32 pairs of speaker and RCA cables measured and listened to

acman3:

No, I am not, but he's always welcome to tag long.

DeKay

Dekay, I am a little confused . Are you also Simonmoon?

Thank you for sharing. It's too bad they didn't include a pricing matrix because in this hobby, we all walk the line of diminishing returns.

Bimmer:

It's fun going through this collection of music dating mainly from the 60's through the early 90's.

I'm only on the first layer in the box with two more to go.

DeKay

@dekay Your mention of Spandau Ballet’s “The Singles Collection” inspired me to pick up a (not so easy to find) mint/new LP. Can’t wait to spin it on my Rega P10 - that may even sound as good as your cassette version. 😎❤️

I spent my professional life measuring consumers'/users' subjective experience of products using various psychometric techniques. I always sought to obtain objective metrics from engineers and designers as well and then correlated those metrics with perceptual measures using multivariate statistics. This reveals both what differences are perceived and, also, what physical product features are correlated with those differences.  

Differences among cables, or any other audio component, can be resolved objectively in this way. I actually did research like this with automotive audio systems back in the day. When questions such as the present one come up I always wonder why this type of research isn't done more often in audio.

 

tom2015

94 posts

08-15-2024 at 08:44pm 

No surprise here, cables sound different. 

The deniers either can’t hear well or have non resolving stereos.

The intellectually lazy comeback that we always get from the folks who will believe anything.

Correction...

My deck was a 700ZXE (not ZXL).

In the 70's/80's I had numerous Nak's (250 for the car, 550, 600  and the less expensive 700 model).

DeKay

Jerry:

I found a pair of spare IC's that I made years ago with cheap low metal mass Radio Shack RCA's and either Chimera Labs or Vampire magnet wire (not certain which).

They were hanging behind a painting in the hallway.

Definitely better sounding than the crusty cables from the 1980's.

FF and RW is spotty on the street find cassette deck and not wanting to get back into a good deck (my last one was a  Nakamichi 700ZXL) I may look for a refurbished Walkman or something small like that to use with the mini system @ the computer.

Most of the old music on these is new to me (currently listening to SADE - Diamond Life).

DeKay 

@dekay ....I thought that it was decided that, if one didn't have the gribenes for exotica cables that welding cables would do Just Fine.....🤨

So....Now....

All the cassettes spouse and I have dragged about with us for Decades....

....have become...

'Vinta'ge"......?!

When did This occur?  Who's responsible for This 'obscurity'?

" I can see the pyres for the fires already..."

....just another foray by The Infidelity Fiends....I knew it.....callous crackpots....🤬

Now listening to the soundtrack to "Return of Superfly".

Toadally awesome.

DeKay

Thanks, that means a lot to me.

DeKay

keep up the good work that's all i can say

@simonmoon 

Thanks for the links, I have seen a fair bit of content from Alpha Audio over the years but don't follow them closely enough to know about this particular review. 

I just listened to Spandau Ballet "The Singles Collection" on cassette and am now coming to the realization as to what a sheltered life (musically) I have led.

Sorry if I'm not getting back to all the numerous PM's about cassette's but I'm just your everyday average mortal and I'm doing the best that I can.

I would like to (eventually) morph this thread into a discussion of SPT portable air conditioners (use an 8 gauge power cord on ours), but not @ this moment.

DeKay

As I’m barely smart enough to own, yet alone use, a computer I need advice on the following query.

How do I change the title of this thread...

from: "32 pairs of speaker and RCA cables measured and listened to"

to: "Cassette Tape Treasure Trove"

???

I’m currently listening to "An Evening With Peter Cook, Dudley Moore & E L Wisty" a double (2 cassettes) on the Polygram label.

DeKay

Interlude for 'tude

Smile when you hit da post.

@garebear ...  Good call, and right on cue.... ;) *fist bump*

Care for some popcorn.....?

OMG:

I'm on the second layer of the "Big box of cassettes" and I'm finding multiple sealed copies of cassettes that sell for thousands of dollars.

They are rare albums that I have never listened to.

Should I open up one unit and give it a listen (can't find any other way to listen to these extremely rare recordings) or should I just sell them as is?

Or - should I wait to listen to them once I have better interconnects in place?

DeKay

I've been receiving gobs of PM's about the cassette hoard, but have yet to receive a recommendation on interconnects (1 meter is fine).

Listening to Leon Redbone "On the Track" right now and next up are...

-Euro Disco Volume 3

-Dr. Demento  "The Greatest Novelty Records of all Time - The 1960's"

-Nilsson "The Point" -  Love this and have numerous copies of it.

I knew that my wife had excellent taste in clothes, jewelry, food, wine and men, but I never gathered her exquisite taste in music until now.  

DeKay

Interesting. One is using graphene as a dielectric and the other as a conductor in a liquid base. I read that there are also some graphene/copper hybrid cables that somehow use fine copper wires to help connect the strands of graphene as much as possible, thus improving the conductivity over plain copper. None of these are pure graphene conductors.

@asctim  There are Graphene cables on the market now. 

https://www.thesoundadvocate.com/2019/08/reviewed-cerious-technologies-graphene-extreme-cables/

https://zavfinousa.com/products/graphene-occ-silver-dart

I wonder if we'll see graphene make it's way into speaker cables and other conductors. Voice coils seem like a great potential application for graphene.

……and we’re off ! 

I just connected a Kenwood KX-W594 cassette deck (found abandoned on our street apron 5-6 years ago) to the Sharp SD-EX111 mini system we use @ the computer.

The reason being that my wife found a large box of her old cassette’s buried in the spare bedroom closet.

The record side is dead/does not function, but the playback side seems to be fine after cleaning the playback head.

Not wanting to make up a new pair of interconnects from my 47 Labs OTA supplies I used a pair of old IC’s that came with a VCR or DVD player (probably VCR as they were really crusty before cleaning).

The Sharp Mini System is powered by a BMI Whale PC (leftover from a previous system) and sports a 6’ pair of the Micca speaker cables connected to Polk RT15i speakers (also have Canare, 47 Labs OTA and Neotch speaker cables for this setup, but the Micca sound good and are an easy connection with their banana plugs).

What interconnects would you try with this setup were you in my shoes (obviously I do not have a budget - the sky’s the limit-;)?

PS:

I’m listening to Lena Lovich "Stateless" (never heard of her before) and can’t wait to go through the rest of the trove.

DeKay

None, as this study shows, there is no clear correlation between measurements to a specific sound signature. Much faster to plug them in and to listen.

I'd like to see various member's opinions on what parameters they would measure to judge the performance of an interconnect.  

I didn't read the entire articles, but yeah.....what @tom2015 said.

I guess the results show that cables do measure differently.

I'm not surprised, but don't really care that much either. I choose my cables based on how they sound, not on how they measure.

No surprise here, cables sound different. 

The deniers either can’t hear well or have non resolving stereos.