Interconnect Directionality

roberttcan" I don't understand half of what you said, probably less."

If you are patient and polite you will learn more from this group do not expect to know everything right away you are still new here!

Translation ..... I don't understand half of what you said, probably less. Therefore I will post a link to a Wikipedia article that will show even more clearly I don't understand the topic or what you said ... well done there jea48, WELL DONE!

From the link you don't understand, "No energy flows outside the cable, either, since there the magnetic fields of inner and outer conductors cancel to zero." ... that means two fields one for each wire, but does not say what direction each one points.... hint, depends on what the polarity is between outer and inner.


jea483,142 posts10-21-2019 9:14pm

BLA, BLA, BLA

"Use a coax cable for an example. Center conductor is solid wire. Shield is the signal ground conductor and is connected at both ends." 

Simple example.... Nobody said anything about the other crap you posted. Who cares? This is an audio forum.

I am sure will pick this Link apart. Have at dude.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poynting_vector#Coaxial_cable

When you find a copper wire, or heck anything that is not a perfect insulator, that is devoid of free electrons, I will be sure to answer the absolutely asinine question posited below: ....


"You want to use water in place of an electrical signal.

Well beings you want to use water in a pipe.

From the time you open the HOT WATER TAP to the time you get HOT WATER from the TAP how long does it take."

Oh yes, LET'S USE A COAX AS AN EXAMPLE.

Do you even know what this example means?  There are a few effects going on in a coax. First you have transmission line effects ... that is because there IS a connection between the two wires in a coax. That connection is a capacitor, and inherent in the construction of the coax is the piece-wise inductance of the wire, i.e. every section of wire has an effective inductance. Why does that matter? ... well similar to how a pressure wave needs to travel through those pipe for water to come out (it only seems instantaneous), a voltage potential propagates along a coax, before conduction starts (well really that happens with all pairs of wires). 

A lot of high frequency coax cables do not use solid wires in the center, but I guess you are showing your lack of experience there.

You do realize that "energy" does not only flow into the center conductor right, it flows into the outer ground as well? Do you realize how the "shielding" even works? .. and I use quotations as the shielding is almost a misnomer, though the outcome is not. It does not so much "shield" the inner conductor, as it prevents a potential from being induced between the outer shield and the interior wire ... which works no matter whether the shield is ground, or the shield is signal, as you are interested in the differential between the two. The outer is usually ground as it is often connected to case ground. Of course, without twisting, it is susceptible to magnetic interference. 

"Use a coax cable for an example. Center conductor is solid wire. Shield is the signal ground conductor and is connected at both ends."

If you are going to be pedantic so will I:

1) The energy in the EM wave causes the electrons to move, the moving electrons impact with tungsten atoms and release phonons, which is what causes the wire to heat up and that causes the emission of photons.

2) NO, the signal, in this case we were talking AC power, but applies to any AC signal, does not move down the wire in one direction. Depending on whether the Live is higher potential than Neutral, or Neutral is higher potential than Live, determine which way the "energy" enters the equipment or is transferred. It defines on an instantaneous basis the electron drift direction. That means that energy is transferred whether electrons are "entering" the fuse or exiting the fuse .... and barring any transmission line effects, which at audio frequencies and fuse sizes will be zero, the bulk model for a fuse, will be the same no matter which way current flows.




"So in a nutshell the signal energy travels down the wire in one direction >>>> from the source to the load in the form of an electromagnetic wave. It’s the energy that causes the light bulb to light. 

It’s the energy that causes the fuse internal wire to melt if the fuse is overloaded. The energy moves in one direction from the source to the load. It does not travel back in forth in the fuse. Agree?"

This below is almost too stupid to answer. How long does it take from the time you open the tap to the time the water comes out? ... If in your house, pretty much instant because the pipes are already full.

"If it was the electrons that carried the signal how long would it take from the time a needle was dropped in the groove of a record to the time you would hear the first note from the speakers?"

... and in a transformer, the moving electrons induce a magnetic field .... and that magnetic field when it intersects with the wires in the secondary causes the electrons to move which induces a voltage potential resulting in an EM wave propagation in the wire.

jea48,

Unfortunately, the real answer to what carries the signal is pretty complex, but sometimes an analogy is best.

What propagates the signal is an electromagnetic wave. The electromagnetic wave is induced by a voltage potential. The energy is technically "carried" in the electromagnetic wave. It is not even carried in the wire, but in the field around the electrons (and wire), but that does not mean that at audio frequencies esoteric dielectrics for wire make any practical difference. That wave induces electron flow in a given direction.  Current, by definition is the flow of electrons, but what really happens is more complex.

The surface electrons provide the medium for the propagation of the EM wave, though just like air doesn't "move" for sound transmission, the electrons do not either. The electric field induced in the wire is what moves electrons along. 

In AC ... i.e. power, audio signals, etc. the applied potential is changes in amplitude and is reversed, which cases the direction of the e-field in the wire to change direction and the direction of the electrons to move.

What perhaps you are missing is how is that signal "converted". Well in a speaker, those moving electrons induce a magnetic field, and when that magnetic field is a speaker coil, when they are moving one way they push the speaker out, and when moving the other way, pull the speaker in.

roberttcan"Not sure if your post is trolling, a serious question, or lack of knowledge. The questions really have little bearing on the question at hand. 


Actually I could not disagree with you more so I can only respond as you and state: "Not sure if your post is trolling, a serious question, or lack of knowledge."

Not sure if your post is trolling, a serious question, or lack of knowledge. The questions really have little bearing on the question at hand.

In AC, the net effective drift velocity is 0, so in a balanced AC line, without DC offset, electrons never move far from where they started, in bulk at least. That does not mean stochastically that some electrons couldn't ... except they don't jump transformers of course.

They do move back and force within fuses though :-) ... both directions in any given fuse.

"Charge" is simply an excess of charge carriers, either positive or negative, though really you don't collect positive charge carriers so much as deplete negative charge carriers. That does not play in a transformer so I am not sure what actual question you are trying to ask here ....  I am giving YOU the benefit of the doubt you have some idea of how a transformer operates?



jea483,136 posts10-21-2019 4:58pm@ roberttcan 

Would you please explain how the electrons in the transmission lines ever leave a generating power plant. Do the same electrons ever reach our homes?


Do the electrons in the primary winding side of an isolation type power transformer pass from the primary winding to the secondary winding? How about the charge?

roberttcan1"clearthink, you may think you are untouchable on this forum, but I assure you you are not. If you continue with this targeted harassment, I will respond in spades and you will not like it."

Don't threaten me or other users of this forum it is a violation and I will not tolerate it from you or others.

It is not for you to limit, restrict, or discourage posters and contributors to this forum from sharing, expressing, or explaining they’re thoughts, observations, or opinions and regardless of you’re opinions or threats.  

If only there could be more of me. Sigh

Oh for the good old days when it was considered poor form to lower yourself to argue with those of lesser station, intelligence, or ability, especially when they are so obviously caught, ensnared and constrained by their own little compulsion, obsession or fetish with saying, writing, and posting everything in triplicate.

Please reconsider, rethink and re-evaluate whether there is a better, more effective, or entertaining way of making your point, accomplishing your goal, or achieving your aim.

Obssessed, he is. No ifs, ands, or buts about it.

roberttcan"Listen, clearthink ... your childish behaviour is NOT endearing. NO ONE asked YOU to do anything, but I will now. CONTRIBUTE ANYTHING OF VALUE or stop replying to my posts."

It is not necessary for anyone to request my participation in order for me to respond to posts or draft, create, and publish new posts. It is not for you to limit, restrict, or discourage posters and contributors to this forum from sharing, expressing, or explaining they’re thoughts, observations, or opinions and regardless of you’re cherished, revered, and holy convictions you should not seek to silence those with who you disagree or who may have offended, insulted, or embarassed you by applying superior reasoning, knowledge or experience.

" What did you do to contribute? Well that would be nothing."

You are apparently ignorant, uninformed, or deluded.

:-)

millercarbon

roberttcan-
Its very unlikely clearthink and geoffkait are one. If clearthink and geoffkait were the same person then that person would have to be able to write, post, and communicate both, together, and with the style, manner, and form of clearthink - who always writes, describes, and posts repeating, restating, and duplicating the same, exact, and similar thing, word, and phrase, always three, never one, and not two, times in a row. But then he would also have to switch when writing as geoffkait to a form of nonsensical word salad that occasionally verges near making sense, without ever quite getting there.

Anyone can do word salad. But writing in the style of clearthink calls for creativity, imagination, and an obsession with threes.  

roberttcan"I don't need to prove anything"

Neither are we required, obligated, or subject to you're order that we conduct any test, perform any measurement, or report any study based solely on you're demand, insistence, or order.  

Hey, question for the group, are clearthink, and geoffkait the same person?  The reason I ask it that clearthink seems to think he needs to speak for geoffkait. Me believing geoffkait is an adult, believes that perhaps he can speak for himself.

NO clearthink, I don't need to prove anything .... though I can easily show that frequency effects are <0.1db on interconnects (MM phono cables excepted), and impacts on phase are so close to be 0 as to be 0.

HOWEVER, anyone with any idea about MFG of audio products knows that resistors are likely to be at 1% tolerance (and worse in many tube amps), the best capacitors 2-3% and many 5-20% tolerance, and changes in room temp and self-heating based on the music volume can have significantly larger effects.  Let's add in changes in parameters due to the self heating of voice coils will have a larger impact than cable direction, and that is not even taking into account the large variation from unit to unit in speaker MFG.

You know what else has a dramatically larger impact on sound transmission than the direction of a cable (shielding aside). Room humidity, especially if you have a larger listening room. Changes in room humidity could easily swamp out any differences you will see changing from one cable to another or from one interconnect to another or the direction.

However, to quote Hitchen's, "What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence". A non-controlled listening test is not "evidence", it is anecdote. Learn the difference please. There are lots of anecdotes here, but there are no evidence. Astrologers use anecdotes ...  (so do people who believe the earth is flat).

roberttcan" I am sure YOU can put some hard numbers around the capacitance, inductance, bulk-impedance, etc. of these audio cables and relate that to amplifier, pre-amp, and speaker complex impedance and what the typical impacts the values of these cables will have on signal transmission. I mean that should be brutally simple for you right? You shouldn't even need Google ..... now after you do that, please relate that to the average impedance and response consistency unit to unit (variance) between capacitors, resistors, speakers etc. in the signal change. I can wait and I am sure others would like to hear your brilliance."

No one here is compelled, obligated, or required to conduct upon you're request, instruction, or demand any specific scientific studies, research, or explanation as to what they hear, percieve, and claim it is entirely upon you to perform such study, assessment, and analysis and since you state with unqualified, unrestricted, and absolute certainty I am sure it will be easy for you to comply with that which you insist others perform on you're behalf. 

Totally weird that people who make cables that work at 100GHz don't know this, but people who make 20KHz audio cables do .... strange ... very strange, almost like it is not true.

Cables are direction for shielding. Cables are directional where intentional elements have been added at one end. The rare, and very rare very very high frequency RF cable (10's of GHz) is direction because the control the impedance along the length for end to end impedance matching.

Since you know this stuff so intimately, I am sure YOU can put some hard numbers around the capacitance, inductance, bulk-impedance, etc. of these audio cables and relate that to amplifier, pre-amp, and speaker complex impedance and what the typical impacts the values of these cables will have on signal transmission. I mean that should be brutally simple for you right? You shouldn't even need Google ..... now after you do that, please relate that to the average impedance and response consistency unit to unit (variance) between capacitors, resistors, speakers etc. in the signal change. I can wait and I am sure others would like to hear your brilliance.


geoffkait17,586 posts10-14-2019 10:56amThings are worse than that ( connectors). A lot worse. In a nut shell all wire is directional. I am not the one who did it so don’t blame me. I did not invent reality. That’s why all cables and power cords and fuses are directional. That’s also why digital cables are directional. That’s why foreword thinking companies like Audioquest and Goertz and Anti Cables control directionality of cables from the get go. You have to honor the inherent natural directionality of wire. 🔜 HDMI Cables, Ethernet cables are also directionality. There is a separate issue with shielding but ideally the shielding direction should conform to the wire directionality. Same with connectors, if they are in fact directional, which they may be. Who knows? So, to summarize, all wire is directional and all wire in everything should be controlled for directionality, speaker internal wire, transformers, capacitors, internal component wiring. You name it.

Food for thought indeed! 🍔 🥨🍰 More food for thought - Audioquest and maybe others highly polishes the surface of their high end solid core copper and silver. Does polishing reduce or perhaps eliminate directionality of the wire? Or is it for some other reason?

I wonder if Ohno continuous cast (OCC) wires are direction to the same degree as drawn copper. If it has to do with the copper grains, perhaps grain-free OCC wires have no direction to them. Food for thought.

Things are worse than that ( connectors). A lot worse. In a nut shell all wire is directional. I am not the one who did it so don’t blame me. I did not invent reality. That’s why all cables and power cords and fuses are directional. That’s also why digital cables are directional. That’s why foreword thinking companies like Audioquest and Goertz and Anti Cables control directionality of cables from the get go. You have to honor the inherent natural directionality of wire. 🔜 HDMI Cables, Ethernet cables are also directionality. There is a separate issue with shielding but ideally the shielding direction should conform to the wire directionality. Same with connectors, if they are in fact directional, which they may be. Who knows? So, to summarize, all wire is directional and all wire in everything should be controlled for directionality, speaker internal wire, transformers, capacitors, internal component wiring. You name it.

Last night I swapped the direction of my digital coax cable between the CD transport and DAC. It sounds like I’m hearing more detail, even though the cable is now going “against” the direction of the arrow printed on it. 

Think of it like fuses. If you have, say, four fuses in the system and don’t know whether they’re in the right direction or not, check the fuses one at a time by listening for which direction sounds best. It will be easier to do this as you go along. As more fuses are in the right direction the clearer the sound will be. And therefore easier to tell which direction is correct for the last couple fuses. Raise your hand if you still don’t understand.

I'm not sure if any so called hi-end cable manufacture uses shielding in
their speaker cables. I'm pretty sure AQ doesn't. I do know the Clear Day
Shotgun and Double Shotgun speakers cables don't.

Making speaker cables with shields is probably not a good idea, too much capacitance in the Power Amp load can make the output stage oscillate. Shielding is used in the interconnects to make sure interference doesn't get amplified with the signal, the amplified signal in the speaker wire is a high enough voltage for most, if not all interference to be lost in the noise floor.

To clarify, the interconnects in my example have no shield at all. Just 3 solid-core wires (1 signal and 2 for return) with cotton insulation on each wire hand twisted together.  Connectors are eichmann bullets.

Thanks for clarifying, that's what I thought you meant. If you want to take the experiment further you may want to test the interconnects further up the signal chain assuming your preamp has some gain. You'd hear the differences clearer also if you experiment with them between a turntable and MC/MM amplifier, the additional gain and RIAA equalisation would certainly highlight mains interference as well as testing to see whether the perceived effect of directionality increases.

To clarify, the interconnects in my example have no shield at all. Just 3 solid-core wires (1 signal and 2 for return) with cotton insulation on each wire hand twisted together.  Connectors are eichmann bullets.

Quick, what planet are you on?

OMG 😲 My new favorite thread! 

Jea48, just curious, did you forget to take your smart pill 💊 today? All (rpt all) stranded and solid core cables should be controlled for directionality, you know, to honor the inherent directionality of wire. What is it about that idea that puzzles you 😳 and gives you so much heartburn? 🔥