Who says cables don't make a difference?


Funny, after all these years, people still say things like "you wasted all that money on cables". 
There are still those who believe cables don't make a difference.
I once did marketing for a cable line I consider to be about the best-Stealth Audio Cables. 
One CES, I walked the rooms with the designer/owner, Serguei Timachev. He carried a pair of his then new Indra interconnects. Going from room to room he asked the room runners to replace their source to preamp IC with the Indra. There was not one that was not completely flabbergasted and said that the Indras blew away what they were using. That was the skyrocketing of Indra and Stealth. The Indra became one of the best reviewed cables ever.
Serguei now makes the Sakra-an IC that blows away the Indra!
I don't understand why some still do not value cables as much as I.
mglik
All of this is subjective right? Is there any data that supports the gain or loss of quality?
The last 5 scag zero turn mowers I had I didn't baby them they ran flat out from day one. Break-in myth still being peddled. 
Weird, you seem triggered by anyone who dares question your world view. You seem rather fixated. Perhaps you should worry more about the lack of useful information in your posts and less about what others post.
boxer125,006 posts07-05-2020 9:52pm

Weird... These are the same qualifications that "atdavid" had. Now go away.

Dow Jones,
The last 5 motorcycles I've owned (3 BMW's, 1 Moto Guzzi, 1 Victory Twin) have all required break in. 

Mitch2,
Is the answer they are all deaf?

robertdid,
" I will put my listening skills up against yours any day. This is what I do .... Except I listen and measure. I even have other people listen ... Lots and lots of people over many years. I have even written papers on critical Subjective listening."

Weird... These are the same qualifications that "atdavid" had. Now go away. 



What is it today? Statements in all the threads became bizarre. I though full moon was last night.
I haven’t heard of engine break-in , in at least 25 or 30 years. They used to have break-in oil. That’s really going back.
One time I was test driving a brand new BMW M3, the car salesman sitting next to told me if I ever rev the engine above 4K, he would stop me immediately and would drive me back to the stealership.
That is weird! Especially with all those moving parts in cables. Just like a car engine.
The all have moving parts for sure.  Also the are all made of the same stuffs - electrons, neutrons, protons ...  which can all be affected by heat, frictions and so on.  
I haven't heard of engine break-in , in at least 25 or 30 years. They used to have break-in oil. That's really going back. 
@andy2 That is weird! Especially with all those moving parts in cables. Just like a car engine.
For some reasons, people believe in engine break-in, but not in cable break-in ... like these two exist in different universe and obeying different laws of physics.  

These threads all come to the same ... may I say happy endings lols.
mitch2,

"I am a little disappointed nobody ever has answered my question about the Finns. "
So it was not Nokia? With their "Connecting people" slogan?
Are we not all friends endowed with reason?

It is important to keep the humor and the "wit" without attacking anybody....

I apologize for my rant but.... 
I'd rather burn my money then waste it on shakti stones and other ridiculous tweaks.

A woman who consult an astrologer is in the same boat that the professional debunker... They has faith, a positive faith in one case, a negative faith in the other case...

I am a true sceptic, i study....And for Shakti stone and other tweaks i simply try with success at low cost to reverse engineering them.... 

Opinions without any studies or any experiments are not of any use .... Sorry....
Wow, step away for a few hours to have some actual fun and it appears this thread has started to get interesting with believers and naysayers lining up like two dodgeball teams.
I am a little disappointed nobody ever has answered my question about the Finns.
I'd rather burn my money then waste it on shakti stones and other ridiculous tweaks.
Nothing like a guy who sells "Magic Pebbles"
Before mocking someone try it....

Put a big shungite stone on your amplifier and after that put a big chunk of quartz.... Listen to the difference, and call that your first lesson in non conventional audio...

I apologize, but i am tired of childish mockeries and games...
So I have said before and will continue to say until contrary evidence comes along that the people who think there's no difference, well they are right. For them there is no difference. Until they learn to differentiate there never will be. Because its not a matter of psychology, or opinion. Its a question of skill. And skills can be learned. If you want to be a good listener, its a skill you can learn. If you want to. But you do have to make the effort.
Good post....

Auditory hability are measured in Hertz perceived or not..... Listening hability are not measurable in this way....

All those debunkers are lazy or simplistic, when they equate perception of grain with illusion...  :)

roberttdid
272 posts07-05-2020 4:18pmOne word Mahgister, religion.


And all the testimonies in this direction cannot be explained by an induced mass placebo effect taking place in several phases ...
Do you think that my work to increase my S.Q. at low cost by myself is religion?

What do you think i think about your blinders? I think" religion"... A tech diploma or even a thesis in physics dont make someone immune to dogmas....
It is possible to make an error, especially when multiple threads follow very similar ideas.

I would say that roberttdid's mistake was a silly mistake, but still just a mistake. It happens.
Too late. Its simply not possible to ever recover from having so totally blown it. You might as well have said, "I’m Joe Biden’s husband, Joe Biden!" Just no possible way to ever recover from such a blunder. You can only go from hilarious to pathetic. Mission accomplished!
Miller, that you would even create this thread to me just shows insecurity about your position.

Uh, he didn’t create this thread. 
Hilarious.
"Until one day I come home after having been to Definitive, put on a CD, and its Michael Ruff Poor Boy which is a superb Sheffield tube recording and it suddenly hits me THIS IS IT! "

Yes, good recordings may sound better than bad ones. Who would have known?





Uh, he didn’t create this thread. Snap out of it, Mr. Smarty Pants 👖 
Miller, that you would even create this thread to me just shows insecurity about your position. If it was so obvious posts like this would never exist.
Nothing like a guy who sells "Magic Pebbles" ... Which are literally pebbles, probably of the aquarium variety in a bag as an audio tweak, and another guy who thinks cables will behave the same in all systems which is of course impossible (unless there is no audible difference).  You two are like the negative of a call to authority. Call to ridiculousness?   Perhaps if all cables matter proponents had even 1 .. just one spokesperson who could talk in any manner other than handwaving and "just trust me" sentences, you would have a better half leg to stand on.


Miller I will put my listening skills up against yours any day. This is what I do .... Except I listen and measure. I even have other people listen ... Lots and lots of people over many years. I have even written papers on critical Subjective listening.  This tired argument about not hearing good enough is just that, tired, especially when coming from a group that as a whole has severely reduced hearing capacity.

millercarbon
Then again it may be due to nothing more than garden variety lack of listening skills.

>>>>>Not to mention the garden variety of pseudo scientists. Like garden variety of snakes. 🤗
Then again it may be due to nothing more than garden variety lack of listening skills.  

I've written many times before about how when I first went component shopping back around 1991 I could not hear any difference between CD players and transports. One time I brought my Magnavox CDB650 to Definitive and they let me compare side by side with a $5k Wadia. Sounded the same to me. Another time about a week later same store a guy drove up from Portland to audition two CD players and was right there and we listened to both and he said sorry but they sound the same to me! 

This went on for months, me struggling to figure out what it is people are hearing. Until one day I come home after having been to Definitive, put on a CD, and its Michael Ruff Poor Boy which is a superb Sheffield tube recording and it suddenly hits me THIS IS IT! Finally I make the connection! 

From then on, in seemingly no time at all, it was easier and easier to hear differences between all kinds of things. Not just components and wires and cones but recordings. 

Hand in hand with this improvement in listening skills was the ability to be able to say how the sounds are different. Looking back on it, the words actually came first. Reading Robert Harley has a whole section in his book. But its one thing to read about grain, how it can be coarse or fine, all gradations clear and pristine and then on to liquid and then on to syrupy, but its quite another to actually make the connection in your mind to realize what these things really do mean. 

So I have said before and will continue to say until contrary evidence comes along that the people who think there's no difference, well they are right. For them there is no difference. Until they learn to differentiate there never will be. Because its not a matter of psychology, or opinion. Its a question of skill. And skills can be learned. If you want to be a good listener, its a skill you can learn. If you want to. But you do have to make the effort.
It's being able to actually quantify these differences arrived at through characterization why people who understand the tech will accept audible differences in some cases and not others.  There is a reason companies like Kimber and Mogami list electrical specs.

They should be able to measure Home Depot zip cord and ANY cable from any other manufacturer and prove that the output from any of them is exactly the same as the output from all of them.


We also do things like hang cables a few inches from a speaker at high volume and measure the signal with a typical preamp/amp impedance to show that vibration typically has no impact. Maybe we measure the voltage on a cable just sitting there with a typical preamp/amp impedance to show that it is near 0 debunking crazy notions of "static" voltage that require burn in to fix.
One word Mahgister, religion.


And all the testimonies in this direction cannot be explained by an induced mass placebo effect taking place in several phases ....

Most medical equipment will use fairly inexpensive shielded AC cables but that is as much to prevent noise into other equipment as noise into the one with the cord.
Most medical wire is application specific and there are no voodoo claims, there are hard scientific reasons, measurements and results. Much of the requirements are purely mechanical, but some are for extremely low signal levels with high impedance where noise susceptibility is much much higher than anything in audio.

I know for a fact that the MD's have moved beyond zip cord and Belkin plug strips.
Why, if everything comes out the same?

@denverfred 
Why, if everything comes out the same?
Here are three reasons to consider:
  • Persistent and proficient cable marketing
  • Illusory truth effect, and finally
  • Investiphobia (the fear of not "keeping up with the Joneses")
IMCE there is one documented, peer reviewed study of audio cabling that has failed to make an appearance in any of our favorite magazines (or those of the medical profession?). Where is the tech/skeptic proof that ALL cables sound the same? They should be able to measure Home Depot zip cord and ANY cable from any other manufacturer and prove that the output from any of them is exactly the same as the output from all of them.
I would at least read their study.
I wonder: Do the docs in the cardiac cath-lab read mags like "Absolute Thrombosis" or "Stentophile" to keep up? I know for a fact that the MD's have moved beyond zip cord and Belkin plug strips.
Why, if everything comes out the same?
Truly people invest money in cables, and they make a little difference, a little one compared to any other way to improve our system....I know it by experience... But cables can also make a negative difference also.... This is particularly true for low or mid hi-fi audio system but even for top of the game one also....

Dont pay too much, choose them right, and forget them to turn your thinking to REAL audio problems to solve...

It is not necessary if  you are deceived or frustrated to equate all cables with lamp cord either....

:)


mglik,

"Funny, after all these years, people still say things like "you wasted all that money on cables".
There are still those who believe cables don’t make a difference."


You’re right, I’m one of them.

After having wasted £100s on various cables to no effect (other than damaging the RCAs on the back of my CD player and amplifier) I don’t find it funny it all.

This is now the oldest scam in audio, and buyers need to be aware.

You can have the flashiest, thickest, tightest and most unwieldy cables possible but all you really seek to gain are damaged terminals.

That's not the difference I was looking for.
" Renounce or die "-Pope inquisitor

I renounce..... :)


By the way his cables are not sold for peanuts..... :)

mahgister,


"Which customer will not ask for his money back for a cable he dont like, after 200 hours of listening , if he was paid many hundred dollars, even thousand dollars ?"

Not exactly cables (I do not put much value on them), but I have not returned some things I did not like, regardless of cost. It would not have been worth my time, effort, energy, whatever, at that time.



Aside from a basic business approach and the well know phenomenon there is always a certain percentage that never return anything the 200 hour or however many hour break in  gives the customer time to get used to the product. I had a speaker manufacturer tell me it took a couple hundred hours break in, for me not the speakers they would be optimal when I got them since they test them all before shipping. 

mahgister,

I am not sure why he does it, but delaying the possibility of return does make it less convenient and less likely to happen.


Any manufacturer has to find something to make her/his products stand out from the crowd. Cable burn-in may be one of those things. It may be a trouble to do it, but it is a part of the business.


It takes a lots of people at Coca-Cola to arrange for billboards, TV ads, etc. to make you feel connected to those smiling people drinking their Coca-Cola. It is a trouble, but they have been doing it for decades with one goal. To sell Coca-Cola.


It does help if manufacturer believes in what she/he sells so she/he may be more honestly enthusiastic about the product. If it were not about burn-in, what else would we be talking when mentioning Morrow cables? You see, even in these few posts, the hype and talk is about the burn-in. The story. The selling point.

You can return any cable from any company immediately after one hour listening if you are not glad with them...Money back... Then the burn-in advice will not save you much returns....

Altough your explanation seem rational in marketing term, the trouble of all this process is pain in the ass even for Morrow....And it is not the majority of companies out there that advise us to let the cable burn in....It is only a few....

Think about all the troubles associated with this "useless" process only to bet that a few customers will not ask for the money after 200 hundred hours of unsatisfaction?

I cannot think that Morrow lied to all customers for a few bucks, i think that he love cables, make it a business, is proud of his cables and listen to all kind of cables to compare with his own....The more probable way to explain this burn-in clause, is to think that he experiment it himself at beginning....Like me when i purchase one at my own surprize....

 Which customer will not ask for his money back for a cable he dont like, after 200 hours of listening , if he was paid many hundred dollars, even thousand dollars ?





mahgister,


I do not know anything about value of those cables, but do propose that one of the reasons for that approach is simply business.

Mr. Morrow is in the business of earning money from cable sales. If not, he would have been giving them for free. In this very competitive cable market, just like any other manufacturer, he needs to distance his products from others'. Emphasis on cable burn-in may be that approach.


Not having money-back return policy would make many potential customers skip his offerings so it would not be a good idea. Understandingly, he would be better off with less returns. Offering return policy, but making sure that it is discouraged under the explanation "you need time to settle" or whatever else, could yield multiple benefits.

"Story" (burn-in) with the cable, return policy (not to alienate potential customers), and a few hurdles to skip over while trying to exercise one's right to return, and you may get good sales with less returns. It is not an unusual business/marketing approach even without starting to talk about any real/perceived functionality. In fact, why would he do it any other way?

Glupson i thought about that advantage too.... But think about the trouble you give to yourself for 30 years in the business, burn in your cables and giving to others the same trouble KNOWING that this is bullshit?

In all probability the few return cables you spare yourself with dont equal all this trouble...

the only explanation that hit the road for me is that Mr. Morrow experiment that himself and know that for his cables the burn-in is not a myth.... This is the only reasonnable explanation...

And all the testimonies in this direction cannot be explained by an induced mass placebo effect taking place in several phases ....

By the way in these 2 hundred hours the cable audible effect pass indeed trough different stages that any customer can observe....
"Now suppose you are Mr. Morrow himself , why in the hell ! would you give to yourself this trouble and to yours customers too, advising them to burn the cables they sold to you or burning them for them... Why ?"
There may be a few reasons and one may be marketing. You have 60 days to return cables, but you are not allowed to return them before day #30. It makes it less likely that you will return it at all even for sheer inconvenience, missing deadlines, forgetfulness, and whatever else. Once you decide to skip though those hoops and return some of the cables there is a 10% restocking fee. That may set you back $700 for speaker cables (up to 3 meter length).
Lao Tse said that you can fill with bunk even a Ming vase.....

:)

«Bunk on the soil is only mud, but in a Ming vase it is really bunk»- Groucho Marx thinking about Wittgenstein.