elizabeth,
A few things....(and I realize this will likely go longer than you may want to read, but others may be interested in this response):
1. The first thing is to note how you seem to be speaking about cable differences. If, as your post implies, the differences between cables can disappear so readily when you are simply asked to listen under blind conditions, that in of itself suggests the differences are not of a scope commonly claimed for cables. We constantly hear about BIG OBVIOUS differences, often describing obvious tightening, or deepening of bass (or the reverse), obviously larger soundstages, extending/refining high frequencies, lusher or tighter midrange, less grain, more dynamic, and on and on.
As I wrote before: these type of differences are akin to what one may hear from a totally re-mastered album.
And yet the idea floated here is that those OBVIOUS differences just won’t be heard when you don’t know which cable you are listening to.
I work in post sound production manipulating sound all day long, in large and often very subtle ways (sometimes I’m literally tweaking, or matching the sound of the "air" in a room). I can guarantee you that if I took a sound, made a copy and very slightly tweaked it, say increasing volume by 3dB or tweaking it via EQ to slightly brighten it, or add the teeniest touch of reverb, I could blindfold you and you would be able to tell the difference during fast switching back and forth. (Of the time of say, allowed by an ABX box).
I’m sure this would not "stress you out" to where you could not longer hear such differences, especially because they are real, and discernible to most listeners. The same would go for comparing an album that was re-mastered to sound different from the original, in the way that many cable-lovers claim occurs with cables.
It CAN get tiring trying to discern audible differences to the degree they are very subtle. The less subtle, the less work you have to do, the more subtle, the more you have to concentrate to find any difference. But again, note that audiophiles typically swap in a new pair of cables and, with no "strain of concentration" at all, confidently declare they heard an obvious difference. For the most part, these types of differences should not be a "strain" to hear, even in blind testing.
2. It’s a common misunderstanding of blind tests, particularly the ABX type used for amps, cables etc, that it has to be done under a condition that causes "stress." Ideally one uses fast switching (due to problematic audible memory for subtle differences - the longer it takes between switching, the less able we are to keep a very subtle sound in memory). But fast switching does not automatically entail listening to fast snippets of sound - rather it simply means being able to switch quickly from one sound to the other when you DO want to compare them. A blind test can be as leisurely as you want...over months if you want, switching whenever you feel as relaxed as you please.
Tom Nousaine, a well known proponent of blind/ABX testing did quite a few extended bind tests with audiophiles (for instance a five week long blind test between two amplifiers Andromeda vs HCA800II).
3. Blind tests don’t mean actual audible differences necessarily go away.Even in my case, I successfully identified differences between an older CD player, newer CD player and a DAC (either with 100 percent, or almost 100 percent accuracy, as I remember).
4. What blind tests can test: Despite the ever present noise level on threads like these - that is geofkait’s muddying of the water ;-) - one just has to be clear on what we want to test.
For instance, if an INDIVIDUAL claims to be able to hear a difference between his new cable and his previous cable, THAT can be tested via DBT. If the individual doesn’t show a statistically suggestive result for identifying between the two cables, strictly speaking you can conclude he failed to demonstrate his own ability to discern between the cables. If the results are strong enough, you can provisionally conclude "sorry bud, you can’t really hear a difference." Does that mean that the cables don’t sound different at all, or that no one at all could hear the difference? No. But the general audibility wasn’t being tested; the capability of the individual to discern between those cables was being tested.
You can ask other question like "Can a bunch of average non-audiophiles tell the difference between A and B cables?" You can set up that test, and potentially get strong results suggesting they can not. (Or the reverse).
You can ask the question can a golden eared audiophile, or a group of such, hear differences? Again...you can get a result relevant to the question the test is set up to investigate.
You can ask "Are the differences between X and Y cable audible in a general sense among human beings?" Then you go and test a wide enough variety of people, with enough tests, look at the results and see in which direction they point - are you stuck with the null hypothesis, or are the results positive for the hypothesis the cable differences are audible? There are any number of scientific tests arriving at such generalities (e.g. with some rare exceptions, humans can’t hear above 20 kHz).
The results are never conclusive in some Absolute sense....but then nothing in science, or life, really is. You just gather ever stronger evidence to support a conclusion.
As I said, I’ve done various blind tests and I draw my own conclusions from my experience, as we all ultimately do (although obviously there are better and worse analysis of how our experience fits with wider sets of facts...) So for me, if I blind test some items and I find it so difficult to hear the difference that I end up guessing, then it’s sitting at a level of difference that I’m not going to worry much about. I’ll save my money if one is more expensive than the other. And I think it’s too bad more audiophiles don’t avail themselves of this tool - are have been mislead about it by blind test naysayers. Tons of people end up spending amazing amounts of money on items that may not have made the difference they thought. I’ve seen many posts by people who have spent lots of money on cables saying "look, I wish they didn’t make a difference because they cost me so much money, but since they DO make a difference, I’ve spent the money." If such people availed themselves of some blind testing they *may* find out they didn’t need to spend that money. Certainly you can go the route of "I don’t care about all that blind testing stuff - my sighted experience is part of my perception and if I hear a difference, well that’s my experience and I’m happy to pay for it."
That’s cool. I actually go that route sometimes myself. But I don’t see why it’s ever better to do something via less information via more. If one WANTS to make sure their money is paying for "real" performance differences, one can try some blind testing, but if one is happy with the experience of sighted results, one can do that as well.
