The Contour System – Directional Wiring of Audio Parts


Hi guys!

The topic is about subjective homemade research of conductors directivity. I know most people don't believe in such phenomena so probably the story is not for them but for those who find it unbearable to listen to imperfect sound of chaotically directed wires and components.
As for me, I hear direction difference distinctly. The matter started from interconnect cables quite long ago, after a while I added to my research inner wiring of loudspeakers, then discover the importance of mains cables direction. After all I decided to find the directions of all the wires and components of my pretty vintage DIY tube mono SE amp and after everything had been done I drew a resulting schematic and wrote the article. It was in 2005, I have translated it in English only now. Hope you will find the article useful or just enjoy it.
Here is the Link: https://www.backtomusic.ru/audio-engineering/theory/contour-system.
anton_stepichev
clearthinker
Differences in SQ can only be confidently distinguished by properly run blind testing.
Blind testing certainly has its place in audio - although not so much for the typical audiophile - but this statement is completely false. Those who insist on blind testing usually cite "placebo effect" or "expectation bias" as justification for their rather odd belief system. Those are very real mechanisms, no doubt, but they are not absolute. Placebo effect will not cure cancer. No blind testing is required to distinguish between extreme examples of audio components, nor is it always required to detect one that is malfunctioning.
If you are not testing blind, your results are personal and subjective and therefore not useful.
You’d be better off speaking for yourself rather than for others. You may well indeed require blind testing to know how something sounds, but that’s not a universal trait.

So, @clearthinker, please tell us about your blind tests. How were they conducted, how many test subjects, what were the results?
@clearthinker
Differences in SQ can only be confidently distinguished by properly run blind testing.If you are not testing blind, your results are personal and subjective and therefore not useful.
Almost twenty years ago, when I first realized that I was hearing the sound of a wire and that it was not a hallucination, I tortured myself and my friends long enough to test the audibility of these effects. Now I just double-check myself after a while and that’s it.

At the same time some mistakes are still left, but blind tests are not a remedy for it. Moreover, in our case, the blind tests lead to system errors themselves. To evaluate quality of the wire we need, among other things, to assess expert’s involvement in listening, that is, how he reacts sensually to certain music, but the blind test was developed by scientists for quite another purpose - to determine the difference in the audible sound (frequency response, noise, distortion). This is the whole problem, scientists test the wrong thing, and then they believe the Stradivarius violins sound worse than some ordinary-level instruments.

mijostyn
The lay audiophile does not have access to this kind of equipment thus is flying blind. It is easy enough to build AB switch boxes. I'm surprised nobody sells them.
They are available from multiple vendors. Van Alstine's has been one of the more popular - it's probably still available even though it doesn't seem to be on its website now. It's not just a switchbox, but a true a/b/x comparator. The Manley SkipJack can also be used. WireWorld makes its own box solely for the purpose of evaluating cables. 

I've long that it odd that the measurementalists who claim cables can't make a difference don't seem to avail themselves of some of these tools.
A good musical performance has a certain direct message to the soul that practically does not depend on the noise level and the linearity of the frequency response, otherwise no one would have listened to 78 records and CD cassettes before. This is a very subtle substance that is formed during a live performance, consisting of many elusive things - musical intonations and shades. This substance is hierarchically the most valuable part of music, it makes you a music lover, makes you tap your foot to the rhythm or takes you to the clouds. As soon as your perception begins to confidently distinguish it from everything else, you begin to look for only this component of the music in any record.

Bingo! This guy gets it! He totally gets it! No wonder he is so good!  



@mijostyn
Since the birth of remote control in audio it has become easy to switch sources. I have my old blind relay driven switch box with RCA ins and outs but I have not pulled that out in decades. I decided on the wire issue decades ago.

mijostyn, you often call others laymen and at the same time offer a false, pseudo-scientific method to determine the quality of wire. Let's assume wires are measurable and when the wire is reversed, it can change its sound by 1 db. But in your testing device, there are at least a dozen randomly directed conductors, which according to strict logic can give out 12 db of difference and you do not know exactly how much. Thus, you will try to estimate the influence of an amplitude of 1 db against the background of an unknown influence of the same nature, but at a much higher level, which in no way can be done accurately.

You can't measure a wire sound with a device that contains wires, isn't it obvious?


Anton, while all that true to some degree I find it most applicable in comparing performances of the same piece by different artists.You forgot to mention the visceral component to live music that is frequently missing from reproductions.

As far as i can get it, you mean exactly what millercarbon have mentioned above.