The Science of Cables


It seems to me that there is too little scientific, objective evidence for why cables sound the way they do. When I see discussions on cables, physical attributes are discussed; things like shielding, gauge, material, geometry, etc. and rarely are things like resistance, impedance, inductance, capacitance, etc. Why is this? Why aren’t cables discussed in terms of physical measurements very often?

Seems to me like that would increase the customer base. I know several “objectivist” that won’t accept any of your claims unless you have measurements and blind tests. If there were measurements that correlated to what you hear, I think more people would be interested in cables. 

I know cables are often system dependent but there are still many generalizations that can be made.
128x128mkgus
Doug,
Can you recommend which rca connector to purchase for the Schroeder Method?
@celander And a pair of SM dual Canare StarQuad assemblies at ~$150 breaks so many banks for audiophiles, too!

If, in Mr. Schroeder’s proclamation, he would have used SM dual Canare StarQuad cables @ $150.00, or Elizabeth’s $51.80 4 F AQs, as the test example for his Schroeder Method, rather than the TEO Audio Liquid Audio Cables and the Clarity Cable (both over $2K per 1M set and both he had previously, lustrously reviewed as being among the most open, detailed, quick and revealing, of cables) it would have made a bit of sense. My thought is - If it takes doubling up a set of $2K+ IC cables, or a pr. of $13,000 speaker cables, to really make them sound great, maybe they weren’t that great in the first place...Jim

@elizabeth You’re Welcome! Best of luck - let us know.
Here is the thing....understanding of stuff moves on....it does not stand still as it does in the minds of the fundamentalists such as the adherents of the LCR-or-the-highway Creed....bashing the Wright Bros because we have modern aircraft is just as wrong headed as bashing anyone for making a cable as well as they did given the most current state of cable building techniques available at the time.

To quote John Maynard Keynes

When my information changes I alter my conclusions What do you do sir?


Well what we did was not sit around and mope and bury our heads in the sand as a fundamentalist would do we acted on the new information and built cable assemblies that incorporated this idea and the results produced spectacular results. But what was especially interesting was the assembly did not produce a result consistent with the standard LCR understanding of what a global doubling of assembly capacitance would produce ( there was no high frequency roll-off, in fact the high end was significantly more delineated, and without any etching, and the sound stage got noticeably larger in every dimension ). Which is why I threw that weird result out to the folks here who claim to intimately know the workings of cable through the strict application of known and accepted laws that generally explain cable behaviour.

And btw we have tried several different cables assemblies using this idea and everytime we used assemblies that had proved superior in the past we got better results in what we call a Double Double configuration. So old methods still have validity in this paradigm, they just seem , uhhh, supercharged, in some way we really can’t explain. But the bottom line is they do, they really really do.

But hey you can stick to your I can’t be bothered what I have is good enough, even though the effort to do so is so relatively minimal if that is what you have to do, but a word of caution when you bury your head in the sand be sure to close your eyes cause you may scratch a cornea or something.
My goodness. If every invention got hammered for the materials used rather than the outcome, then how could we have ever ventured out of the cave to create fire and the wheel?

The fact that such superb cables were easily improved upon by a simple modification that does not affect the integrity of their construction should be celebrated rather than condemned. 

Ok, we have some meaningful discussion; let's dial back the rhetoric and keep the open, non-competitive discussion going.

Jhills, good point; I can see where you might have been influenced to think it had to be a big $ interconnect. No, it does not. I believe it would work even with throw away ICs. My understanding is Schroeder Method is completely independent of sales/marketing/perceived valuation of cables.

However, let's be clear; from my and others' comparisons the quality of the IC is carried through in the "magnifying" - that's fairly accurate catch word for the global effect - of the single ICs sonic characteristics in the system. It becomes very easy to hear differences between cables, much easier than with single IC. The effect on the system is pervasive and powerful, really Unbelievably powerful. I have said it is on the order of a $10K component upgrade. Pick your component. It's like a leap in speaker production. etc. I know that sounds absurd, but to describe it as lesser would not convey reality.

In fact, I have never discussed using the TEO Double Double, because I have never used it! I believe I will at some point, but it has been others who have been discussing that particular Schroeder Method cable. I have discussed publicly the Audio Sensibility manufactured double IC in my Audio Blast article at dagogo.com about that company, which is far less expensive, likely in the realm of sensibility in the mind of many for an experimental cable. The presumption that I am somehow tied in with TEO's sale of their Double Double is incorrect. I did not ask them to make it, I have not tried it (though I hope to), and as not yet being a user I am not yet endorsing it. Hopefully that clears up some confusion in the community. I am, however, happy that they trusted my discussion enough to be the first to make a double IC, and that they seem interested in my impression of trying it.

As to the Clarity Cables, I have on loan generously from Chris and Melissa Owen some cables including Organic ICs, and I have found them to best many a competitor. I consider them among the most favored of all cables I have ever used (dozens) in 30 years. So, yes, I used them and continue to do so in Schroeder Method, and they are favorites. (BTW, I think I could have gotten cables with MSRP in the tens of thousands on loan similarly indefinitely, but they were not as good imo. If my priority was image I would use them to bolster my reviewership. I'm not about B.S.)  The encouragement to use better ICs is not fluff. I have compared them against inexpensive ICs and they are vastly superior to cheap ICs, and preferable to the Audio Sensibility double ICs. However, one must consider the cost differential.

Celander has been using the HAVE Inc. dual Canaire StarQuad manufactured ICs, and I discussed this aspect of inexpensive cables in my article. I think the skeptics should read my article at dagogo.com if they have not, because some of these potential misperceptions will be addressed.

Now, to the community:

Hopefully our skeptics will begin to see that I have no agenda to fool you. I have no agenda to be in cahoots with someone to get them sales. I am fleshing out something I discovered and others are along for the ride. This is a seminal event that many are finding incredible - in a good way!

The reason I'm discussing it in the cables/science forum is that it seems to defy conventional theory. Why? How? I have no idea, and neither do the users and manufacturers. So, does that mean it's hokum? TRY it. The track record is that you also will accept it, despite not knowing how it works.

I am pursuing a patent after a user of Schroeder Method suggested that I should benefit from it. I think I have commented on that publicly previously. At this point the only benefit I have had are four pair of loaned manufactured double ICs (2 RCA and 2 XLR) and some Y-cables  from Audio Sensibility for the article. That's it. I'm spending more in terms of my time cost than "it's worth" trying to get through to people, because I have a zeal for audio and this IS worth discovering. Do I someday want to benefit financially from this? Yes, but a potential patent is years away, is by no means a sure thing, and any financial gain is even less assured and even further off, and it seems I will have to put in a fair bit of my own time and potentially capital, too, before ever seeing a dime. So, at this time I have just about zero for all my efforts and potentially great expenditure of time with no guarantee of benefit financially. Just how is that bilking people?

So, why would I even do this? You should hear it.  

BTW, I'm not paid to review at dagogo.com either. That's another major misnomer. My hourly "wage" when I get a discount on a component is such that most of you would never work for that kind of rate. I did the numbers and it's wretched. I basically have given away thousands of dollars of my time to aid the community. The reason I keep doing it is that I'm very into variety of gear and systems, and love exploration of them. Why not write at the same time?

Now, skeptics, you can scour this post and seek to discredit me for minutia or perceived inconsistencies, or you can take what I have shared at face value for your benefit and run with it. At this point no skeptics have volunteered to try Schroeder Method. I'll bet several others are behind the scenes, and I hope they will come forward.

So, skeptics, are you going to try?

Frankly, Imo this is the best potentially lower cost improvement to a stereo rig you will ever be handed. So, I think you should stop being pissed off/disgusted with me and try it.

So, what about my question in regard to analogue? How does it materially/methodologically differentiate itself from cables? how does the overwhelmingly subjective field of Vinyl related audiophilia escape the same condemnation as cables? TURNTABLES ARE TONE CONTROLS! LOL

WHERE'S THE BEEF?   ;)