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Opening a can of worms

Here is the can filled with opinions. It's been hashed and rehashed to infinity and beyond with no clear result. Since I am a seeker of truth I'll post my thoughts here for the yea and naysayers to debate over. Question is: Are expensive speaker or any other cable in a system worth the exorbitant cost over a reasonably priced cable loom? I thought I'd  experiment myself to find out. My comparison is between Transparent Ultra cable loom and Blue Jeans cable loom on a pure stereo system comprised of Proceed PAV,  Proceed PDSD,  Krell Kav 250, Musical Fidelity A3cd, Sony Ps4300 TT and B&W 803D2 speakers. All sources were used by this experiment using identical playback material. Cables had in excess of 200 hrs burn time and all were identical in lenght. The only variation were the connector manufacturers.
One change that occurred during this 4 week long endeavor was that I'm firmly seated on the sharpest picket on the fence.
My result is that I'm now a believer that there are audible differences in cables. I also believe that these differences are minute and one has to really listen carefully and for a long time to discern these differences.
Now to the crutch of the matter, $$$$$, As we all know Transparent Cables would reside in the upper tier of Audio Cable expense.  Blue Jeans Cable on the other hand falls into the lowest tier of expense (well maybe not lowest but low nontheless )
One would think then that the Transparent would be far superior to the BJs. Not really! Yes the highs were a little cleaner, mids a little tighter and lows a tad more pronounced but not by as much as one would expect. Soundstage was somewhat more open and airy and depth was somewhat more defined with the higher priced cable but again less than one would expect. 

Now for my personal opinion regarding the cable debate: expensive cable looms are slightly better than reasonable priced looms, if a dollar equals a penny to you then by all means opt for the higher priced loom, if a penny equals a penny don't be ashamed for opting for the best you can do. The differences are so minute that it's not worth going into debt over. BOTH looms sounded superb on my test system and I would be happy with either loom.

Now let the debate begin, just know I'm a fence sitter and not in one camp or the other
gillatgh
shadorne's avatar
shadorne
7,491 posts
 
Agreed we are all different. Some brains are more wired to fanciful wishful thinking and some are more logical with a higher degree of rationality. Does this affect what we thinkwe hear - absolutely!

If fuses or wires made a difference to equipment performance it is rational to expect these affects would be well known and many industries (hospitals, military, IT, airlines, manufacturers etc.) would all be purchasing these audiophile specialty products for the increased precision they bring to any electronic device.



hifiman5's avatar
hifiman5
1,838 posts
 
@shadorne   I can, without reservation state that I am a logical, sequential left-brained thinker prone to wanting all things rationally explained, but  I know I hear differences in cables burned in or not. 

Just because there are such perceived differences, the nature of those differences would not, I suspect matter or apply to hospitals, etc. There are, I'm sure, differences in visual acuity of test equipment (imaging) that would indeed matter to a doctor who is examining an Xray, MRI or mammogram image.  I doubt that the qualities that affect my aural perception would be applicable to their desire for more acute visual perception.


shadorne's avatar
shadorne
7,491 posts
 
So special wires and fuses are ONLY critical in audio sound quality? Nobody else has a need for special performance tuned $50 110 volt AC fuses. Nobody else has a need for better performance from $1000 wires to run 3 feet? 

Seriously, how could anybody buy into this kind of logic? It is predicated on audio equipment being somehow different from all other electronics. Why wouldn't your digital camera provide shaper images and better color from a better USB cable. Why woudn't all printers or PC perform that much better with a better fuse? Why do people upgrade RAM in PCs but nobody buys special digital performance PC fuses so that the digital bits have rounder zeros and sharper 1s? Why wouldn't your car run better and faster with a different fuse or specialist battery cables - after all modern cars all run on electronics?


nonoise's avatar
nonoise
11,226 posts
 
In case you glossed over, forgot, or simply didn't retain what you read from other threads, audio fuses are rebranded specialty fuses that are used in medical, military, aerospace, and important IT functions, among others. They're called high rupturing fuses. Google it. 

Now that they've been around awhile (what, two decades?) some audio makes have specified certain builds and styles (think real hard) like SR who have the factory do it or BeesWax, who go and do it themselves after buying audio fuse stock. Do you honestly believe that SR has their own fuse factory?

Please.

And as for your analogy regarding printers and cabling, to call that the same as audio reproduction is both a silly and lazy argument. Not well thought out at all. 

All the best,
Nonoise
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