Top 10 Signs That A Cable Company is Selling Snake Oil


This response was published by Audioholics.com.
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The audio industry is full of hype with the most nonsense surrounding the simplest component of the A/V chain - interconnects and speaker cables. Because there are often very little measurable and audible differences between cables, many of the exotic cable vendors use psuedo junk science to differentiate their products from their competitors. These vendors often prey upon the suggestible audiophile giving them reasons why these products must be utilized in their precious systems in order to achieve the best performance possible to reach the true path of audio nirvana. Listed below are the top 10 cable snake oil claims to watch out for. If a vendor is selling you on any of these fallacies, run don't walk away from their products, unless of course you enjoy a good sci-fi story and desire to buy expensive audio jewelery.  

Watch out if a Cable Vendor or Manufacturer:
  1. Promotes that their product allegedly eliminates audio related Skin Effect and/or "Strand Jumping" problems.
  2. Claims revolutionary breakthrough in cable technology by polarizing or biasing the dielectric using a battery.
  3. Promotes that their products eliminate "Audiogenic", "Diode Rectification" or any type of non linear distortions. See Debunking the Myth of Cable Distortion and Dielectric Biasing
  4. Physically places (+) and (-) wire leads in separate dielectrics not closely spaced in a common jacket. See: Calculating Cable Inductance of Twin Feeder Cables
  5. Claims vast improvements in sound by inserting "Cable Elevators" to raise the cables off the floor and minimize electron misfiring or static energy fields.
  6. Claims that cryogenically freezing cables improves fidelity or measurably changes electrical properties after the cable is restored to room temperature.
  7. Claims that their cables require a "Break In" period.
  8. Claims that measurements cannot quantify why their designs are superior and often misapply engineering principles in their reasoning but abandon the associated governing laws and metrics that establish them.
  9. Claims audible differences exist between stranded and non-stranded wires of same gauge rating, geometry and conductor spacing.
  10. Claims audible differences between silver and copper cables of equal design geometry and gauge.

128x128blumartini
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All sciences have questionable edges, that is their nature.

Anyone who does not understand that.... does not understand the concept of science, nor moving forward.

Anything else is dogma and dead.

as my signature at DIYaudio used to say:"Only dead fish swim with the stream" -Malcom Muggeridge

And no one and no science and no endeavor can properly move forward by driving through viewing the world through the rear view mirror. As that is only half of the story ....and results in dead circular logic.

The future cannot be successfully projected by viewing the dogmatic past aspects of human endeavor. Anyone who understands what the word science means, knows this. Science was delineated, as an act, to specifically avoid this. Science is about proofs ----- but first comes exploration.

No one ever said a company can’t base a product on exploration.

As a matter of fact, such a thing is not all that uncommon, and not just in the world of audio. Not by a long shot.

Audio is about the sonic qualities as heard by the ear, and those are not wholly measurable. This is known. As the correlations and the sciences of all the aspects involved are not fully fleshed out.

The nature of the situation is to have varied levels of hearing ability and varied levels of intellect, varied levels of self awareness, all involved across the whole field of audio.

And we end up with threads like this, where the one set of people gang up and attack another set of individuals.

Individuals who just want to be left alone, as they are tired, to their bones... with the illiteracy that ceaselessly comes after them. No reasoning at all, just the unending ceaseless illiteracy.

Which is why some forums have banned such threads from existing. It is something that Audiogon should consider enacting.
You are nothing if not predictable Clearthink, but so is a broken watch.

For instance, I can predict that in your haste to troll my posts, you will either misread, misrepresent, or misstate what I have written.

Here, perhaps this will help you from making the same mistakes in the future:  https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation_mark
Why is there so much fear of responding to his claims? Not an argument, no need to ban questions or concerns audiophiles may have.

The purpose of the thread was to give clarity and scientific feedback to the claim.


The irony is palpable in the following statement:

And we end up with threads like this, where the one set of people gang up and attack another set of individuals.

Individuals who just want to be left alone, as they are tired, to their bones... with the illiteracy that ceaselessly comes after them. No reasoning at all, just the unending ceaseless illiteracy.

Coming from someone who wrote,
All for the sake of a small group of deaf incapable illiterate projecting a**hats.
all for the illiteracy of a small group of psychopathic people who can’t hear and can’t understand science


Since quotes seem to be in vogue:


"What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence." , Christopher Hitchens