Cable Break In for the Naysayers

@ozzy 

I think it is perfectly fond to be so passionate about some activity that others may label your obsession as nuts.

Many lasting inventions and ideas are born by people who were a little nuts.

This past weekend, I went to a live on stage performance of Richard Wagner's "Parsifal" opera. The music so resonates with me that I experienced waves of tingling that start in my lower back, travel up through my spine and blossom inside my head, and then travels down my spine, back up and on and on.  Extremely pleasurable. This music excites a strong resonance in my nervous system (as we Physicists say). I can repeat at home as I listen to the music on my audio system.

Can this phenomenon be described? Yes, the physical activity is well understood. And No, The emotional experience cannot be described by words and technical jargon. There will always be our body that interacts with our surroundings.

This is an area ripe for more research - the mind/music interaction.

Be proud of your obsessions. They define you.

I am firmly into the "scientific" approach to my system. I have a very complete set of hardware and software that allow me to perform quite a few of tests that result in a number. Quantifiable.

I do understand that measurements allow one to evaluate the technical performance of my audio components and system.

However, I am quite aware that measurements are not the complete story. 

I firmly understand that any cable, power, line or digital cannot influence audible sound that is sensed by human beings. No one can shake me from that understanding. I am aware that others do not share my opinion. Until we learn more about the mind/music interaction, it is shortsighted to dismiss any experience that one might perceive. 

As a culture (world culture) we will arrive at the place where we can more quantitatively describe the emotional effects that come from the enjoyment of music. Until then, we will continue to have discussions such as these; good discussions with many ideas shred and contemplated are also steps to a deeper understanding.

Any of us who tend to use a little THC from time to time, can attest to the profound effect it can have on our perception of music.  Nothing about my system has changed, but in the right state of mind, the experience can move from audible, to physical, to dare I say it, almost a religious experience.  OK, maybe that's a bit far but you get my drift.  My brain is telling me how I am experiencing the event.  Not to drag this back to confirmation bias, but only to say, we as humans are able to hear and experience many different things for many different reasons.  Is the Doobie Brothers "Taking It To The Streets" really the finest recorded album of all time, or was it just my perception of it last night? 🤣  Cheers.

@kevemaher ”…I firmly understand that any cable, power, line or digital cannot influence audible sound that is sensed by human beings. No one can shake me from that understanding.”
 

You realize that statement is the opposite of scientific? Scientific is about open mindedness and based on observation to develop theories to explain and predict observations. Not looking at meters and firmly denying anything that doesn’t show up there.

i recommend just for a day forgetting about science and what you understand and go to a high end audio store and ask them to help you experience the differences a cable or power cord can make. Then just listen. The differences can be really shocking. Folks in a good store can choose some contemporary equipment and wires to illustrate. 

@ghdprentice 

My apologies for the confusion. It is Physics that explains why cables don't alter sound. As a Physicist, I live in that worldview.

A power cable designed and built for the express purpose of delivering power from one place to another cannot alter electronic signals in an audio system.

Poorly built or deliberately altered cables might be able to affect the components in the system to the point that sound is perceived as changed. I cannot think of a method to do this, but I can't rule it out.

And finally as Boz Scaggs  says:

... "You went your way

and I went mine".