Blind Power Cord Test & results

It is annoying to me how little audiophiles/public understand science - not in specific examples like bees and PCs per se, but in the way scientists are supposedly rigid, archaic formulists reminiscent of Pink Floyd’s The Wall. In my experience, scientists go to the fringe of knowledge and theory with a lot of grace, unlike the people who try playing the role.

I personally believe cables do make a difference and knowledge of the make-and-model has an influence of perception through expectation. I hope most phile’s, in the silent majority, are in the same boat. And like I stated ABX and blind between-subject testing are perfectly viable in eliminating expectation. An experiment’s procedure may be flawed and the conclusions may not fit the data, but I have yet to read or hear any logical reason why these tests are inherently flawed. One may not like the results, but ya' need more than that to discount the test.

Bumblebee physics myth:

http://www.howstuffworks.com/news-item223.htm

Despite my reaction to his posts, I agree with Twl more than I disagree. The parameters such as system and room need to be addressed and while ABX is good tool, it is not worth much on many levels in audio, especially in private circumstances. Also, in future threads, subjective discussions should not be interrupted by contrarian physical explanations and vice-versa. There is no point to it.

I find many of the posts in this thread disturbing. I hope the inability to follow a logical line of reasoning is an anomaly unrepresentative of our population generally. One poster even tosses around statistical significance as though it had meaning outside of sampling, distribution, variance, and inference. But that's just misuse of jargon. I'm really concerned about the apparent inability to reason logically from premises to conclusion. Is this thread about auditory perception or religion? I get the impression it's about religion: You are either a believer (that there are audible differences that can be heard by the discerning few) or not.

Although I was director of a high-tech research center, my original training was in psycoacoustics, particularly binaural auditory processing. I've been addicted to HiFi since before stereo. I admit my speakers are bi-wired, and I have no idea if it makes a bit of audible difference, but I like them that way.

db

I never believed in sonic differences of power cords, and I laughed at those who did. Then, when I finally broke down and decided to try a high-end cord, I couldn't believe the improvement. Even a skeptic friend of mine was immediately converted after he heard my new power cord.

I have since used many power cords better than this first upgraded cord. I have no interest in reading 'tests' that discredit power cord differences, as I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that they can make as much of a sonic difference as different interconnects make. Yes, I'd like to know why and how they do this, but until and if the scientific reasons manifest themselves, I'm satisfied to know that they do.

I can listen to one power cord on a component using 2 or 3 music selections, and then switch to another cord and tell you what the sonic differences are. I can also have one cord in my system for a week, then change to another cord and be able to hear that cord's signature clearly. I have put stock cords back in only to be horrified by how inferior they sound.

I don't like spending money on power cords, and wish they all sounded the same. Problem is: they don't.

In a very interesting post above, Donbellphd notes:

Is this thread about auditory perception or religion? I get the impression it's about religion... (...)

Somewhere in-between, I'd say, and closer to religion: music is an emotional experience and the equip attached to its reproduction seems to borrow from that emotionality... hence a partial (at least) explanation of

...the inability to follow a logical line of reasoning

. As such it could be termed

an anomaly (REPRESENTATIVE) of our population

. There must be similar anomalies representative of other populations -- music maybe (as in, which is the best performance of Mahler2 and why).
Other than that, I also agree that some of the things tossed around make little sense including, sometimes, blurb tossed around by manufacturers of reproduction equip.
At the end of the day, most of us don't know much about circuit design and loudspeaker modelling -- nor should we. Add to that the bickering between engineers who DO know about these subjects which seems to add to the population's confusion...
Cheers