Cable Burn In

The day began with two brief tests of the Tiefenbrun claim that undriven transducers (digital alarm watches, telephones, headphones, or other loudspeakers) in the same room audibly degrade the sound quality - a claim which forms the rationale behind their "single speaker" demonstration demand. Firstly, a digital alarm watch with piezoelectric "beeper" was held about 500 mm behind Tiefenbrun's head while he listened to the loudspeaker reproduction from his stereo seat on the couch, with the watch either fully exposed or clasped firmly between the palms of my hands. We were assured that the latter artifice would muffle any deleterious effects. This was thus a single-blind test: The testee did not know the covered/uncovered status of the watch at each trial, but the tester did know. A random series of 20 trials was conducted while Remington cued up the turntable (playing a female vocalist) on each occasion, as he did throughout the day. Tiefenbrun's result: 10 correct responses in 20 trials, an outcome which shows no ability to discriminate between the two situations.

The second test, also single-blind, used a Linn "Kan" loudspeaker as the undriven transducer. Again the female vocalist was used as source material. The loudspeaker lay on the thickly-carpeted floor behind the listening couch. It was placed either on its side (the "uncovered" condition) or on its face (the "covered" condition) according to a random series of choices. Ten trials were conducted during which Tiefenbrun achieved a score of 5 correct out of 10. Again, this demonstrates no discrimination ability beyond what one would expect purely on the basis of chance.