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Hype, Hyperbole and high price!

Okay, I understand that this site has to make money by having advertisers, but cheese and crackers, the claims that are made are just laughable if not down right criminal!  Before I attended an engineering university I too was duped into buying expensive wires and such.  Now, armed with an engineering and physics background, I can see through the BS claims made.  I try and not let it get in the way of my enjoyment of good quality stereo equipment, but when a salesman tries to sell me something based on testimonials, hype and hyperbole, I tell him politely my background and then ask him a series of questions which leaves him dumbfounded. 

Such crap as directional wires - (I used to work for both Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman) and trust me, if we had to test the miles of wires for directionality in every piece of equipment built...well you get the gist.

I have friends that are audio snobs and although they argue with me (Basically buyer's remorse) they know that what I say is true and end the conversation.  Oh well, I suppose I will continue to get a headache when I read said claims.

Sigh!
kenny928

Showing 2 responses by grm

grm
149 posts
 
I guess I'm in over my head here, not for lack of trying... Lesson learned!
grm
149 posts
 
Hi, newbie here. I was interested in this supercharged forum and decided I wanted to positively contribute. First, I'm a college student that could never afford some of the cables talked about in this forum, however, even with my limited experience, I must say that not all interconnects sound alike. I can say this because the first "high-end" cables I purchased from an authorized dealer (too many fakes out there unfortunately) was a set of Kimber Silver Streaks. I found the streaks to sound much better to "my" ears than the cables that were included in the box. Anyway, looking at the Kimbers design, being so simple, I decided I would copy them and build my own to save BIG$. Obtained some braided (3 conductor) wire and some decent looking RCA connectors. I used a silver solder to the terminations, 1 for signal and 2 for ground. Bottom line, they sounded absolutely terrible! I was so disappointed! What in the world was the difference?? Was it because the Kimbers used silver for the signal line?? I just don't know... I ended up populating my system with both balanced and single ended Silver Streaks with no desire to look back. I always wondered what a set of cables costing more than the component your connecting it to would sound like, I must believe there comes a point of diminishing returns as well as "drinking by the label". Lastly I believe, case-in-point, that there is a very loose correlation of price vs performance. I say this because again, I have my PC connected to my CDP/DAC using a TOSLINK cable because I had a nasty ground loop hum with COAX. The TOSLINK cables I tried came from AR and another from Monster, the AR cable sounded different, not actually better, just different. How could this be? It's a digital signal, should they not sound the same? Anyway, I found this website called HDTVHookup and I purchased a no-name generic 280 fiber Glass cable for $22, wow, what a difference!!??? I apologize in advance for being so verbose, please excuse.    
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