How accurate are cable descriptions for your system?

@artemus_5 

 It also depends upon which speaker cable you went from to the new one.

Great point. Another variable not factored in by most reviewers or commenters. This whole hobby careens between art, pseudo-science, and science without a whole lot of clues.
 
 @williewonka  -- Steve, thanks for your great post and the link to the Zavfino thread. Your account of why the hobby is subjective and the variety of your listening tracks was masterful.
 
@lalitk 

 IMO, cables are just as important as your components and room acoustics. And you gotta hear them in your system rather than relying on reviewers and manufacturers description.

 Well put. The video I was referencing above has, today, 23,256 views. If what folks here have said is true, then the video is quite the bit of puffery. I wouldn't make such assertions to such a wide following but then again, I care about my reputation for saying reasonably true things.
 
I can see the usual back and forth with Mahgister and room acoustics is happening. I'm only trying to discuss the relative accuracy of cable character claims. 
 
 @ghdprentice  Thanks for your co@decooney  has also a long track record of very careful trial and error. When you guys discuss cables, I listen and then try to relate whether my gear, room, tastes and other factors to the experimental situation described. Then, I may try a cable.
 
 @jasonbourne52  Which particular Ouija boards give the most transparent and accurate results? I have a Ouija board but it's tubby, etched, shrill, and flabby in its predictions.
 
 @whart  
 

 Before you go crazy on wire, I’d want to know that the system is optimized for the room, some room treatment or other things may prove to be important too, but placement and positioning, which may require some experimentation and heavy lifting, might also be in order first.

Great post and I like your order of priority. I totally agree. One should not "sweat the small stuff" if the big stuff isn't already dealt with. That's why I spent over a year and half mostly on room acoustics.
 
 @prndlus 
 
"I don’t trust anything said by a seller about subjective aspects of their audio equipment; they have motive to stretch the truth, and no reason to be especially truthful because there are no consequences."
 
 Agreed. And once again, in the item mentioned in my OP, we don't have a "seller" but a Youtube "reviewer" who is just imparting his "wisdom" to his thousands of viewers. It's more furrowing of the earth between fact and fiction, news and infotainment.
 
 @dinov 
   "Then as you go up the line on a cable it’s all about the resolution, micro details, sound stage. This is particularly true with a couple of the brands I have ie: analysis plus, and nordost."
   
   I have a couple levels of AP and I completely agree with this description -- despite whatever other differences we have, this is true for my situation. 

Hi all,

I appreciate the advice but I should probably state it plainly -- I’m not shopping for cables, I’m not really interested in upgrades at this point, etc.

My question arises out of interest in the phenomenological, epistemic elements involved -- and also in the way in which people interpret online (or other) advice.

There is a tremendous amount of conceptual looseness in this hobby, and one way I’ve been able to create what I think is a very decent system is by figuring out who to listen to, who to ignore, what control factors matter, etc. If you look back at a lot of my posts, they’re often (not always) driven by my wider project of establishing linguistic, sensory, and psycho-acoustic metrics. Otherwise, acquisition becomes a Sisyphusean guessing game.

@jjss49 Good point. I was thinking that, overall, there is a lot of that in audio. Someone says the sound is "bright" or "tubby" or... "musical," etc. and it is often hard to really get a definite or semi-definite sense of what is designated in sensory experience.

As with the sense modalities of taste and smell, we have a vocabulary for aural phenomenon that is comparatively vague -- compared to vision-vocabulary. Still, we do try and often it can take a while. But when something is being sold, well, caution to the wind!

Thanks to posters. I suppose I’m still interested in your answer to the question in the OP. 

Let me rephrase it:

When you hear cables described in a certain way -- but not specific to your system -- how accurately do you find those descriptions matching up to what you eventually here, if you try the cables?

@dekay Thanks for the link.

@1971gto455ho 

So cable believers only, deniers not allowed.

Right, because I'm asking people who hear a difference whether it corresponds to how they have heard the supposed difference described.

Follow that? 

If someone does not hear a difference, then it is already obvious that they would not hear a difference from the supposed difference described.

I can explain it to you, but I can't understand it for you. 

Cheers

@tony1954 

When you say "Just another opinion" does that mean that "all opinions are equal"?

It is the most obvious truism to say that one has to "listen for themself" -- so we certainly agree on that.

Above and beyond that, some people with opinions have those opinions grounded upon:

• serious investment of time and effort
• an effort to detach from prejudice
• extensive, controlled comparisons

As a result of their efforts, they develop what Hume called:

"Strong sense, united to delicate sentiment, improved by practice, perfected by comparison, and cleared of all prejudice." 

And that's why THEIR opinion is worth MORE.

@stevewharton ​​​​​​@kellyp )

I like the wine metaphor. I think we all struggle. Not only because these terms are very very vague (in terms of designating a precise sensory correlate event in our own situated experiences) but there are many acoustical factors which make the comparison laughable if it's meant to be serious or scientific. (That pretense to scientific accuracy is probably what gets under most people's skins.)

We might consider the wide range of factors that comprise a certain sonic event:

recording
cables
amp
preamp
speakers
room
listener interpretation

So, when someone says "this cable sounds like X" then I need to know something reasonably precise about the other factors involved -- and how they compare to my own space and taste. Otherwise, what they say about the cable is fairly opaque. A.K.A. nearly "useless." Unless one is just looking for something to try. And I have no beef with that. We all need to get our hints from somewhere.

Silversmith Fideliums -- thanks for mentioning.