What’s your vote for the most ridiculous, overpriced, and useless tweak?

OregonCaliorniaPapaDoc-I will ask you one last time-what did you pay $5,000 for? Since you have such confidence in the value of your purchase, why not unwrap the package and find out wha the heck you paid for? A bundle of nano-fibers or a bundle of cat hair or a large Russian vintage oil and paper capacitor wrapped up in squirrel fur?

I understand rabbits are directional. You might check that.

"I tried smoking rabbits as a teenager. I found them hard to keep lit."
You obviously were not doing it right...  

I have the Furutech demaganetizer (demag alpha). Anyone who listens to LPs or 45s, who doesn’t use one (or something equivalent) is only hearing maximum 90-95 percent of what’s on their records (varies per record). Subtract another 5% if you don’t use the Furutech SK-Filter.
As for PPT, all their stuff is just the best you can get. 

^^^ I tried smoking rabbits as a teenager. I found them hard to keep lit.

cryogenically treating speaker cables. Back in around late '80's or early '90's cryoing rifle barrels was all the rage. Had one cryoed and it was 100 bucks pissed away. In spite of anecdotal evidence there is no proof that it does anything.

Frank,
If you look at the first comment to the OP, it makes the very same point as yours. So here we are, 144 comments later, back to where we started.
Full circle, full stop.
j

fsonicsmith sez ...

"1) anything from Perfect Path Technologies"

I guess at this point we can assume then, that you have contacted PPT and accepted their offer for a 90 day, money-back, no obligation trial on their products, have given them a fair trial, and then found them to be unacceptable to you, correct? So, please enlighten us ... which products did you try that you found to be ineffective in your system?

I’ll wait.

Thanks ...

Frank

This is a Hobson's choice. How is one to know without either resorting to pure speculation or admitting that you were a rube who paid a boatload for fairy dust? You can't win either way. I prefer the former so I nominate based on common sense and my own sense of reality;
1) anything from Perfect Path Technologies
2) this; https://www.musicdirect.com/equipment/furutech-demag-lp-demagnetizer
But at the end of the day, isn't any power cable priced above maybe a thousand bucks and isn't any interconnect above maybe $2,000 and any speaker cable above say $3000 a tweak-a ridiculously expensive tweak? What about $5,000 PC's and 10K speaker cables? Expensive wire to me is a tweak. The highest priced wires are the highest priced tweaks. I think wire makes a difference. A lot of tweaks make differences. 
I have another one for you-crazy fancy casework and faceplates to amps, preamps, phono stages, any exotic piece of equipment. Take D'agostino gear encased in jewel-like outer-clad. It's F-you bling bling. It's a tweak because you can look at it and believe that it sounds better based on how it looks. Any honest manufacturer will tell you that fancy casework adds more the final price of the product than any other aspect of the piece. Pro-ject, iFi, and at one time Musical Fidelity realized this and captured a market eschewing the bling-bling. Steve McCormack has always stayed away from fancy casework. Oh well, I digress. 

@flapjack,

" 'You ever try and ask your power company to correct the direction of the wires connecting your house to the local transformer?'

Yes, the restraining order is still in effect I believe...."


Thanks for that!

A great example of what can happen when a self appointed expert offers an appeal to the imagination entirely devoid of method, experiment and most importantly, evidence. 

The result? A true laugh out loud moment.

Audiophilia doesn't get much funnier than this.. 

" You ever try and ask your power company to correct the direction of the wires connecting your house to the local transformer?"

Yes, the restraining order is still in effect I believe....

That reminds me. I’ve got a million (count em!) candle power adjustable strobe light I use to improve CDs. Haven’t used it in years. It’s a makeshift “photon cannon” in the style of Nespa Pro strobe light CD device. Just set the thing for 100 flashes per minute and expose the CD to the strobe light for 60 seconds. It will treat about 8 CDs simultaneously. Cannot beat with stick!

A cheap tweak.  Installing red light bulbs in your listing room improves the sound.  Ha.

Nobody can understand what he cannot at first, or be it at last, imagine as a possibility... Alas! An answer for a question we never ask for, seems to some of us like an insult...But why not trying,experimenting and going for the unexpected ? Tweaks are only fun and rewarding if you make them for yourself... It is not necessary to buy anything, only to create for yourself...

I’m a little surprised none of the tweakaphobes has mentioned the Quantum Clip. The Re-animator. Hey, If this is going to be a remedial class for advanced tweaks so be it! And the Clever Little Clock chopped liver, I suppose?

http://pwbelectronics.co.uk/product/quantum/quantum.html

It doesn’t make sense that stranded wires are not all in the same direction if the manufacturing process is automated - even without going to the trouble of controlling directionality. Do they dump all the strands in a barrel and pay some guy to grab them one by one? Give me a break! If it doesn’t make sense it’s not true. 

It certainly doesn’t hurt to try reversing interconnects, no matter whether they’re stranded, shielded, unshielded, whatever. Besides, there are other reasons why there’s no guarantee that reversing cables will be audible. We all know what those reasons are, don’t we? 😬 The big boys control the whole process from A to Z, so that interconnects, speaker cables, power cords, HDMI cables will be in the correct direction as marked. It’s not rocket science.

Of course, anyone can ignore directionality, it’s no skin off my nose. It’s just one of those small and sometimes irritating things that separates the high end from everybody else. One wonders, how long it will be before people get smart and control directionality for transformers, internal wiring of components and speakers, capacitors, resistors, ribbon connectors, etc.?

"As I just got through saying you cannot reverse power cords either, obviously. Duh!"

Too late! So, that is what all those sparks were about?

Guys, this is turning into a pissing contest.  No matter how many times you guys go back and forth on each other, Geoffkait will always get the last word in.  Lets get back on topic, shall we?

Well spoken Mr. Geoffkait. I'm perusing this thread for its information and humor.

azbrd
geoffkait,

I’m only quoting the advice you give everyone on this site, to reverse the direction of their wires because they will hear a difference. You never considered that many of use balanced cables and there is no way to do that after the cable is made. In addition, asking the cable manufacture to construct a balanced cable with the “proper” directionality only gets crickets or laughter because they can’t measure OR hear any difference either direction the cable goes.

>>>>I don’t recommend anyone reverse balanced cables. Never did. You’re putting words in my mouth. As you “astutely” observe that would conflict with the direction balanced cables should be connected. As I just got through saying you cannot reverse power cords either, obviously. Duh!

So somehow the AC current between an AMP to a speaker behaves differently than the AC current for power to the amp? BTW, if the signal does not go the opposite direction the AC circuit wont won’t work.

>>>>I certainly did not say that. Do you have reading difficulties? Of course the current goes in both directions. How observant of you.

There may be many people who don’t understand how a CD player or a combustion engine works, for sure there are plenty of people on this forum who give flaky Pseudoscience advice.

>>>>You’re much better at high school name calling than logic. One assumes you have a high school diploma. Maybe not, how should I know? In any case, you should probably stick to comedy.

GeoffKait,

I’m only quoting the advice you give everyone on this site, to reverse the direction of their wires because they will hear a difference. You never considered that many of use balanced cables and there is no way to do that after the cable is made.  In addition, asking the cable manufacture to construct a balanced cable with the “proper” directionality only gets crickets or laughter because they can’t measure OR hear any difference either direction the cable goes.

So somehow the AC current between an AMP to a speaker behaves differently than the AC current for power to the amp?   BTW, if the signal does not go the opposite direction the AC circuit wont work!

There may be many people who don’t understand how a CD player or a combustion engine works, for sure there are plenty of people on this forum who give flaky Pseudoscience advice!

azbrd

Geofkait, how would one reverse the direction of a balanced cable? the ends are different, should i send them back to the company who made them and have the wire direction reversed? Assuming they would not laugh at me how would they prove that they did it without little arrows on the wire??

>>>>The general idea is to control wire and cable directionality during manufacturing. That way you can have your cake 🍰 and eat it too. The cable will then be balanced AND in the correct direction. Otherwise, it’s a compromise. Obviously, you can’t reverse balanced cables or power cords to check on directionality. Duh! 🙄

I recently had to disconnect the main power at my house from the street transformer, i asked the guy from the power company about reversing the wires to get the directionality right and he laughed at me, asked what the hell i was talking about. I mentioned your name Geoff, said you were an expert about wire directionality! Seriously though, he asked how you measured the difference. He also mentioned the fact that AC current goes back and forth at 60HZ so half the time it would be WRONG if wire were directional.

>>>>You measure the difference by measuring the drop in voltage one way, then the other. It’s the direction for which the resistance is less that sounds better. Follow? The AC signal does go back and forth, the power dude was absolutely right about that. But we only care about the signal when it’s traveling toward the speakers. Who cares about the signal going in the opposite direction? 🔛 Hel-loo! That’s why Audioquest controls directionality for their high end power cords. Because in all AC circuits wire is directional. 

It seems the guys who work on AC current every single day have not been trained on wire directionality OR, maybe it just does not exist!

>>>>>So what? People play CDs every day but don’t know that the CD laser is a Quantum device or how quantum physics works. People drive cars every day without knowing how a combustion engine works. 😳 Wire directionality is strictly an audiophile phenomenon. Obviously, electricity “works” in either direction.

Geofkait, how would one reverse the direction of a balanced cable?  the ends are different, should i send them back to the company who made them and have the wire direction reversed?  Assuming they would not laugh at me how would they prove that they did it without little arrows on the wire??

I recently had to disconnect the main power at my house from the street transformer, i asked the guy from the power company about reversing the wires to get the directionality right and he laughed at me, asked what the hell i was talking about.  I mentioned your name Geoff, said you were an expert about wire directionality!  Seriously though, he asked how you measured the difference.  He also mentioned the fact that AC current goes back and forth at 60HZ so half the time it would be WRONG if wire were directional.

It seems the guys who work on AC current every single day have not been trained on wire directionality OR, maybe it just does not exist!

Some of these gullible people that mocks all "tweaks", the bad with the good,wheat and tares, bought the reviews or bought the marketing engineering spins, without knowing that the same product, does not sound the same, in different mechanical audio grid, in different electrical house grid, in different acoustical room grid, in different qualitative information grid... Then instead of experimenting by themselves they changed their gear in so called "upgrade", in the pursuit of an elusive experience of sound and music that was not always only positive,because it is first and foremost necessary to "tweak" the 4 grids, the mechanical,the electrical, the acoustical and the information grid to get optimal results with their actual components... Or you can buy for sure a 100,000 dollars system if you can and lives without any question about "how to get the maximum results with the minimum money ".... And remember that "tweaks" is not a synonym for "snake oil"...My best to all...

The evidence for directionality is in the listening. Empirical evidence, after all, is one of the corner stones of the scientific method. The easiest way to proceed IMHO is to reverse interconnects and see if one way sounds better than the other. Then, if so inclined, you can do the same with speaker cables and fuses. As Bob Dylan says at the end of all his songs, good luck to you.

Geoffkait, prove it to us that wire is directional!  Just cause you say its so does NOT make it a reality.  You ever try and ask your power company to correct the direction of the wires connecting your house to the local transformer?  Interesting these same wires do NOT have little arrows on them to assist with this too.  Its only high prices audio cable that have them.

I forgot to add that I use a shungite plate also....

Nevermind closed spirits without any imagination nor creativity....Blake said to them that they does not have to go to hell, they are hell...

You can spit your sarcasms; today I change my near listening field position and to recreate the cohesiveness of the imaging I use a big dinosaur back-bone,a thin cable,an Herkimer diamond, and a small copper bell; and guess what? My imaging is more cohesive and better than ever in my new listening position... This is not a joke....My best to all...

It would be nice if people were a little more open minded around here. 😀 Now, I’m not saying be so open minded that your brain 🧠 falls out onto the floor. Then we’d have to drag out the squeegees and mop it up.

Or...you could start your own, more “positive” thread. That would pretty much be an entirely different topic, no? I’ve explained my post
 ad nauseam on this thread!

OP, it would have been more positively minded to have a thread that talks about what tweaks people have found to be beneficial.

Anyhow, your thread has thrown up some interesting comments from Geoff and Mahgister, thanks to them.

The cheapest tweak that makes a standard CD sound like an SACD...Spray Armorall on the silver side and wipe it off. Then play. This fills in the microscopic pits in the surface and lessens the laser diffusion....More info comes off the CD . It works!

azbrd91
Directional wire, wire break-in devices and overpriced aftermarket power cords.

>>>>That makes it kind of rough since all wire is directional.

cd318
I’d say 99% of all tweaks are useless and hence likely to be both ridiculous and overpriced at the same time.

>>>That means you believe 1% are not useless. Well, that’s a start. Confucius say trip of thousand miles start with one tweak.

Directional wire, wire break-in devices and overpriced aftermarket power cords.  

I nominate my best friend’s wife

I'd say 99% of all tweaks are useless and hence likely to be both ridiculous and overpriced at the same time.

Can we audiophiles really believe that manufacturers and designers operating in an highly competitive cut throat field would deliberately be ignoring all these easy to implement tweaks which might give them an edge over the competition? 

Oh OK, silly question.

Put me down for a Shun Mook LP clamp when it's back in stock...and I'll take some of that ludicrously priced cable whilst I'm at it, and don't forget those gold plated fuses.

Cryogenics or Voodoo, I don't care I'm just waiting for the Star Wars brand to enter the market - I can really feel the Force.

Thanks for the video.... This discovery of Emoto about water is just confirmed science now by the research of Nobel prize winner Luc Montagner after the great Jacques Benveniste dead by now and crucified and Killed by the likes of Maddox of Nature review.... By the way I am a fan of Sheldrake field... 

I am a disciple of Goethe science understanding.Then the quantum entanglement link between all things goes only in the direction of this genius understanding of nature,he is known but underestimated...My favorite quote is "There is no theory behind phenomena, phenomena are the theory" and this other one : " the history of science is science itself" Goethe was one of the greatest living spirit of the last 2 centuries... It is easy to understand most genius after the fact of their discoveries was made clear and known for every one, but for Goethe it is a little more difficult because understanding him ask for the transformation of the direction of intelligence and consciousness itself and not only intellectual studies...

a link to Montagner discovery after Benveniste :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8VyUsVOic0

Thanks for reading! More on information fields here, short YouTube video, how writing different kinds of messages affect the formation of ice crystals,

https://youtu.be/tAvzsjcBtx8

Geoffkait15,695 posts06-08-2019 1:22pmThe whole story how the Teleportation Tweak works can finally be told.

http://www.machinadynamica.com/machina43.htm

I finally understand what you means by information field...You are right it was missing in my understanding of audio mechanical grid, and electrical, and acoustic......Thanks...

Blu-Tack re-usable adhesive. If you liked play-doh you'll love this stuff. Maybe OK for posters but not for speakers as advertised in a mid-fi catalog.

Yep all good!  😊

glow_worm,

It’s all good. I get your point ‘there is a line where this pursuit ends and hucksterism begins’. 

I read with interest all that is here. The hardest thing to parse is the psychological NEED to hear that it is "better" after spending $$$.
I like DILL; the manufacturer's friend....