03-10-13: Zd542
Measuring is just one scientific method. If all we are looking to do is confirm that 2 cables can sound different from each other, a well conducted listening test is just as valid.
I'd like to add to Zd's characteristically knowledgeable and level-headed post the self-evident point that analysis also has its place in the scientific method.
To cite a few examples, the first two of which are somewhat extreme but not completely unrealistic:
It is easily possible to demonstrate by analysis that the difference between 10 foot interconnect cables having capacitances of 50 pf/ft and 10 pf/ft is likely be audible to those with unimpaired hearing if used at the output of a resistor-based passive preamp having typically high output impedance.
It is easily possible to demonstrate by analysis that the difference between a 20 foot speaker cable having high inductance and one having low inductance is likely to be audible to those with unimpaired hearing if used with electrostatic speakers whose impedance descends to 1 ohm or so at 20 kHz (which is not uncommon).
It is easily possible to demonstrate by analysis that differences in phono cable capacitance will have a profound effect on the sonics of moving magnet cartridges.
So cable differences can be audible. The question then becomes how much less extreme can the circumstances become before reports of claimed differences are sufficiently implausible that they are more likely to be the result of the placebo effect or failure to recognize and control extraneous variables.
Obviously the answer will vary considerably from system to system and from listener to listener, and each listener will have to make his or her own judgment about that. My bottom-line feeling, however, is that as with most things in life the best answer is likely to fall somewhere in the middle ground between the ideological extremes.
Issues such as whether one think cables are priced fairly or how much of a difference they make, is for another thread. That stuff is just personal opinion; everyones answer is valid.
Not sure that those should necessarily be treated as separate issues. It often seems to be implicit in the arguments of those at the "believer" end of the spectrum that the existence of differences suggests that "more expensive" has a high likelihood of being "better." And the basic motivation of those at the "skeptic" end of the spectrum often seems to be to dispel that belief.
For the several reasons I expressed in my earlier posts in this thread, and perhaps for other more cynical reasons that could be cited, my belief is that the correlation between performance and price, while significantly greater than zero, should not be expected to be a strong one.
Best regards,
-- Al
