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What Does Holographic Sound Like?

And how do you get there? This is an interesting question. I have finally arrived at a very satisfying level of holography in my system. But it has taken a lot of time, effort and money to get there. I wish there had been a faster, easier and less expensive way to get there. But I never found one.

Can you get to a high level of holography in your system with one pair of interconnects and one pair of speaker wires? I don't believe so. I run cables in series. I never found one pair of interconnects and speaker wires that would achieve what has taken a heck of a lot of wires and "tweaks" to achieve. Let alone all the power cords that I run in series. Although I have found one special cable that has enabled the system to reach a very high level of holography -- HiDiamond -- I still need to run cables in series for the sound to be at its holographic best.

There are many levels of holography. Each level is built incrementally with the addition of one more wire and one more "tweak". I have a lot of wires and "tweaks" in my system. Each cable and each "tweak" has added another level to the holography. Just when I thought things could not get any better -- which has happened many times -- the addition of one more cable or "tweak" enabled the system to reach a higher level yet.

Will one "loom" do the job. I never found that special "loom". To achieve the best effects I have combined cables from Synergistic Research, Bybee, ASI Liveline, Cardas, Supra and HiDiamond -- with "tweaks" too numerous to mention but featuring Bybee products and a variety of other products, many of which have the word "quantum" in their description.

The effort to arrive at this point with my system has been two-fold. Firstly, finding the right cables and "tweaks" for the system. Secondly, finding where to place them in the system for the best effects -- a process of trial and error. A lot of cables and "tweaks" had to be sold off in the process. I put "tweaks" in quotation marks because the best "tweaks" in my system have had as profound effect as the components on the sound. The same for the best of the cables, as well. For me, cables and "tweaks" are components.

Have I finally "arrived"? I have just about arrived at the best level that I can expect within my budget -- there are a couple of items on the way. In any case, I assume there are many levels beyond what my system has arrived at. But since I'll never get there I am sitting back and enjoying the music in the blissful recognition that I don't know what I am missing.

I should mention that there are many elements that are as important as holography for the sound to be satisfying, IMO. They include detail, transparency, coherence, tonality, and dynamics, among others. My system has all of these elements in good measure.

Have you had success with holographic sound in your system? If so, how did you get there?
sabai
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 
Onhwy61 wrote,

"Some people fall outside the curve because they are brilliant
outsiders blazing paths into the unknown. But for every person like that
there are probably a thousand who are just oddballs. I honestly don't know
where Sabai falls. I applaud him for his willingness to share, yet at the
same time some of the things he says sound like an elaborate inside joke.
Not all that different than the post by the guy selling the over the telephone
test tones."

Most folks would probably consider tiny little bowls that improve bass
frequencies, 7.8 Hz frequency generators, the Red X Coordinate Pen, LP
demagnetizers, the Quantum Clip, Tourmaline Gun, liquid cables, CD edge
bevelers, directional fuses and Rainbow Foil to be elaborate jokes or cruel
hoaxes foisted on gullible audiophiles. Side note: the telephone thing does
not involve test tones.

GK
onhwy61's avatar
onhwy61
5,350 posts
 
My apologies for misdescribing the telephone thing. Although I note you are careful not to say it wasn't a joke.
csontos
1,311 posts
 
Oh come on, Al. With all due respect, you of all people here should be able to tell us what we can expect to hear and what we cannot regarding the OP's position. Remember the "b.s."? Is it appropriate for all of us to become delusional? Seriously.
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 
Onhwy61 wrote,

"My apologies for misdescribing the telephone thing. Although I note you are careful not to say it wasn't a joke."

- Ok, I'll say it. It's not a joke. It's as serious as a colonoscopy without anesthetic.

:-)

GK
almarg's avatar
almarg
9,670 posts
 
09-18-12: Csontos
Oh come on, Al. With all due respect, you of all people here should be able to tell us what we can expect to hear and what we cannot regarding the OP's position. Remember the "b.s."? Is it appropriate for all of us to become delusional? Seriously.
Actually, I can’t say what others should expect regarding the OP’s position, and I don’t think that anyone can. I would simply asterisk the experiences he has reported with a big “YMMV.”

As I have said in the past in many cable-related threads, cable effects are dependent to a considerable extent on interactions between their parameters and characteristics and the technical characteristics of what they are connecting. Things like input and output impedances, noise susceptibility, susceptibility to ground loop effects, power supply design (with respect to power cords), amplifier class of operation and other design variables (with respect to power cords), use of feedback in amplifiers (with respect to speaker cables), etc, etc. And even if the technical characteristics of what is being connected are known in detail, many of those effects would still be inherently unpredictable. And to the extent that there is predictability, it is easily possible to cite situations in which a sonic comparison between two cables would yield exactly opposite results depending on what is being connected.

What would be a delusion, IMO, is an expectation of a high degree of correlation between cable price and cable performance. Weakness of that correlation follows in part from that system dependency and inherent unpredictability. And if, as many here would assert (including me, to a degree that is LIMITED AND FINITE), cable effects are not fully explainable on the basis of generally recognized science, there is further reason to expect a weak correlation between price and performance. To the extent that cable effects are not explainable on the basis of generally recognized science, no one can say with any precision where the dividing line is that separates sonically beneficial optimization of a given aspect of a cable’s design, from overkill that substantially raises the cost of the cable but provides no benefit.

FWIW, the OP’s path is not one that I would personally follow. It suggests the possibility that a multitude of small inaccuracies were both originally present and subsequently introduced, which after a great deal of time and experimentation have been made to essentially cancel each other out. If I were not satisfied with the imaging/dimensionality/holography of my system, consistent with some of Onhwy61’s comments I would focus on speaker placement, listening position, and room acoustics, and probably also on upgrading components. But that’s just me. The OP has found a path to success that worked for him, for which he is to be congratulated. But as I said earlier, YMMV.

Regards,
-- Al
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