) scored the highest in his tests and the cheapest performed "worst", but he claims that "he couldn't care less if the cheaper cables sound better"
He's the real deal! didn't you notice that he didn't let the lack of gold plating, and the home-made look of heat shrink on the most expensive cable cloud his perception of its noticeably better quality?  :clap:
 
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Offline coppice

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #28 on: August 24, 2021, 01:42:27 am »
In theory, a cable could be made to have higher resistance after a set point (skin effect).

Would be nice if someone with access to a 20Hz to 20kHz LCR meter got his hands on one of these cables, just to see what the numbers say.
When you do get real performance loss with an audio cable its usually a relatively high impedance output feeding a high capacitance cable, forming a low pass filter, and the treble rolls off heavily. Instrument cables, like electric guitar cables, are notorious for this, as you need a pretty long cable on most stages. Mic outputs are usually a much lower impedance, and long cables usually work well.
 
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Offline MazeFrame

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #29 on: August 24, 2021, 07:49:26 am »
In theory, a cable could be made to have higher resistance after a set point (skin effect).
The skin effect is one of those bits of jargon that audio-scammers throw around to mystify and confuse. It has no relevance to audio applications because it happens at microwave frequencies.
AFAIK, Skin Effect starts as soon as there is any frequency.
For power transmission, it is definitely a consideration. Hence the construction of those cables (steel core for structure, aluminium conductors on the outside). Since those operate in one could call "bass"-range, there may be something worth experimenting on a Saturday afternoon here.

Quote
Would be nice if someone with access to a 20Hz to 20kHz LCR meter got his hands on one of these cables, just to see what the numbers say.
Do "20Hz to 20kHz LCR meters" exist? A few minutes with the LC equations will show you that the size of components resonating at those frequencies are quite rare and unusual... Of course it's not the case if you add R. LCR meters generally measure at line frequency (50/60 Hz), twice line (100/120 Hz), 1kHz and maybe 10kHz. If you want to measure impedance through the audio band you need to use a bridge with external input from a signal generator.
Yes. Most of the bench top ones can do DC to kHz/MHz. GWInstek LCR-8210 for example (DC, 10Hz - 10MHz).
And since planes have 400Hz board systems, it is quite an important consideration to keep losses down.

Low frequency oscillators can be accidentally achieved by putting a capacitor in the wrong spot on an Op-Amp's feedback line, don't ask me how I know.
« Last Edit: August 24, 2021, 07:53:21 am by MazeFrame »
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Offline CJay

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #30 on: August 24, 2021, 11:23:03 am »
You can fuck that up easily by replying to his positive comments. That wrecks the entire thread :)

True, but I bet the replies would be deleted rapidly.
 

Online AVGresponding

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #31 on: August 24, 2021, 04:57:30 pm »
Quote
You do NOT use SY cable in a BS1363 plug-top, because there is neither space nor provision for safely connecting the braid to earth, which effectively leaves it as a floating conductor, which is a big no-no.
Remember this is audiofoolary so the screen is only connected at one end to stop noise being transferred,the connection from braid to earth will be made on the other end of the cable

An unused conductor should only be ever terminated at one end, otherwise it becomes a functional conductor. The termination should be at the supply end, not the load end.
nuqDaq yuch Dapol?
Addiction count: Agilent-AVO-BlackStar-Brymen-Chauvin Arnoux-Fluke-GenRad-Hameg-HP-Keithley-IsoTech-Mastech-Megger-Metrix-Micronta-Racal-RFL-Siglent-Solartron-Tektronix-Thurlby-Time Electronics-TTi-UniT
 

Online themadhippy

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #32 on: August 24, 2021, 05:55:32 pm »
Quote
The termination should be at the supply end, not the load end.
yea we know that but these are audiofools,who  make up their own were rules  ,like advising reversing the polarity of the supply to improve the sound,but ignoring the regulations  about single pole switching and protective devices,or claiming to have measured directionality in cables,strange how kimber never did reply to my request for further details.
 

Online bd139

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #33 on: August 24, 2021, 07:28:43 pm »
Surprised my comment hasn't been deleted yet  ???

 

Offline wraper

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #34 on: August 24, 2021, 07:48:57 pm »
Surprised my comment hasn't been deleted yet  ???
You might be the only one who sees it. Check from incognito mode or logout from your account.
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #35 on: August 24, 2021, 08:09:09 pm »
I had to add my point to the thread as well.  :-DD

Quote
Studios don't use RCA cables. I should know. I design cable and signal transmission systems for contemporary TV studios. We use XLR cables, Belden, Mogami, Klotz, Sommer, Canford, whatever we can find in the box, (but always Neutrik connectors, because they don't break).  Then we run it to the stage box, where it's A/D converted, and run as multicast IP traffic over the cheapest available unshielded CAT6 into a wall box where there's a £3 RJ45 IDC jack, and then 70 metres of CAT6, another IDC jack, and then into an Ethernet switch. The switch of course costs £5000, because it's a PTP boundary switch.

The cable wankery is just that, wankery. It does not matter a bleeping worm turd what you use, as long as it is balanced, reasonable impedance and rugged.

If you could be arsed to do a proper double blind test, you would be very hard pressed to find any differences, and if you do, it's usually because the audiophile gear tends to be built using unstable unfiltered designs that brown out when you load it just a little bit wrongly.  Proper gear, built right to pro transmission standards, is very insensitive to cable loading. 100 meters 120Ω pair cable is inaudible if you do it right.

Online bd139

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #36 on: August 24, 2021, 08:47:08 pm »
Spot on.

There's another thread going on actually which is quite funny which I pointed out a similar conclusion on: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/projects/recommend-me-the-thinnest-coaxial-cable-but-i-need-the-thickest-shield/msg3631855/ ... worth a read to look at the solutions
 

Offline langwadt

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #37 on: August 24, 2021, 10:17:33 pm »
In theory, a cable could be made to have higher resistance after a set point (skin effect).

Would be nice if someone with access to a 20Hz to 20kHz LCR meter got his hands on one of these cables, just to see what the numbers say.
When you do get real performance loss with an audio cable its usually a relatively high impedance output feeding a high capacitance cable, forming a low pass filter, and the treble rolls off heavily. Instrument cables, like electric guitar cables, are notorious for this, as you need a pretty long cable on most stages. Mic outputs are usually a much lower impedance, and long cables usually work well.

that's why you use instrument cable for guitars and not microphone cable ;)
 

Offline langwadt

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #38 on: August 24, 2021, 10:20:50 pm »
In theory, a cable could be made to have higher resistance after a set point (skin effect).
The skin effect is one of those bits of jargon that audio-scammers throw around to mystify and confuse. It has no relevance to audio applications because it happens at microwave frequencies.
AFAIK, Skin Effect starts as soon as there is any frequency.
For power transmission, it is definitely a consideration. Hence the construction of those cables (steel core for structure, aluminium conductors on the outside). Since those operate in one could call "bass"-range, there may be something worth experimenting on a Saturday afternoon here.

what audio signal cares if the resistance of a cable isn't get any less than that of a few mm^2 of copper?

 

Offline tszaboo

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #39 on: August 24, 2021, 10:32:49 pm »
OK, so here is some technical details and myth busting.
Speaker cables: A typical speaker is 8 Ohm, complex, slightly inductive load. If you connect it with 5m of 18 AWG  copper wire, that is about 320mOhm extra resistance. Your Amp has some extra output resistance (typically as low as possible). But the ratio of the speaker cable and speaker resistance is called "damping factor", and because you connect a reactive load with a mostly resistive conductor, it does change with frequency. Additionally, passive crossovers make everything more complicated.

RCA / Interconnect cable: Depending on the source, the source impedance can be as high as 10KOhm (record player). If we place a moderate 5uH 100pF( which is not impossible for these cables ) on this output, it filters at the 10kHz already. 10Khz is audible, but (and this might be more important) it could sound different for a dual tone test note.

I personally see the difference between a cheap and a good XLR cable. It provides different noise floor for my microphone, SPL meter in software shows it clearly. I also saw burn in effect in an amp, with my own eyes, because I had a DSO2024 connected to it, after building a circuit and powering it the first time.

This guy is obviously a snake oil salesmen, but there is some non-trivial effects of cables (or coat hangers).
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #40 on: August 24, 2021, 10:42:31 pm »
In theory, a cable could be made to have higher resistance after a set point (skin effect).

Would be nice if someone with access to a 20Hz to 20kHz LCR meter got his hands on one of these cables, just to see what the numbers say.
When you do get real performance loss with an audio cable its usually a relatively high impedance output feeding a high capacitance cable, forming a low pass filter, and the treble rolls off heavily. Instrument cables, like electric guitar cables, are notorious for this, as you need a pretty long cable on most stages. Mic outputs are usually a much lower impedance, and long cables usually work well.

that's why you use instrument cable for guitars and not microphone cable ;)

Yes, there likely is a bit more capacitance in a twisted pair, but that tends to be offset by the impedances (source and input) in such circuits by convention being much lower and the capacitance required to make a dent in the response being so much higher.

A typical guitar pickup, OTOH, is pretty high output impedance, perhaps 15K, and ideally needs loading with 1MΩ of input impedance to not lose out. A balanced microphone typically is 100-200Ω output impedance, and will perform well into 3KΩ, which is typical microphone input impedance. Rule of thumb for audio is that  Zin/3 > Zout  will mostly do fine, impedance-wise, but more is better.

Offline langwadt

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #41 on: August 25, 2021, 12:15:02 am »
OK, so here is some technical details and myth busting.
Speaker cables: A typical speaker is 8 Ohm, complex, slightly inductive load. If you connect it with 5m of 18 AWG  copper wire, that is about 320mOhm extra resistance. Your Amp has some extra output resistance (typically as low as possible). But the ratio of the speaker cable and speaker resistance is called "damping factor", and because you connect a reactive load with a mostly resistive conductor, it does change with frequency. Additionally, passive crossovers make everything more complicated.

and that cable+output resistance is effectively in series with the DC resistance of the voicecoil so..
the skin effect just means that as frequency increase bigger cable doesn't decrease the resistance, does it matter if you 10mm^2 cable only looks like at 1mm² cable at 20kHz ?

RCA / Interconnect cable: Depending on the source, the source impedance can be as high as 10KOhm (record player). If we place a moderate 5uH 100pF( which is not impossible for these cables ) on this output, it filters at the 10kHz already. 10Khz is audible, but (and this might be more important) it could sound different for a dual tone test note.

things that are easily measured

I personally see the difference between a cheap and a good XLR cable. It provides different noise floor for my microphone, SPL meter in software shows it clearly. I also saw burn in effect in an amp, with my own eyes, because I had a DSO2024 connected to it, after building a circuit and powering it the first time.

This guy is obviously a snake oil salesmen, but there is some non-trivial effects of cables (or coat hangers).

the difference between cheap and good xlr cable noise floor is likely how the shielding is constructed
 

Online Haenk

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #42 on: August 25, 2021, 08:46:21 am »
I wonder why no one ever solders their cables directly to the amp PCB and speaker/player PCBs - those plugs just add contact resistance which even your 100 EUR plug has. Not only is it way cheaper but technically superior (not that anybody would ever notice, but still...)

 

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #43 on: August 25, 2021, 11:42:48 am »
Surprised my comment hasn't been deleted yet  ???
You might be the only one who sees it. Check from incognito mode or logout from your account.

I see your comment.

It seems he does reply to pretty much replies to very comment but the subjective ones and he claims to be doing a "subjective listening" test but didn't see any removed yet.

I got one reply that it wasn't about me believing it "not even a little" and another talking about a the "wife test" to my comment about their difficulty selecting the right remote control:

Quote
Prairie Dawg 15 hours ago
 @Mr Mobodies  The "Wife test" somehow reminds me of a program I saw about a dog which could do maths, tapping its paw to give the answer to a verbal question.  In short, it could answer whatever the owner could - when she got it wrong the dog did. It was picking up some subtle visual clue when the nth tap matched the answer, when the owner was shielded from sight the dog's answers pretty random. So - TL;DR wife picking up some (maybe subcounscious) cogniive bias

So according to that the wife maybe picking up what he expects her to do.

I like how he says his wife couldn't find the correct remote control without his help and she sits down for an hour and a half to listen to the same track:
Quote
08:16 i was able to get my wife to sit down for about an hour and a half. I can barely get her to pick up the right remote control for the tv leave alone here to switch cables at the back of my amplifier...  and i played one track repeatedly Flamenco Sketches by Miles Davis

and seems to me to be making out like the cables are beyond science itself:

Quote
15:34 these cables do not sound the same and for reasons I can't explain I don't think an adequate explanation exists when it comes to science  :bullshit: I take a slightly philosophical approach our auditory system and the neurology of our brain have developed over eons.

Quite a bit of this don't make much sense to me as I can't see it with my own eyes or feel it:
Quote
14:20 You'll be happy with the Megami and the Van Damme the Chord and the Beldum in comparison are a little bit more recessed  :bullshit: it's the Vander Gull
that rolls things off the most there's no point having that high end extension if sibilance isn't well controlled otherwise that's quality can
get quite annoying the most rolled off cables here have less to do so they fare fairly well but the Megami and the van damme do a reasonable
job if tonal accuracy matters to you it certainly matters to me because I listen to a lot of acoustic instruments *vanderholt is the most warm
sounding cable and colors
the sound the most on that side of the spectrum that's why it gets a two the beldum's still warm but less so and the Chord
is the most neutral sounding cable and that's why it gets a four the Megami in comparison is distinctly leaner but it's the Van Damme that colors the
sound
:bullshit: the most on the other side of the spectrum and that's why that gets a two for those of you who are interested in the results from my subjective
listening
tests the Van Damme came in last place in fourth place was the Van Der Hull with 42 points there was joint second place for the mogami and
the beldum even though they have very different sound characteristics and the chord signature came out on top with 50 points I didn't know what to
expect but there's some interesting results here

...

15:44 I take a slightly philosophical approach our auditory system and the neurology of our brain have developed over eons.

...

15:48 There might be all kinds of subtle windows and doors to our perception that we haven't uncovered yet that seems quite likely we know a lot about our
auditory system there's an awful lot that we don't know as well and i'm not alone industry insiders designers will regularly tell you they switch out
components and they measure the same but sound different there either is a massive conspiracy going on or they're all incompetent and then there's the
electron itself the fundamental particle that's responsible for all of this we think of it as a tiny subatomic particle with a negative charge because
that's how it's generally observed apart from when it isn't when you get into the realm of quantum mechanics it's described as a wave because it exhibits
the behavior of a wave something called wave particle duality which sits at the heart of quantum mechanics and if you think that's science voodoo well
that's the reason why you're sitting here being able to observe me now a lot of our technology is based on our understanding of quantum mechanics so if
we don't know the actual nature of electron itself I think it's a **little bit arrogant to assume that we've got everything figured out my advice for those
of you getting start in this hobby remains the same.


Buzzwords: Tonal accuracy, subjective listening tests?, siblance, warm, rich, sound colour, philosophical, brain waves, ions, neurology, quantum mechanics, wave particle duality, fundamental particle, subatomic partical, negative charge, science voodoo ... over an audio cable.

* Is he saying that the colour of the cable is going to have an effect on how it sounds or is he visualizing colours from the sound he perceiving from the said cable?

** I don't see any demonstration other than him talking.
« Last Edit: August 25, 2021, 11:47:29 am by MrMobodies »
 

Offline xrunner

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #44 on: August 25, 2021, 11:50:31 am »
Buzzwords: Tonal accuracy, subjective listening tests?, siblance, warm, rich, sound colour, philosophical, brain waves, ions, neurology, quantum mechanics, wave particle duality, fundamental particle, subatomic partical, negative charge, science voodoo ... over an audio cable.

* Is he saying that the colour of the cable is going to have an effect on how it sounds or is he visualizing colours from the sound he perceiving from the said cable?

** I don't see any demonstration other than him talking.

I want to ask him, well if all these things are true about cables, what do they do in mission critical uses such as space communications, military, or aircraft? All that is vastly more critical than a person sitting on their ass listening to a vinyl record. Does NASA hire audiophiles to check out their headsets and cables?

 :-//
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Online bd139

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #45 on: August 25, 2021, 12:36:42 pm »
So basically he's bonkers and talking rubbish?
 
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Offline borjam

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #46 on: August 25, 2021, 02:01:26 pm »
I had to add my point to the thread as well.  :-DD

Then we run it to the stage box, where it's A/D converted, and run as multicast IP traffic over the cheapest available unshielded CAT6 into a wall box where there's a £3 RJ45 IDC jack, and then 70 metres of CAT6, another IDC jack, and then into an Ethernet switch. The switch of course costs £5000, because it's a PTP boundary switch
Tsk tsk!!!!!

You are hurting unsuspecting musicians beyond belief! You should use this.

https://www.futureshop.co.uk/audioquest-diamond-rj-e-ethernet-cable

And by the way this store is so awesome. They even offer a 96 hour burnin service, no less! Of course they warn you that audio cables are directional which is entirely logical, or would you live happily upside down, sucker?

The comments section is awesome. And this particular cable seems to be especially hard to tame.


« Last Edit: August 25, 2021, 02:04:06 pm by borjam »
 
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Online MrMobodies

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #47 on: August 25, 2021, 02:30:21 pm »
https://www.futureshop.co.uk/audioquest-diamond-rj-e-ethernet-cable

And by the way this store is so awesome. They even offer a 96 hour burnin service, no less! Of course they warn you that audio cables are directional which is entirely logical, or would you live happily upside down, sucker?

It seems that adjusting the burn in time doesn't affect the cost.

Quote
Solid 100% Perfect-Surface Silver Conductors (PSS)
    Solid High-Density Polyethylene Insulation
    Dielectric-Bias System (DBS, US Pat #s 7,126,055 & 7,872,195 B1)
    Silver-Plated Terminations
    High-Speed Data Capacity
    Directionality
Specification :

    Metal: Solid 100% PSS Silver
    Dielectric: Solid High-Density Polyethylene
    Termination: Precision-made low-mass ultra-wide bandwidth connectors with 100% shield coverage and strain relief
    Jacket Colour: Black/Silver Braid

Solid 100% Perfect-Surface Silver Conductors (PSS):

Perfect-Surface Technology applied to extreme-purity silver provides unprecedented clarity and dynamic contrast. Solid conductors prevent strand interaction, a major source of cable distortion. Extremely high-purity Perfect-Surface Silver minimizes distortion caused by the grain boundaries which exist within any metal conductor, nearly eliminating harshness and greatly increasing clarity compared to OFHC, OCC, 8N and other coppers.

Buzzword bullshit: Extreme-purity, unprecedented clarity, dynamic contrast, strand interaction, cable distortion, high-purity, Perfect-Surface, grain boundaries, harshness, increasing clarity, directionality.

Does that mean that the conductor is silver plated or pure silver?


 
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Offline cdev

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #48 on: August 25, 2021, 02:45:08 pm »
Now that so many people have VNAs its possible to test audiophoolery cables much better.

Why not?
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Offline borjam

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #49 on: August 25, 2021, 02:46:36 pm »
Now that so many people have VNAs its possible to test audiophoolery cables much better.

Why not?
VNAs are useless for that. You need MNAs instead, but they haven't been invented yet.
 

Offline Sighound36

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #50 on: August 25, 2021, 03:47:22 pm »
I would suggest near 42Hz in real terms no withstanding having a fireplace between them  >:D
« Last Edit: August 25, 2021, 03:49:08 pm by Sighound36 »
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Offline Sighound36

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #51 on: August 25, 2021, 03:48:49 pm »
"Now that so many people have VNAs its possible to test audiophoolery cables much better Why not?"

Something mention every time I hear this crap  :-DD
« Last Edit: August 25, 2021, 03:51:44 pm by Sighound36 »
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Offline madires

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #52 on: August 25, 2021, 06:49:12 pm »
I would suggest near 42Hz in real terms no withstanding having a fireplace between them  >:D

From the viewing angle It's hard to guess the speaker's depth. If the depth is less than the width it could be 42 Hz. When it's a few cm more than the width then 38 Hz are possible. Quite disappointing for an audiophile setup. ;D
 

Offline Sighound36

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #53 on: August 25, 2021, 07:21:29 pm »
I would suggest near 42Hz in real terms no withstanding having a fireplace between them  >:D

From the viewing angle It's hard to guess the speaker's depth. If the depth is less than the width it could be 42 Hz. When it's a few cm more than the width then 38 Hz are possible. Quite disappointing for an audiophile setup. ;D

Absolutely, although I was thinking about the claimed freqency response as 'opposed' to the REAL in room response  ;D
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Online MrMobodies

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #54 on: August 25, 2021, 07:54:48 pm »
Just noticed this review:
https://www.futureshop.co.uk/audioquest-diamond-rj-e-ethernet-cable
Quote
Needs very long burn-in before sounding good
27 JAN 2021 martin carter Verified Purchaser

I ended-up liking this cable. But, the most helpful thing I could say about it is this: It needs an inordinately long burn-in period. In fact when first connected I was shocked by the terrible sound quality - way over bright and harsh, just horrible. You need the patience of a saint with this one. In desperation, I ended up leaving it playing internet radio 24/7 - while not listening I must add!!! I was within a gnats whisker of sending it back under the 60 day trail period.

Future Shop recommends 100 hours burn-in. In my experience, that’s optimistic. * It was a couple of months at least before it had settled down. After that it does start to sound good, very good in fact. But I do think AQ should be up-front with customers and explain the long burn-in requirement.
*That he settled down or got use to it.

If he was using that as a network cable that sounds to me beyond stupid and Dave Jones did video on something similar about the product not being setup designed right if it is being influenced like that but I doubt it in this case.

EEVblog #719 - Sony Low Noise Audiophile SDXC Memory Card
youtube.com/watch?v=AO-vbzLPwSc
Yoiutube transcript:
Quote
03:45 the hell has I got to do with anything when you've got a complete digital
system ones and zeros between your memory card and your DAC. If your product
is going to be influenced by a slightly less EMC somehow radiated by your memory
card then you haven't designed up your product correctly
. It's just complete and
utter bullshit but they need some sort of crap in here to convince the audio
fools that it's going to sound better.
« Last Edit: August 25, 2021, 10:01:35 pm by MrMobodies »
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #55 on: August 25, 2021, 09:13:32 pm »
If he was using that as a network cable that sounds to me beyond stupid .

It is. People who believe in this have not understood data transmission. They might claim to understand, but they're so busy wanting to believe that their new expensive toy is good that they can't distinguish between fantasy and reality.



Just to reiterate;

  • All streaming in a consumer playback environment is via TCP/IP
  • The IP traffic is, today, exclusively TCP, more specifically HTTP. Because nothing else will function given the proliferation of middle boxes, NAT gateways, and other packet-destroying paraphernalia that make up the end-user "internet" today.
  • Sometimes it might be SMB. Still TCP.
  • In both cases, it is essentially a checksummed (multiple layers) file transfer. It is not a bitstream as would be found via AES3 or S/P DIF. (those both actually transfer samples, in AES3 32-bit ones, that are alternatingly left or right, and have extra data in the top 8 bits, given a 24-bit audio level value.)
  • It being a file, it is always transfered with liberal buffering, implying that there is ample time for getting the samples out of the file and into the playback application.
  • (How can we be certain there's buffering? Because doing it without buffers is impossible, and small buffers are much harder. I know, because in my application you can't buffer much at all when it's really live, and people who made the signal will hear it (stage monitors) after it's been shipped over your network! We even have to use RTP over UDP, and we do a bunch of magic with clocking things, using PTP et al.)
  • In the case of ID3 tags, they are at the end of the file which means that if your player can show the title it has the entire file or can do random reads.
  • So, the player, before playing, gets most of the file, in chunks (HLS) or disk blocks (SMB) or as a more traditional FTP-style transfer.
  • The file has a header, in which there's a sample rate indicated.
  • The local oscillator governing the D/A converter is responsible for putting samples out in the right rate, as read from the header. Not the network, not the NAS, not the web server handing the HLS stream out. They're just shipping bits, with buffering.

That's all there is to it. The network is not responsible for the clocking of the playout, and any player who is influenced by network cables in any way is probably illegal to sell, because it does not meet EMI/RFI immunity standards.

Edit: The above assumes flat uncompressed WAV or AIFF. If you have compression (MP3 / FLAC / OGG or Tidal (*barf*)) , you have a lot of maths being done in non-realtime priority in the player computer before there are samples that can be output paced via the local clock. More abstraction, more buffering, less chance of interference by the network.
« Last Edit: August 25, 2021, 09:17:43 pm by mansaxel »
 
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Online bd139

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #56 on: August 25, 2021, 09:33:09 pm »
Oh yes. My first encounter of this was 26 years ago. I spent a good chunk of 1995 trying to persuade a law student that his £70 SPDIF cable wasn't going to make his MD recorder any better than the £2 one. There are a whole bunch of things he just didn't know or understand including ATRAC :palm:. We got there in the end.

He was an Amiga user as well  :-DD
 

Offline MazeFrame

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #57 on: August 26, 2021, 10:03:36 am »
Just to reiterate;

  • All streaming in a consumer playback environment is via TCP/IP
  • The IP traffic is, today, exclusively TCP, more specifically HTTP. Because nothing else will function given the proliferation of middle boxes, NAT gateways, and other packet-destroying paraphernalia that make up the end-user "internet" today.
  • Sometimes it might be SMB. Still TCP.
  • In both cases, it is essentially a checksummed (multiple layers) file transfer. It is not a bitstream as would be found via AES3 or S/P DIF. (those both actually transfer samples, in AES3 32-bit ones, that are alternatingly left or right, and have extra data in the top 8 bits, given a 24-bit audio level value.)
  • It being a file, it is always transfered with liberal buffering, implying that there is ample time for getting the samples out of the file and into the playback application.
  • (How can we be certain there's buffering? Because doing it without buffers is impossible, and small buffers are much harder. I know, because in my application you can't buffer much at all when it's really live, and people who made the signal will hear it (stage monitors) after it's been shipped over your network! We even have to use RTP over UDP, and we do a bunch of magic with clocking things, using PTP et al.)
  • In the case of ID3 tags, they are at the end of the file which means that if your player can show the title it has the entire file or can do random reads.
  • So, the player, before playing, gets most of the file, in chunks (HLS) or disk blocks (SMB) or as a more traditional FTP-style transfer.
  • The file has a header, in which there's a sample rate indicated.
  • The local oscillator governing the D/A converter is responsible for putting samples out in the right rate, as read from the header. Not the network, not the NAS, not the web server handing the HLS stream out. They're just shipping bits, with buffering.

UDP and TCP are the common transport protocols (when going by OSI)
TCP is used where time is kind off irrelevant but integrity is important (File transfers, etc.)
UDP is used when time is more important than integrity (Streaming, online games, etc.)

HTTP (and SMB or FTP, or any protocol aware of the concept of "file") is Application layer. Way different beast and has nothing to do with shuffling 1's and 0's about.

All the compensation for jumbled packets happens in the displaying software on the receiving end, NOT in the transport! Else you would have to update your router (not modem, not switch) for every new file format.

SPDIF (no matter if home or pro format) is VERY time sensitive. As such, minimal (if any) buffering. A "broken" packet or a flipped bit does not matter much (even if every 10th packet goes missing completely), after the DAC and its output filter are done with the bit-stream, it will be difficult to measure and impossible to hear.
Additionally, even when the receiver had time to detect an error, there is no way to tell the sender to re-transmit.

There is also never a full file transfer (there is not even the concept of file). Just some info, left/right select and then the actual audio payload. Else you would have to wait considerable time each time you change the song (say 8MB mp3 @ 15Mbit/s ~ 4 Seconds).
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Offline Sighound36

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #58 on: August 26, 2021, 03:29:14 pm »
Very sorry gents, I must aplogise in advance he is loosely British  :-DD



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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #59 on: August 26, 2021, 06:16:27 pm »
He should buy some carpet. That is more likely to improve the sound  :-DD
 
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Offline xrunner

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #60 on: August 26, 2021, 06:38:25 pm »
I was waiting on him to say the best listening is done with only socks on which improves the sub-phonic ergonomic sound scenario and boomy brilliance.

 :-DD
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Offline tszaboo

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #61 on: August 26, 2021, 09:10:09 pm »
OK, so here is some technical details and myth busting.
Speaker cables: A typical speaker is 8 Ohm, complex, slightly inductive load. If you connect it with 5m of 18 AWG  copper wire, that is about 320mOhm extra resistance. Your Amp has some extra output resistance (typically as low as possible). But the ratio of the speaker cable and speaker resistance is called "damping factor", and because you connect a reactive load with a mostly resistive conductor, it does change with frequency. Additionally, passive crossovers make everything more complicated.

and that cable+output resistance is effectively in series with the DC resistance of the voicecoil so..
the skin effect just means that as frequency increase bigger cable doesn't decrease the resistance, does it matter if you 10mm^2 cable only looks like at 1mm² cable at 20kHz ?

RCA / Interconnect cable: Depending on the source, the source impedance can be as high as 10KOhm (record player). If we place a moderate 5uH 100pF( which is not impossible for these cables ) on this output, it filters at the 10kHz already. 10Khz is audible, but (and this might be more important) it could sound different for a dual tone test note.

things that are easily measured

I personally see the difference between a cheap and a good XLR cable. It provides different noise floor for my microphone, SPL meter in software shows it clearly. I also saw burn in effect in an amp, with my own eyes, because I had a DSO2024 connected to it, after building a circuit and powering it the first time.

This guy is obviously a snake oil salesmen, but there is some non-trivial effects of cables (or coat hangers).

the difference between cheap and good xlr cable noise floor is likely how the shielding is constructed
The speaker cable is in series with the inductane as well. And 20Khz skin effect is negligible, since you have multiple conductors in a cable, called stranded cable.

Differences can be measured, never claimed otherwise. But you might be surprised, because human hearing has extremely large dynamic range. That's why ie. an oscilloscope is often a bad choice to measure audio circuits, not enough bits. A lot of other general purpose engineering tools are just not suited for it. A DSA would be good for it for example, or a Keithley 2015.
 

Offline langwadt

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #62 on: August 26, 2021, 09:40:39 pm »
OK, so here is some technical details and myth busting.
Speaker cables: A typical speaker is 8 Ohm, complex, slightly inductive load. If you connect it with 5m of 18 AWG  copper wire, that is about 320mOhm extra resistance. Your Amp has some extra output resistance (typically as low as possible). But the ratio of the speaker cable and speaker resistance is called "damping factor", and because you connect a reactive load with a mostly resistive conductor, it does change with frequency. Additionally, passive crossovers make everything more complicated.

and that cable+output resistance is effectively in series with the DC resistance of the voicecoil so..
the skin effect just means that as frequency increase bigger cable doesn't decrease the resistance, does it matter if you 10mm^2 cable only looks like at 1mm² cable at 20kHz ?

RCA / Interconnect cable: Depending on the source, the source impedance can be as high as 10KOhm (record player). If we place a moderate 5uH 100pF( which is not impossible for these cables ) on this output, it filters at the 10kHz already. 10Khz is audible, but (and this might be more important) it could sound different for a dual tone test note.

things that are easily measured

I personally see the difference between a cheap and a good XLR cable. It provides different noise floor for my microphone, SPL meter in software shows it clearly. I also saw burn in effect in an amp, with my own eyes, because I had a DSO2024 connected to it, after building a circuit and powering it the first time.

This guy is obviously a snake oil salesmen, but there is some non-trivial effects of cables (or coat hangers).

the difference between cheap and good xlr cable noise floor is likely how the shielding is constructed
The speaker cable is in series with the inductane as well. And 20Khz skin effect is negligible, since you have multiple conductors in a cable, called stranded cable.

stranded wire doesn't help with skin effect because all the strands are shorted together. In litz wire each strand is individually isolated and carefully arranged

 

Offline tszaboo

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #63 on: August 26, 2021, 10:03:38 pm »
stranded wire doesn't help with skin effect because all the strands are shorted together. In litz wire each strand is individually isolated and carefully arranged
Oh really? You seem book smarts, but I'm just going to leave this here, maybe you learn something:
https://www.belden.com/blogs/broadcast/understanding-skin-effect-and-frequency/
I let you guess, if an 18 AWG wire uses 95% or 90% or 85% of it's cross section.
Or this entire discussion matters for the point I was making.
*It doesn't, you are just heckling.
 

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #64 on: August 26, 2021, 10:19:40 pm »
Quote
All streaming in a consumer playback environment is via TCP/IP

I think streaming from a HDHomerun is UDP/IP. I had a periodic corruption problem with my MythTV system which I assumed was the antenna because it's a pretty dodgy area for TV around here (the symptom is the picture breaking up a bit briefly). Evenutally I figured it had to be the HDHomerun so got a new one, and blow me if that didn't do exactly the same. What else could it be? There's only 1m of UTP to a gigabit switch then 1m of UTP to the DVR, and viewing pre-recorded video over that same link was fine. Changed the cables anyway, just to be sure, but still no fix.

Turned out that the switch was suffering capacitor swelling, which caused the occasional packet to be corrupted. Normal video (for viewing) was unaffected since the packet would just get resent, but the HDHomerun uses UDP and doesn't have a resend ability, so the stream didn't get corrected.

OK, not audio and a surprise to me, but it happens :)
 

Offline PlainName

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #65 on: August 26, 2021, 10:41:37 pm »
Quote
Very sorry gents, I must aplogise in advance he is loosely British

I thought I was prepared for the bullshit he was no doubt going to spout, but I actually found I couldn't watch much of that at all - it was so bad! However, I did watch enough to find out why cable risers are used, something that hadn't been explained before (to me - obviously any audiophile will know the words if not the meaning). So I learned something, even if it was bollox :)
 

Offline langwadt

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #66 on: August 26, 2021, 10:50:45 pm »
stranded wire doesn't help with skin effect because all the strands are shorted together. In litz wire each strand is individually isolated and carefully arranged
Oh really? You seem book smarts, but I'm just going to leave this here, maybe you learn something:
https://www.belden.com/blogs/broadcast/understanding-skin-effect-and-frequency/
I let you guess, if an 18 AWG wire uses 95% or 90% or 85% of it's cross section.
Or this entire discussion matters for the point I was making.
*It doesn't, you are just heckling.

where does that link say anything about stranded wire?  as far as skin effect is concerned stranded and solid wire is the same


 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #67 on: August 27, 2021, 07:25:40 am »
Quote
All streaming in a consumer playback environment is via TCP/IP

I think streaming from a HDHomerun is UDP/IP. I had a periodic corruption problem with my MythTV system which I assumed was the antenna because it's a pretty dodgy area for TV around here (the symptom is the picture breaking up a bit briefly). Evenutally I figured it had to be the HDHomerun so got a new one, and blow me if that didn't do exactly the same. What else could it be? There's only 1m of UTP to a gigabit switch then 1m of UTP to the DVR, and viewing pre-recorded video over that same link was fine. Changed the cables anyway, just to be sure, but still no fix.

Turned out that the switch was suffering capacitor swelling, which caused the occasional packet to be corrupted. Normal video (for viewing) was unaffected since the packet would just get resent, but the HDHomerun uses UDP and doesn't have a resend ability, so the stream didn't get corrected.

OK, not audio and a surprise to me, but it happens :)

Once you go to uni- or multicast video via RTP/UDP, all bets are off. TBH, that was not the set of assumptions we started out with ;-)

What one needs to do, in that case, is to establish what kinds of traffic are present, and if they are in conflict with each other to a level that will impair performance. Then, one needs to determine what tools are available, and likely put a lot of money into an Ethernet switch (assuming this is on the LAN at home or so) that will allow some traffic management.

Having a working PSU not subject to TEA Rule 9 is a good start, but you very soon run into things like classifying access lists, DSCP trust, queue depth and allocation on departing interfaces, CoS mapping, et c.

Nice rabbit hole, that.

Also, the single most damning thing that will bite you in traffic management is flows that originate in a high-bandwidth device and are supposed to go out towards a lower bandwidth link. Say you have the HDhomerun on Gig, and there's a receiver on the other end of a 100Mbit Ethernet line in the upstairs bedroom. Where the speed change when the line rate is $1/10$ will have an enormous impact. If there is not buffer space enough to convert bursts of 1000Mbit to a stream of 100Mbit, there's going to be drops, and that even if you're not using more than perhaps 20% of the rated bandwidth.

Offline tszaboo

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #68 on: August 27, 2021, 07:27:07 am »
stranded wire doesn't help with skin effect because all the strands are shorted together. In litz wire each strand is individually isolated and carefully arranged
Oh really? You seem book smarts, but I'm just going to leave this here, maybe you learn something:
https://www.belden.com/blogs/broadcast/understanding-skin-effect-and-frequency/
I let you guess, if an 18 AWG wire uses 95% or 90% or 85% of it's cross section.
Or this entire discussion matters for the point I was making.
*It doesn't, you are just heckling.

where does that link say anything about stranded wire?  as far as skin effect is concerned stranded and solid wire is the same
 

Offline MazeFrame

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #69 on: August 27, 2021, 07:40:49 am »

What one needs to do, in that case, is to establish what kinds of traffic are present, and if they are in conflict with each other to a level that will impair performance. Then, one needs to determine what tools are available, and likely put a lot of money into an Ethernet switch (assuming this is on the LAN at home or so) that will allow some traffic management.

What? Not everyone is running a 40Gig network at home?  :scared:
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Online Haenk

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #70 on: August 27, 2021, 08:48:51 am »
Very sorry gents, I must aplogise in advance he is loosely British  :-DD

I just want to quote him:

"These tips will make your system sound twice as good."

Is that extravagant British understatement? I mean, why not three times as good?
 

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #71 on: August 27, 2021, 02:18:38 pm »
Apparenty one Youtuber that responded to me, I think it was the first one saying that it is not what it was about:

Quote
entity279 3 days ago
It's really not about you believing or not. Not even a little bit

There's really so few cable comparisons around so obviously they can't please everyone.

Quote
entity279 36 minutes ago
@Mr Mobodies  It's about the reviewer describing his comparative experience with these products. Experience just simply can't be wrong (or right).

Comparison could for sure (always ) be improved. But there are  probably 1 or 2 other cable comparisons this year on yt. It takes courage to put such content out, while so many avoid it.

It is about Tarun Sharma's "The British Audiophile" experiences of testing a bit like a story.

Only some cables, some datasheets and opinionated testing.

If I knew on that basis I wouldn't have watched it and bring up the opinions in question from when I thought from the title "Audiophile Vs Pro cables evaluated - Surprising results!" to assume to mean and expect cable tear downs and physical testing to show the differences.

I would be annoyed though if I clicked on a title like that which I often do to find it being opinionated.
« Last Edit: August 27, 2021, 02:48:39 pm by MrMobodies »
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #72 on: August 27, 2021, 03:53:07 pm »

What one needs to do, in that case, is to establish what kinds of traffic are present, and if they are in conflict with each other to a level that will impair performance. Then, one needs to determine what tools are available, and likely put a lot of money into an Ethernet switch (assuming this is on the LAN at home or so) that will allow some traffic management.

What? Not everyone is running a 40Gig network at home?  :scared:

I limit myself to 10G. But my vmware host has 2 of them.

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #73 on: August 27, 2021, 03:57:01 pm »
He should buy some carpet. That is more likely to improve the sound  :-DD

I suggested that and got a sensible response. Am impressed.

Online MrMobodies

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #74 on: August 27, 2021, 06:16:59 pm »
He should buy some carpet. That is more likely to improve the sound  :-DD

I suggested that and got a sensible response. Am impressed.

I just looked and couldn't see that, is it still there?

I thought what I said was sensible about measuring the differences and/or show us a hearing test but according to some of the commenters none of these things seem to matter to them for story tellers talking about their experiences. With a title like that I'd generally get annoyed and think click bait when I don't find what I 'd expect.
« Last Edit: August 27, 2021, 06:24:35 pm by MrMobodies »
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #75 on: August 27, 2021, 06:36:22 pm »
He should buy some carpet. That is more likely to improve the sound  :-DD

I suggested that and got a sensible response. Am impressed.

I just looked and couldn't see that, is it still there?

Yup, at least when I check from a non-logged-in browser.

Quote from: Youtube
Måns Nilsson
för 22 timmar sedan
Get a bloody rug in. It will do 3 orders of magnitude more difference than the snake oil you're peddling.

Hifi Knob.
för 22 timmar sedan
Hahahahaha. My wife won’t let me.

Obviously his wife is running the hifi store from where you can buy the things he's reviewing  :-DD :-DD :-DD

Online MrMobodies

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #76 on: August 27, 2021, 06:58:19 pm »
Yup, at least when I check from a non-logged-in browser.
If the bots didn't hide it because of the word "bloody" maybe he hid it when he got all embarrassed.

Quote
Obviously his wife is running the hifi store from where you can buy the things he's reviewing  :-DD :-DD :-DD
According to him she couldn't even pick up the right remote without his help:
Quote
08:58 I can barely get her to pick up the right remote control for the tv.
Maybe he is just trying to gain sympathy like below in his story telling ventures techniques.

Quote
Quote
douxreveur131 1 week ago
Hello. First of all, I want to thank your wife for all the time spent for these tests. It's really brave of her and she must have found it all very boring !
On the subject of audio cables, it's always good to remember that it's just a hobby and that no matter how we feel about it, it's not that bad ;)
You can also get high quality cables without spending a lot of money with a little soldering and patience.
The NEOTECH brand offers the best quality UP-OCC copper at very reasonable prices. It's up to you to choose the RCA plugs of your choice
Quote
brown-eyed man 2 days ago
Ah Tarun you are a brave man indeed, evaluating cables.
As always, I appreciate your approach to reviewing. You tell us what you hear, rather than summarizing. And since we know what your reference system is, we have a way to correlate your descriptions to a know reference
Quote
Skip 6 days ago
Tough topic - nice job keeping it "corralled" - brave but of you, but obviously true to say that all of those cables sound different. And sure, that doesn't mean that one is necessarily better than another, they just sound different. But hey, for whatever reason, some that don't buy into that fact are very out spoken about it - like I couldn't care less what a person is running for cable, but, admit that I'm running hi end, high priced stuff, well, as we all know, ya won't have to wait very long for the fireworks to emerge. Thanks for posting.
Quote
Jon R 1 week ago
Yet to watch but brave man 😁
Quote
Mrhifitunes 1 week ago (edited)
Wow..brave to tackle cables... I agree 100% with your view...many things we still don't understand...it would be good if we did..but also it's nice not too and have some "magic" going on.  Compare it with adults and kids imagination.  My favourite cable is Kimber pjb.  Sounds great and great specs too (53ohm/km low cap and induc)Didnt find anything better price / quantity (same pricerange as those pro cables)
Quote
John 1 week ago
Very brave taking on cables Tarun.  You may be interested in my own findings with some of these cables in my own highly resolving active ATC  system and a previous passive system.   Having read on countless forums that a decent quality shielded cable is all you need, I purchased some Mogami interconnects and I also have Van den Hul the 1st and second and Van Damme and Belden knocking around.  In the passive system I too found Mogami bright and lean - very fatiguing after 30mins listening.  Van den Hul can really help in a bright system (its nickname is Van den dull) but softens off edges too much for me.   Van damme and Belden were considered OK but nothing special.  In the passive system I tried some used Transparent Audio reference cables and I had to buy them as they were in a nother league, so revealing yet so refined.  Placebo effect ?  Who knows, all I can say is they did it for me. When I changed to the active ATC's  I tried some long interconnects to the speakers, some Van den Hul the 2nd and some Van Damme microphone cable (that ATC themselves recommended)   which was very cheap. ATC are cable sceptics interestingly.  I still found the VDH dull but every other cable cheap or expensive sounded much the same. I have come away with the feeling that balanced cables are far less critical than single ended and they all sound much the same.  I now use balanced Van Damme shielded microphone cable and I am totally happy.
I have also tried lots of exotic mains cables and I find Belkin is as good as anything.

[/quote]

Isn't Dave Jones, PhotonicInduction, BigClive, and many like them brave? They tackle quite a lot of things most of the time.

Oh I forgot... He is story telling.

This seems to talk some sense:
Quote
U2021 1 week ago
Put a spectrum analyser on the end of each cable. This will show attenuation and loss together with bandwidth.
No point doing it by ear as you will not hear any difference.
It also depends on the hearing of the user.
A lot is snake oil.
« Last Edit: August 27, 2021, 07:49:38 pm by MrMobodies »
 

Online bd139

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #77 on: August 27, 2021, 08:41:40 pm »
He should buy some carpet. That is more likely to improve the sound  :-DD

I suggested that and got a sensible response. Am impressed.

Sounds like he needs to replace that component of his life  :popcorn:
 
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Offline midix

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #78 on: August 27, 2021, 10:07:40 pm »
I imagine he must have his head screwed in at the same exact position for every test, to avoid hearing "cable differences" that are actually being caused by minor position differences of his head relative to his speakers.
 

Online bd139

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #79 on: August 27, 2021, 11:49:32 pm »
It’s simpler than that as that assumes immaculate perception. Some days you listen to a track and it sounds great. Some days it sounds like some rats fighting in a bin. On the same reproduction device that is.

However stuff sounds pretty good after a bottle of wine. Even the wine tastes good after that much. And it’s only £5na go. Much cheaper to fix the perception than interconnects.
 

Online floobydust

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #80 on: August 28, 2021, 02:33:37 am »
AES Ten years of A/B/X Testing
"Experience from many years of double-blind listening tests of audio equipment is summarized. The results are generally consistent with threshold estimates from psychoacoustic literature, that is, listeners often fail to prove they can hear a difference after non-controlled listening suggested that there was one. However, the fantasy of audible differences continues despite the fact of audibility thresholds."

I've found there is real science with loudspeaker cables and differences, affecting power amplifier sonics. Seen with a scope or spectrum analyzer.
But it's going down a rabbit hole of electronics subtleties and prob. best discussed in another thread, psycho-electronics aside lol.
 

Offline xrunner

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #81 on: August 28, 2021, 11:23:42 am »
He responded to me -
Quote
"This was a subjective listening review. I am sure there are other channels that can provide you the objective measurements you seek. There is a distinct lack of proper scientific double trials in this area. Unfortunately, a double blind test done but one person does not make it scientifically valid due to the sample size being one. There was a single blind test done in my cable evaluation (a double blind test would require switching mechanisms that do not degrade sound quality and a second person cable to set it up).

I switched the cables about half a dozen time for my wife to listen and made sure I had no interaction with her. Each time she picked out the difference between the cables and surprisingly quickly. Others You-tubers have done similar investigations where some have picked out differences and others have not. My advice, try for yourself 😊"

I told my friends I could teach them to be funny, but they all just laughed at me.
 

Online MrMobodies

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #82 on: August 29, 2021, 06:44:00 am »
Got this reply, pointing out that the title was mistated in some way at the same time calling us whiney babies and that we're demeaning? them and got to to call an waaambulance.

Quote
Jon Beck 14 hours ago @Mr Mobodies  I checked out the EEVBLOG forum with the post about this video review (mis-stated as a speaker cable comparison).  I was distracted by the demeanor of that forum and went on my way.  What a bunch of whiney babies there! Somebody should call the waaambulance for that lot.

It looks me me like Tarun loves his audio cables and stuff as to why he replies to many of the commenters that identify with him.

Maybe one day he'll get some testing gear in place for his blind tests to have something to back it up with and put an end to the opinionated snake oil mysteries.
« Last Edit: August 29, 2021, 06:53:26 am by MrMobodies »
 

Online bd139

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #83 on: August 29, 2021, 09:10:50 am »
I bet he’s “sick of experts” too  |O

Hear that said a lot by morons.
 
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Offline PlainName

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #84 on: August 29, 2021, 10:07:53 am »
Quite a few morons cherry pick partial quotes out of context too.
 
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Offline mc172

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #85 on: August 29, 2021, 10:25:46 am »
Got this reply, pointing out that the title was mistated in some way

Well, yeah, the title is incorrect. They're not speaker cables. I pointed this out on the first page but everyone keeps banging on about speaker cables.
 
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Offline madires

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #86 on: August 29, 2021, 10:35:42 am »
Reading is a lost art.
 
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Online MrMobodies

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #87 on: August 29, 2021, 07:57:37 pm »
Buyers of these cables can also "whine" too about "it not sounding right" and needs burning in and so on.

I was told by someone about "upsetting the apple tree" for them.

Quite a few morons cherry pick partial quotes out of context too.

I think I might be guilty of that one on a number of occasions as I frequently misinterpret things.
« Last Edit: August 29, 2021, 08:01:47 pm by MrMobodies »
 

Offline EEVblog

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #88 on: August 29, 2021, 11:08:28 pm »
Yes, I know. The whole audiophool thing has been done to death, but I still can't help but shake my head at these people who can trick themselves into hearing differences that don't exist.

If you pay $800 for a cable you WILL hear the difference!
 
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Offline langwadt

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #89 on: August 29, 2021, 11:29:23 pm »
Yes, I know. The whole audiophool thing has been done to death, but I still can't help but shake my head at these people who can trick themselves into hearing differences that don't exist.

If you pay $800 for a cable you WILL hear the difference!

you either hear it or admit to yourself that you're an idiot, so ...
 

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #90 on: August 29, 2021, 11:54:21 pm »
If you pay $800 for a cable you WILL hear the difference!

He says his wife noticed the differences:

Quote
08:25 I just basically got her to listen to that track for 15-20 minutes and then I switched the cables sometimes I'd pretend to
switch the cables and I didn't actually switch them I made sure that I wasn't in eye shot and I just asked her to
tell me which cable she preferred and whether she noticed a change every time without fail she noticed a change and
she picked out the cable out the two that she preferred so take from that what you like.

One commenter mentioned that it could be about a wife test thing:

Quote
Prairie Dawg 15 hours ago
@Mr Mobodies  The "Wife test" somehow reminds me of a program I saw about a dog which could do maths, tapping its paw to give the answer to a verbal question.  In short, it could answer whatever the owner could - when she got it wrong the dog did. It was picking up some subtle visual clue when the nth tap matched the answer, when the owner was shielded from sight the dog's answers pretty random. So - TL;DR wife picking up some (maybe subcounscious) cogniive bias
 

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #91 on: August 30, 2021, 12:07:37 am »
Title fixed.
 
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Offline magic

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #92 on: August 30, 2021, 06:39:10 am »
If you pay $800 for a cable you WILL hear the difference!
And if you don't then you will not.
Sounds like some guys in here are missing out :-DD
 

Offline HalcyonTopic starter

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #93 on: August 30, 2021, 06:47:42 am »
I have to laugh, one of my mates is an audiophool. Nice guy, but I think he believed everything the sales guy told him. Has all the gold plated, woo woo cables etc... Claims he has a golden ear but was unable to hear that his record player turns a little too fast. I was listening to a song I had heard many. many times and told him it's slightly too fast. He didn't believe me.

Anyway, what I'd love to know from people smarter than I am is this... He streams all his music to his overpriced premium sound system via a Bluetooth DAC. Does Bluetooth recompress audio and result in degradation of the original source material?
I mean it sounds perfectly fine. I have a Bowers and Wilkins audio system in my car which sounds phenomenal but I still stream to it using Bluetooth. I'd just be curious to know if there is any real perceivable difference in audio quality versus playing music directly from a phone via the audio output.
« Last Edit: August 30, 2021, 06:52:45 am by Halcyon »
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #94 on: August 30, 2021, 06:58:04 am »

One commenter mentioned that it could be about a wife test thing:

Quote
Prairie Dawg 15 hours ago
@Mr Mobodies  The "Wife test" somehow reminds me of a program I saw about a dog which could do maths, tapping its paw to give the answer to a verbal question.  In short, it could answer whatever the owner could - when she got it wrong the dog did. It was picking up some subtle visual clue when the nth tap matched the answer, when the owner was shielded from sight the dog's answers pretty random. So - TL;DR wife picking up some (maybe subcounscious) cogniive bias

There is a classic case demonstrating this, illustrating the absolute requirement for double-blind testing; "der Kluge Hans".

Offline borjam

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #95 on: August 30, 2021, 07:19:09 am »
I have to laugh, one of my mates is an audiophool. Nice guy, but I think he believed everything the sales guy told him. Has all the gold plated, woo woo cables etc... Claims he has a golden ear but was unable to hear that his record player turns a little too fast. I was listening to a song I had heard many. many times and told him it's slightly too fast. He didn't believe me.
That one is tricky. Few people are able to detect absolute frequencies.

Quote
Anyway, what I'd love to know from people smarter than I am is this... He streams all his music to his overpriced premium sound system via a Bluetooth DAC. Does Bluetooth recompress audio and result in degradation of the original source material?
I mean it sounds perfectly fine. I have a Bowers and Wilkins audio system in my car which sounds phenomenal but I still stream to it using Bluetooth. I'd just be curious to know if there is any real perceivable difference in audio quality versus playing music directly from a phone via the audio output.
It depends. There are lossy and lossless compression algorithms for Bluetooth audio.

https://www.soundguys.com/understanding-bluetooth-codecs-15352/

So, it's a bit complicated. Not only your equipment must support it, it must be also properly supported without some subtle software bug breaking codec selection.
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #96 on: August 30, 2021, 07:29:09 am »
I have to laugh, one of my mates is an audiophool. Nice guy, but I think he believed everything the sales guy told him. Has all the gold plated, woo woo cables etc... Claims he has a golden ear but was unable to hear that his record player turns a little too fast. I was listening to a song I had heard many. many times and told him it's slightly too fast. He didn't believe me.

Anyway, what I'd love to know from people smarter than I am is this... He streams all his music to his overpriced premium sound system via a Bluetooth DAC. Does Bluetooth recompress audio and result in degradation of the original source material?
I mean it sounds perfectly fine. I have a Bowers and Wilkins audio system in my car which sounds phenomenal but I still stream to it using Bluetooth. I'd just be curious to know if there is any real perceivable difference in audio quality versus playing music directly from a phone via the audio output.

There are two things that could be a problem with Bluetooth (or any digital transfer system);

  • Latency
  • Bit errors.

The former is, generally, not a problem in unidirectional audio transfer, even if it's "live" -- we cope pretty well with the multiple second delay in terrestrial TV. (until the radio transmission of same sports event is 2 seconds earlier...) Basically we have no reference as to "when" and then we have to accept what's coming at us as "now", FSVO. For prerecorded media, it's of course mostly irrelevant.

The latter is of course more complicated; it depends on EMI levels, distance (mostly as distance tends to introduce more line-of-sight challenges), physical barriers to radio waves et c. 

Actually, I lied. There is a third thing, and that it is that Bluetooth is vertically integrated. There are only those applications in the various OSI equivalent layers as the standards owner of Bluetooth saw fit to include.  This means that there's a scant few audio codecs specified for Bluetooth audio, and given a decent RF link, it's mostly about comparing codecs and their performance. You don't get 2mbit/s AES3 bit-clean 24bit/48KHz, no matter how hard you try.

If your BT link is APT-X compatible in both ends (there's a negotiation, so you might end up lower), though, it's practically transparent. I've been on the fringes of some serious testing of this at a former employer, and the data supports APT-X at 576kbit/s as pretty wide open.  The earlier SBC standard might not be as transparent.  There are a few other newer standards that look to be promising, but IMNSHO the APT-X is your best bet.

Also you need to think about the encode-decode chain in entirety. Since the BT link, as observed above, requires recoding, you have at minimum a storage format -> BT recode -> BT decode chain to factor in. If you listen to streaming radio, the best case probably is more like:

Linear sound file or live transmission (both at 48KHz 24-bit) goes into processing for streaming and then to the live stream encoder, coming out as AAC 192kbit (highest encoding standard at previous employer), which is received by your phone, recoded to a Bluetooth transport format, sent over the BT link, and then unpacked and played back.
If it's a "normal" show, it's more like a 384kbit MPEG2 file played back; the L24 storage option is reserved for classical music.

Phew!

The mere thought that the directional arrows on your Ethernet cable would need to be correctly oriented in this is criminally insane.

Offline borjam

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #97 on: August 30, 2021, 07:50:01 am »
I wonder what audiophools would think about professional digital audio streaming over IP, for example Dante.

It needs a properly configured network but it works like a charm. Now tell a live sound engineer to buy a 50 metre long
"special Ethernet cable" for his digital snake from Audioquest  :-DD :-DD :-DD

But of course audiophile grade routers do exist!
« Last Edit: August 30, 2021, 07:51:36 am by borjam »
 
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Offline madires

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #98 on: August 30, 2021, 09:35:33 am »
When our audiophools upgrade to optical network cables they will need directional multimode fiber. >:D
 

Offline MazeFrame

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #99 on: August 30, 2021, 11:01:53 am »
Anyway, what I'd love to know from people smarter than I am is this... He streams all his music to his overpriced premium sound system via a Bluetooth DAC. Does Bluetooth recompress audio and result in degradation of the original source material?
Depends on the BT standard and Codec used.
Some Codecs do not compress, they just use the available bit-rate and drop whatever would push past the limit.
Wireless streaming is always lossy.

Important distinction:
Streaming - Information is NOT stored permanently on the receiving device
Transfer - Information IS permanently stored on the receiving device
« Last Edit: August 30, 2021, 11:03:32 am by MazeFrame »
Never Forgive, Always Forget.
Perpetually Angry and Confused!
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #100 on: August 30, 2021, 11:24:48 am »
I wonder what audiophools would think about professional digital audio streaming over IP, for example Dante.

It needs a properly configured network but it works like a charm. Now tell a live sound engineer to buy a 50 metre long
"special Ethernet cable" for his digital snake from Audioquest  :-DD :-DD :-DD

But of course audiophile grade routers do exist!

Hey Borja,

I know you are clever, but when you call Dante "working like a charm" I'd like to question that a bit.

Dante:

  • Will not traverse a router
  • Is limited to 64 channels
  • Will only be routed by a stinking Windows app, also on the same LAN
  • Is using PTPv1
  • Won't easily interoperate with AES67 or Ravenna
  • Is proprietary
  • And, I don't like it.

 :-DD :-DD :-DD

But, seriously. In my application (2000+ sound sources spread over a 2000km long country), Dante is a joke, a toy. Their attempt at world domination would have been spent better in coöperation with other industry forces to build an even better AES67.

Online MrMobodies

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares speaker cables
« Reply #101 on: August 31, 2021, 03:20:55 am »
I bet he’s “sick of experts” too  |O

Hear that said a lot by morons.

EEVblog #29 - Audiophile Audiophoolery
Quote
04:31 anyone with half a brain at all knows that what is this gonna do when
you've got all that crap or crap quality mains cable running in your walls and
through the powerlines

Joke: Then I guess the morons don't have half a brain.

Maybe he'd be sick of this review:
youtube.com/watch?v=KzwAdwvy9l4
Audioquest Thunderbird Zero Speaker Cable Review: 72V DBS Legit Science or Snake Oil?

Quote
26:41 now look look what happens when i plug the audio quest cable in boom wow now
you see our noise floor went up here it's doing some weird stuff over here it
really went up here i don't think it's detectable because it's still at point zero
two percent here but who knows you know um who knows when you're cranking it up if
it can amplify that even more but look at these spikes so whatever kind of noise
was in the room

33:12 this cable does not live up to the marketing claims from my measurements
um it's difficult to work with in my opinion the connector breaks pretty easily
on it as you can see here just by sticking in the amplifier it broke off...

Pretty much sums it up for that Audioquest snake oil cable.

Quote
36:36 tell me if these educational videos are helpful... tell me if you fell victim to some bs markettiing that you now realize was nonsense.
I suppose that may make them sick too when they realize.
« Last Edit: August 31, 2021, 03:24:11 am by MrMobodies »
 
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Offline borjam

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #102 on: August 31, 2021, 06:12:42 am »
I know you are clever, but when you call Dante "working like a charm" I'd like to question that a bit.
I guess you have more experience with Dante than me, so I won't argue much. Anyway what I meant (poorly phrased
is that it works without creating any of the "audiophoolic" problems audiophools imagine ;)

Quote
Dante:

  • Will not traverse a router
  • Is limited to 64 channels
Hmm. I think they wanted to play it safe. Running on a single broadcast domain they can do a lot of magical autoconfiguration without
relying on poorly supported multicast stuff.

So, well, it's designed for a building or at most campus level application.

Also I think they haven't done a bad job making sure that it can work with many "enterprise" Ethernet switches and with a reasonable
configuration it can coexist on the same infrastructure.

Quote
  • Will only be routed by a stinking Windows app, also on the same LAN
What I have used is Macos based. I haven't tried Dante Domain Controller but I understand it's available on Macos as well? No Linux, though.

Or what do you mean with "routed"?

From what I understood they avoid a central "router" node per se, relying instead on a Dante Controller application that is more like an orchestrator for the capabilites in each Dante interface. That's not a bad decision.

Quote
  • Is using PTPv1
  • Won't easily interoperate with AES67 or Ravenna
I have used it just for mostly straightforward stuff, so no experience there. Anyway I insist, in the context of this thread the "works like a charm" means it doesn't create "audiophool" issue and I am sure audiophools that have attended live concerts in which Dante was used haven't noticed "imaginary digital issues".

Quote
  • Is proprietary
  • And, I don't like it.
I must agree with this. It should be an open standard instead of a proprietary solution. As for liking, I think they did a good
job for their intended usage (venue level networking, at most campus level).

Quote
But, seriously. In my application (2000+ sound sources spread over a 2000km long country), Dante is a joke, a toy. Their attempt at world domination would have been spent better in coöperation with other industry forces to build an even better AES67.

I think they played it safe taking into account the lack of networking experience in audio professionals and the awful chaos in some implementation aspects of common protocols.

So yes, I saw it's not a "WAN" protocol but still I was surprised at how easy it is to set up as long as you have decent networking knowledge.
 

Online coppercone2

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #103 on: August 31, 2021, 07:11:31 am »
boxed wine at radio shack?
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #104 on: August 31, 2021, 01:03:29 pm »
I know you are clever, but when you call Dante "working like a charm" I'd like to question that a bit.
I guess you have more experience with Dante than me, so I won't argue much. Anyway what I meant (poorly phrased
is that it works without creating any of the "audiophoolic" problems audiophools imagine ;)


I unfortunately have experienced Dante, yes. And like all pro and semi-pro system solutions, it is pragmatic w.r.t. 'phoolery. That much is true.

Quote
Dante:
  • Will not traverse a router
  • Is limited to 64 channels
Hmm. I think they wanted to play it safe. Running on a single broadcast domain they can do a lot of magical autoconfiguration without
relying on poorly supported multicast stuff.

So, well, it's designed for a building or at most campus level application.

Also I think they haven't done a bad job making sure that it can work with many "enterprise" Ethernet switches and with a reasonable
configuration it can coexist on the same infrastructure.
...until you have Ravenna and/or AES67 and/or SMPTE2059-clocked SMPTE2110 video. They all use PTPv2 which is an either-or protocol with PTPv1. If you support PTPv2 on your network, the Dante nodes will lose sync, because they can't create their clocking island. We ended up downgrading to a much worse switch for those nodes where Dante can't be turned off.
Quote
  • Will only be routed by a stinking Windows app, also on the same LAN
What I have used is Macos based. I haven't tried Dante Domain Controller but I understand it's available on Macos as well? No Linux, though.

Or what do you mean with "routed"?

From what I understood they avoid a central "router" node per se, relying instead on a Dante Controller application that is more like an orchestrator for the capabilites in each Dante interface. That's not a bad decision.

That is correct. And it is the right decision to make.  I meant that the Dante Domain Controller that actually lets you set the crosspoints (i.e. decide which multicast addresses nodes are going to subscribe to) is a Windows app.

Quote
Quote
  • Is using PTPv1
  • Won't easily interoperate with AES67 or Ravenna
I have used it just for mostly straightforward stuff, so no experience there. Anyway I insist, in the context of this thread the "works like a charm" means it doesn't create "audiophool" issue and I am sure audiophools that have attended live concerts in which Dante was used haven't noticed "imaginary digital issues".

Quote
  • Is proprietary
  • And, I don't like it.
I must agree with this. It should be an open standard instead of a proprietary solution. As for liking, I think they did a good
job for their intended usage (venue level networking, at most campus level).

Quote
But, seriously. In my application (2000+ sound sources spread over a 2000km long country), Dante is a joke, a toy. Their attempt at world domination would have been spent better in coöperation with other industry forces to build an even better AES67.

I think they played it safe taking into account the lack of networking experience in audio professionals and the awful chaos in some implementation aspects of common protocols.

So yes, I saw it's not a "WAN" protocol but still I was surprised at how easy it is to set up as long as you have decent networking knowledge.


All your points are valid. It's a fantastic 1:1 replacement for an analog multicore cable and a small matrix router. The problem is that's there no path upwards. You can't grow, and you can't control things beyond the peephole they give you. 

Also, you're completely correct that they wanted an easy sell for a complex problem. Problem is that this does not always work.. Biggest issue is the discovery of nodes and sources. Noone has solved this correctly in the "complete products" area; there's only skeletal implementations of properly designed node discovery systems, like the BBC efforts with NMOS IS-04

But no, Audiophools they're not!

Offline borjam

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #105 on: August 31, 2021, 01:26:36 pm »
...until you have Ravenna and/or AES67 and/or SMPTE2059-clocked SMPTE2110 video. They all use PTPv2 which is an either-or protocol with PTPv1. If you support PTPv2 on your network, the Dante nodes will lose sync, because they can't create their clocking island. We ended up downgrading to a much worse switch for those nodes where Dante can't be turned off.
Out of my "pay grade". I do live jazz and I can work with a 10 channel mixing desk, go figure :)

That is correct. And it is the right decision to make.  I meant that the Dante Domain Controller that actually lets you set the crosspoints (i.e. decide which multicast addresses nodes are going to subscribe to) is a Windows app.
Ah! I saw they offer it as a virtual machine appliance and I imagined it would carry some Linux system as the OS.


Quote
All your points are valid. It's a fantastic 1:1 replacement for an analog multicore cable and a small matrix router. The problem is that's there no path upwards. You can't grow, and you can't control things beyond the peephole they give you. 

Also, you're completely correct that they wanted an easy sell for a complex problem. Problem is that this does not always work.. Biggest issue is the discovery of nodes and sources. Noone has solved this correctly in the "complete products" area; there's only skeletal implementations of properly designed node discovery systems, like the BBC efforts with NMOS IS-04

But no, Audiophools they're not!
So, we basicly agree. Now, how about teaming up and creating 9th Circle fixing all the Dante problems using IPv6, eggs, bacon, blockchain, BGP, egs bacon, quantum cryptography, blockchain and  and fuzzy logic and blockchain blockchain instead of discrete bits?  :-DD :-DD I am sure audiophools would love the fuzzy thing and the blockchain would help them feel secure?


 :-DD
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #106 on: August 31, 2021, 01:43:33 pm »
...until you have Ravenna and/or AES67 and/or SMPTE2059-clocked SMPTE2110 video. They all use PTPv2 which is an either-or protocol with PTPv1. If you support PTPv2 on your network, the Dante nodes will lose sync, because they can't create their clocking island. We ended up downgrading to a much worse switch for those nodes where Dante can't be turned off.
Out of my "pay grade". I do live jazz and I can work with a 10 channel mixing desk, go figure :)

That's my hobby!

http://vvv.besserwisser.org/Public/Bilder/Skafestplats/desk.jpeg

But no, Audiophools they're not!
So, we basicly agree. Now, how about teaming up and creating 9th Circle fixing all the Dante problems using IPv6, eggs, bacon, blockchain, BGP, egs bacon, quantum cryptography, blockchain and  and fuzzy logic and blockchain blockchain instead of discrete bits?  :-DD :-DD I am sure audiophools would love the fuzzy thing and the blockchain would help them feel secure?


 :-DD

I'm actually content at applying science where there's a need. I run a lab-grade clock system for work, with dual GNSS mainframe clocks, a distribution system and a monitoring system (clock quality, et c.) that's something extra. That's what it takes to build good synchronisation for audio and video..

Offline madires

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #107 on: August 31, 2021, 01:51:26 pm »
Hmm. I think they wanted to play it safe. Running on a single broadcast domain they can do a lot of magical autoconfiguration without
relying on poorly supported multicast stuff.

So, well, it's designed for a building or at most campus level application.

Also I think they haven't done a bad job making sure that it can work with many "enterprise" Ethernet switches and with a reasonable
configuration it can coexist on the same infrastructure.
...until you have Ravenna and/or AES67 and/or SMPTE2059-clocked SMPTE2110 video. They all use PTPv2 which is an either-or protocol with PTPv1. If you support PTPv2 on your network, the Dante nodes will lose sync, because they can't create their clocking island. We ended up downgrading to a much worse switch for those nodes where Dante can't be turned off.

I don't know anything about Dante, but there are two layers of QoS you can tweak to match your requirements and make things work. Ethernet and IP have each their own QoS functionality which can be combined. Additionally, professional switches and routers support several methods of queueing and queue configuration to map QoS classes to specific traffic handling while also supporting filters to classify specific traffic. If you need to build broadcast domain islands you can use VLANs.
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #108 on: August 31, 2021, 09:27:45 pm »

I don't know anything about Dante, but there are two layers of QoS you can tweak to match your requirements and make things work. Ethernet and IP have each their own QoS functionality which can be combined. Additionally, professional switches and routers support several methods of queueing and queue configuration to map QoS classes to specific traffic handling while also supporting filters to classify specific traffic. If you need to build broadcast domain islands you can use VLANs.

At times I dream of the blissful times before I knew about the intricacies of IP QOS and Ethernet COS. And queuing in switches.

Anyway, it is moot, in the Dante vs Ravenna case. To get good enough quality of the PTPv2 clock (all nodes on the net synchronised within 1µs ) for the real stuff, you need PTP-aware switches; most implementations that are useful are acting as boundary clocks, where the switch becomes an intermediate master clock to its children.

These are not cheap devices. Our most common one, for audio, is the Cisco Nexus 9348, which costs about 7000€, list, for 48 ports GE, 4 ports 10GE, and 2 ports 100GE.

Now, the implementation (and this is common to all switches we've tried, not to bash Cisco) is such, that when you tell the switch to start doing PTPv2 magic, it also stops forwarding PTPv1. Yeah, it sucks. I blame IEEE. This means that if I want Dante and AES67/Ravenna on the same network infrastructure (and it's a very strong requirement that we follow Metcalfe's Law and don't build one net per application), I will have to use minimum 2 switches. The one for Dante can be PTP unaware, but since I then must make extra effort to put the clocking packets first in the interface queues on that switch, I can't take just any crapola switch; it needs queues and it needs means to fill them with the right packets. So, I now have 2 rack units occupied, 2 switches to manage, even if I only need a handful of ports.

Offline Jr460

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #109 on: August 31, 2021, 09:54:54 pm »
Late to this thread.

Let me say I use Dante in semi-pro way every weekend for years.   I have friends that work large venues that have the whole place setup with Dante.   Never had an issue with it ever, it just works.

It doesn't require $7k switches.   I use a pair of lower end Cisco 8 port switches.   Read some of the doc, the switches does have to do PTP, what they do want suggest is a switch with low gitter.  They gave a list of switches from Cisco to stay away from.   I trunk two VLANs between the switches, one has Dante only on it the other has DMX/Artbet and other low bandwidth data.

The switch does have to run or understand PTP, just be predictable in the forwarding of packets.   What you do need to setup onto switch is QOS so that PTP gets priority.   Plenty of docs, show the exact settings to use.


I do question two things stated.   Limited to 64 channels, NO.
Needing some windows only app, NO.   Most times nothing else is needed.   If I want to pull a live recording, then the controller running on MacOs  and also the Dante Virtual sound card driver, that looks like an ASIO driver to any recording app you happen to have.   Controller allows me to map the streams to channels on the virtual sound card.

Mixing and matching withe other new protocols.....   No need.
 

Offline madires

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #110 on: September 01, 2021, 10:45:24 am »
Now, the implementation (and this is common to all switches we've tried, not to bash Cisco) is such, that when you tell the switch to start doing PTPv2 magic, it also stops forwarding PTPv1. Yeah, it sucks. I blame IEEE.

Have you tried switches supporting the configuration of the PTP version per port (e.g. OnTime networks)?
« Last Edit: September 01, 2021, 08:33:47 pm by madires »
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #111 on: September 01, 2021, 07:56:36 pm »
Now, the implementation (and this is common to all switches we've tried, not to bash Cisco) is such, that when you tell the switch to start doing PTPv2 magic, it also stops forwarding PTPv1. Yeah, it sucks. I blame IEEE.

Have you tried switches supporting the configuration of the PTP version per port (e.g. OneTime networks)?

No, and having looked at the CM-1600-FC4 from OnTime (I'm assuming that "onetime" was misspelled based on googling for both strings) I see that it would help with protocol translation, but not with the carrying of media traffic, and then it's out. I'm currently running something like 250 ports Ethernet for audio media traffic locally, with some 200 more for remotes, and I need more, to give an impression of the scale we're operating at.

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #112 on: September 01, 2021, 08:01:37 pm »
Late to this thread.

Let me say I use Dante in semi-pro way every weekend for years.   I have friends that work large venues that have the whole place setup with Dante.   Never had an issue with it ever, it just works.

It doesn't require $7k switches.   I use a pair of lower end Cisco 8 port switches.   Read some of the doc, the switches does have to do PTP, what they do want suggest is a switch with low gitter.  They gave a list of switches from Cisco to stay away from.   I trunk two VLANs between the switches, one has Dante only on it the other has DMX/Artbet and other low bandwidth data.

The switch does have to run or understand PTP, just be predictable in the forwarding of packets.   What you do need to setup onto switch is QOS so that PTP gets priority.   Plenty of docs, show the exact settings to use.
You can do it without PTP support, that is the whole point. All you need to do is make sure you have enough bandwidth and some queuing in place.  It is a splendid alternative to an analog snake, which is what people buy it for. It does not work as well for my scale of things, where I have, as stated, perhaps 2000 sources active over a 2000 kilometer long network.

I do question two things stated.   Limited to 64 channels, NO.
Needing some windows only app, NO.   Most times nothing else is needed.   If I want to pull a live recording, then the controller running on MacOs  and also the Dante Virtual sound card driver, that looks like an ASIO driver to any recording app you happen to have.   Controller allows me to map the streams to channels on the virtual sound card.
I'm happy to be corrected here.

Mixing and matching withe other new protocols.....   No need.

Lucky you!

Offline tszaboo

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #113 on: September 02, 2021, 11:08:47 pm »
Anyway, what I'd love to know from people smarter than I am is this... He streams all his music to his overpriced premium sound system via a Bluetooth DAC. Does Bluetooth recompress audio and result in degradation of the original source material?
Depends on the BT standard and Codec used.
Some Codecs do not compress, they just use the available bit-rate and drop whatever would push past the limit.
Wireless streaming is always lossy.

Important distinction:
Streaming - Information is NOT stored permanently on the receiving device
Transfer - Information IS permanently stored on the receiving device
Not for long:
https://www.qualcomm.com/news/releases/2021/09/01/qualcomm-adds-bluetooth-lossless-audio-technology-snapdragon-sound
 

Online mansaxel

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Re: "A British Audiophile" compares audio interconnects
« Reply #114 on: September 03, 2021, 11:50:18 am »

Not for long:
https://www.qualcomm.com/news/releases/2021/09/01/qualcomm-adds-bluetooth-lossless-audio-technology-snapdragon-sound

As long as the path from storage to D/A isn't bit-clean (just shuffling octets) there will be recoding from one lossless format into another, and several steps of it at that. Recoding is identified as one major cause of signal degradation in sound transfer systems. It can be reduced in impact by starting out with less reduced bitrates, but is still audible.


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