Have I lost my mind? I swear that I am hearing differences in the direction I hook up my interconnect cables between my preamp and power amp. These are custom built solid core silver cables with Eichmann bullet plugs. There is no shield so this is not a case where one end of the cable’s shield is grounded and the other isn’t.
There are four ways ways to hook them up: Right: Forward. Left: Forward. Right: Backward. Left: Backward Right: Forward. Left: Backward Right: Backward. Left: Forward.
There is no difference in construction between forward and backward, but here are my observations:
When they are hooked up forward/backward there appears to be more airy-ness and what appears to be a slight phase difference. When hooked up forward/forward or backward/backward, the image seems more precise like they are more in phase. The difference between forward/forward and backward/backward is that one seems to push the soundstage back a little bit while the other brings it towards you more.
What could possibly cause this? Does it have something to do with the way the wire is constructed and how the grains are made while drawn through a die? Am I imagining this? Have I completely lost my mind?
I am willing to test on any system you wish to configure ...
Let's see if the group can agree about what that system might look like. Then you could try to assemble something comparable at one of the major audio shows, and invite Audiogon readers and others in to participate.
- Buried in some ... probably a lot of my messages back and forth with Geoffkait was that I was specifically referring to, and I used these words, analog audio signals and "non time dependent digital signals". I used those words very specifically as most DACs today either reclock the external optical or digital serial audio data and/or they are USB based and hence generate a local clock for audio. I specifically took time dependent digital signals out of my discussion, because as I clearly stated above as well, MHz level digital signals have 10's and 100's of MHz bandwidth and hence are subject to transmission line effects.
Let's add the most obvious reason in the case you provided, RCA connectors are not controlled impedance connectors which is why most good equipment has BNC connector now. (p.s. probably even before that article you linked was written, I was modifying my equipment to better match source/load impedance to the cable, a specific cable, to minimize jitter). DACs were not nearly as good back then.
AND, I never said the energy travels back and forth from source to load. That is how you are interpreting it, and that is wrong. I said it travels both directions in the loop, and that electrons flow through the whole loop, which means they are impeded by and pass through the interconnect (or fuse) in both directions, equally, outside of transmission line effects, which don't come into play at analog audio frequencies coupled with SNR and mismatch timing/amplitudes. I will throw in that skin effects in any tolerable cable at audio frequencies, SNR, loading is also a null proposition w.r.t audible differences.
Here is the thing jea48, the claim, at least from MFRs, many users are more honest, is that they ALWAYS improve. My $100 one is good, $1000 amazing, and $10000 totally stupendous, and you have to admit MFRs and users make these claims.
Tell me, how do you match said cables to equipment that has tolerances in the few percent range? .... and claim "always better"?
Care to start a thread? I don't mean that facetiously. As I said, I am willing to fund, it, but not all of it. I think we would need local assistance for good quality equipment. I can think of a few in the industry who would help with things like ensuring the acoustic treatment is done well, speaker placement near optimum. I would not want to enter any of my potential bias into it.
We could start a GoFundMe. It either dies on the vine, or it goes through.
I am willing to test on any system you wish to configure ...
Let's see if the group can agree about what that system might look like. Then you could try to assemble something comparable at one of the major audio shows, and invite Audiogon readers and others in to participate.
roberttcan I spent some time yesterday trying to find any credible evidence that the EM wave flows back and as it moves from the source to the load at near the speed of light, (in a vacuum). I found nothing. And I mean nothing at all that supported your claim. Not even the slightest mention.
>>>>>Wikipedia to the rescue! How often we see this type of statement by a skeptic - “I could find nothing at all that supported your claim.” That’s gold, Jerry, gold! 🤗 But you’d be sure and tell us if you did, right? Wink, wink!
@geoffkait
LOL
Tell you what Geoff, LOL. I’ll pay you $5 bucks, (payable by PayPal gift), if you can find any credible evidence that says the signal energy EM wave travels both directions as it flows at near the speed of light from the source to the load.
Geoff, there’s an easy $5 bucks to be made.....
>>>>>>Thanks, anyway, I prefer not to get involved in speculation. 🤡 But now that you mention it, it appears we’re back where we started about a month ago, actually longer. I’ve been asking, even gave some pop quizzes, if anyone knows or would like to speculate exactly WHAT specifically gets distorted and/or gets noisier when the wire or fuse is in the “wrong direction.” What is the “audio signal” prior to the speakers? Obviously after that is the acoustic audio waveform. Even die hard skeptics can offer answers. You don’t have to believe in directionality at all. I am including the power cord, too. What is the AUDIO SIGNAL? Nobody seems to know. Here are the candidates, feel free to add others,
1. The audio waveform 2. The current 3. The voltage 4. The power 5. The timing 6. The electromagnetic wave 7. Electrons 8. Photons 9. The Poynting vectors, E and H (electric and magnetic fields)
the audio signal is the moment to moment differential. The intelligence or information in or of the system, over time, so to speak.
It’s the given changes in the state of the system, in relation to one another, in a specific direction in time, as a sequenced record.
Just one way of potentially many to think of it.
as for mr robertcan: Our patent folks, quite educated in the sciences and in patent knowledge, thought our patent made for the biggest change in electrical conduction in the area of small signal and/or transmission lines, in at least the past 150 years.
I won't say what I want to say, so I will paraphrase. Absolutely Nothing At All. It is a whimsical attempt to use a book of knowledge one person has in one area to justify a potential phenomena, i.e. that fuses are directional, in the framework of audio equipment (debatable of course).
If fuses do really have directionality w.r.t. detectable sound reproduction (repeatable, testable, verified), then a whole host of other common electrical and electro-thermal properties are far more likely.
jetter1,402 posts10-24-2019 5:27pmJEA and all, WTF. For those of us who have no clue and maybe a bit less interest, what does the answer to above mean to the sound of the music?
Somebody and I won’t mention any names didn’t understand Roberttcan the question. The question has little do with directionality per se but is a very general question. What is the audio signal? Hint - it’s not the audio waveform. Or is it? You tell me. There are many reasons why the audio signal can be degraded or improved, no? Better interconnects, better power cords, better amplifier, isolation and other tweaks. So, gentle readers, what change occurs to the “audio signal” that would improve or degrade it? In order to answer that question you have to know what the “audio signal” is, specifically, one would imagine.
geoffkait17,701 posts10-24-2019 6:32pmSomebody and I won’t mention any names didn’t understand Roberttcan the question. The question has nothing do with directionality but is a very general question. What is the audio signal? Hint - it’s not the audio waveform. Or is it? You tell me. There are many reasons why the audio signal can be degraded or improved, no? Better interconnects, better power cords, better amplifier, isolation and other tweaks. So, gentle readers, what change occurs to the “audio signal” that would improve or degrade it? In order to answer that question you have to know what the audio signal is one would think.
... but on a serious matter, do you even know many of the designers of these most contentious products in the audio industry?
Some of them really know their stuff. Some of them I think would have trouble screwing in a light bulb without a Youtube video. However, they are really good marketers and hence they move a lot of products.... and they have a whole army of GK's to help them :-)
Just an additional thing to think about, my sister is a Neuro Researcher who spends a considerable amount of time listening to neurons fire in the brain. The cables she uses were over 100,000, are submerged in liquid nitrogen, and are absolutely directional.
The cables she uses are heavily shielded due to the extreme, extreme low signal levels, and that is why they are shielded, not because the underlying physical cable is directional.
Are you saying the cables are submerged in liquid nitrogen in use?
So ... a theory was posited (well stated as fact), that the signal being AC (changing polarity) mattered not w.r.t. cable being not directional, and that cables were directional because energy only flowed in one direction, towards the load. Claims were made w.r.t. current in speaker wires, and in AC wires that the current moving away from the load had no audible effect, and hence could be ignored and because of this, interconnects were directional. I expect most on this forum would not be in a position to agree with this or refute it.
The first statement about energy transfer direction is correct, as the energy flows towards the load along the Poynting vector. The Pointing vector defined the flow of energy in an electrical circuit. The second statement is not correct. It sounds right based on the first statement but it is not.
The Poynting vector is the spacially integrated cross-product of the E (electric) and B (magnetic) fields, over the WHOLE circuit, and that everywhere current is flowing (in a wire), there are E and B fields, meaning that EVERYWHERE current flows impacts the Poynting vector. If you didn’t have current flowing both towards the speakers AND away from the speakers, you wouldn’t have E and B fields and you wouldn’t have a Poynting vector and you wouldn’t have energy transfer from the source to the load. The current traveling to the speakers and away from the speakers are equally important in defining the Poynting vector.
At a macro level, the Poynting vector is the same for both polarities of the AC signal, as the E-field is structurally the same, but as opposed to that justifying interconnects are "directional", the opposite are true outside of transmission line effects.
You can ignore the current traveling in the direction away from the speakers, I.e., toward the wall, since that direction of current flow is not (rpt not) audible. The only direction that’s audible for any wire is the one toward the speakers. It is the speakers that ultimately produce the sound you hear. So, it’s the “quality” of the current traveling toward the speakers that is the issue. That’s why fuses sound better in one direction, worse in the other direction in AC circuits and DC circuits. As Old Blue Eyes sez, that’s life.
>>>>While that’s true, and for virtually all cables and power cords - the current alternates. 🔛 But you can ignore 😳 the current when it’s traveling in the direction toward the wall outlet. 🔜 The only direction we care about is the one that drives the speakers. That’s the direction that is audible.
@roberttcan. Say someone takes a homeopathic remedy for chronic pain. The remedy has been tested and the results are it contains no pain relieving properties. Yet the person taking the remedy swears he is pain free and feels great. Are you stating he’s wrong and he is not pain free, he’s just fooling himself and he actually IS in pain and feels terrible?
n another thread, you linked a comment about capacitors. There are some audiophiles who believe capacitors cannot make a differences. However, for capacitors, we can show that the dielectric absorption effects are at least large enough that audible effects are possible. There may be electromechanical effects due to the large plate area that also comes into play
If one were to accept what Roger states, then there's another way to look at cables and the possibility that we don't fully grasp the hows and whys of it all.
roberttcan There is an assumption (often a self assumption) that certain "audiophiles" have golden ears, and hence they use all these "tweaks" because they have super-human hearing and can hear differences the rest of us cannot. The reality is that it is equally plausible that what they really have is a higher susceptibility to suggestion, self suggestion, and confirmation bias. At this point is it hard to argue that the latter is not the more likely case, as most of these claims fall apart when the ability to see/know the change is remove from the equation.
>>>>Well shut my mouth and call me corn pone! I wouldn’t have believed if I didn’t see it with my own eyes. The best use of Strawman arguments all week - and there’s been a bunch, frequently by you know who. I don’t think I’ve seen so many logical fallacies jammed into one paragraph. Bravo! 🤗 A mite presumptuous, don’t you think?
robertcon- "
There is an assumption (often a self assumption) that certain "audiophiles" have golden ears, and hence they use all these "tweaks" because they have super-human hearing and can hear differences the rest of us cannot. The reality is that it is equally plausible that what they really have is a higher susceptibility to suggestion, self suggestion, and confirmation bias. At this point is it hard to argue that the latter is not the more likely case, as most of these claims fall apart when the ability to see/know the change is remove from the equation." AND, from the Something For The Fuse Guys thread:
"........but when someone brings up a group, made of up actual audio researchers, experts, and others who are viewed by their peers as experts, that that group is suddenly of "no value"." I especially appreciated the opening line, about, "self-assumption", AS IF the poster was free of such things, after the egregious, unmitigated hubris, they've exhibited. I suppose, everyone is expected to believe, "susceptibility to suggestion" and expectation or, "confirmation bias" MUST be nonexistent, within Bobbie's cadre? What about peer pressure? Imagine one of them, admitting to actually hearing a difference, let alone an improvement, knowing what they would face. Oh, wait: those guys(the Naysayer Cadre) are COMPLETELY impartial(snort of derision). Or- is it possible, that there’s ever been a panel, selected from a completely random pool of music lovers, that have never met or compared notes, as relates to their listening preferences/biases? And: had their aural acuity tested, prior to listening? I’d be mildly interested in the results myself, were that the case!
.... it is the pundits who need to take said blind tests and prove they can hear a difference ...
Nobody here is obligated to "prove" anything to you or anyone else. Of course, you’re not obligated to accept any of their representations, either. This is a hobbyist’s group, where everyone is free to share their experiences.
Controlled double blind tests are right out of the Middle Ages. The same sort of thing was employed to determine whether a woman was a witch or not. She was tied with a rope and thrown into the river. If she floated she wasn’t a witch. If she sank she was a witch. It’s the same thing with a double blind test. If the test fails the device under test is a hoax. Or so they say. We know how “they” is. It used to be the Church back in Medieval Times, now it’s Science. We’ve been double blinded ....by Science! 😎
robertcon- "
Your lack of knowledge of how to design experiments to eliminate bias does neither validates your last statement NOR invalidates the fact that it is the pundits who need to take said blind tests and prove they can hear a difference since they are the ones making the claim. No need to worry about the preferences, biases or experience since the only people taking the test are the ones making the claim."
The above is simply another of your blatant shows of hubris(and attempted obfuscation). ie: You know absolutely nothing, about me or how much of what I have studied. Unlike you and your obvious insecurities, I have nothing to prove or promote. My only agenda, is to encourage others, not to take someone else's theories as fact/truth and to actually test things/listen for themselves, with their own ears and on their own systems. It's the only way they'll ever know, if whatever they're curious about actually makes a noticeable difference, TO THEM.
Breaking Gnus!! 🐃 🐃 🐃 More good stuff from the author of....you guessed it! Zen and the Art of Debunkery. The terms professional debunkers and “knee-jerk skeptics” are not intended to disparage anyone here on this thread, of course. 🙄
“While informed skepticism is an integral part of the scientific method, professional debunkers — often called “kneejerk skeptics” — tend to be skeptics in name only, and to speak with little or no authority on the subject matter of which they are so passionately skeptical. At best, debunkers will occasionally expose other people’s errors; but for the most part they purvey their own brand of pseudoscience, fall prey to their own superstition and gullibility, and contribute little to the actual advancement of knowledge. As such, they well and truly represent the Right Wing of science.
To throw this reprobate behavior into bold — if somewhat comic — relief, I have composed a useful “how-to” guide for aspiring debunkers. This manual includes special sections devoted to debunking extraterrestrial intelligence, alternative healing methods, astrology and “free energy.” I spotlight these fields not because I necessarily support all related claims, but because they are among the most aggressively and thoughtlessly debunked subjects in the whole of modern history.
Many of the debunking strategies laid bare here have been adapted nearly verbatim from the classic works of history’s most remarkable debunkers. Though they often cross the threshold of absurdity under their own steam, I confess I have nudged a few across it myself for the sake of making a point.
As for the rest, their fallacious reasoning, fanatical bigotry, twisted logic and sheer goofiness will sound frustratingly familiar to those who have dared explore beneath oceans of denial and disingenuousness, and have attempted in good faith to report their observations.”
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