The Science of Cables

geoff,

Given your web site: yes,  I see you have trouble identifying extraordinary claims ;-)

I didn’t think you could give me any examples, Professor 🤓 As I said, a big old Strawman argument. Nothing brings the pseudo skeptics out of the woodwork like cables. 

So we all (kinda) agree that cables have an impact on sound quality...we all want to hear the ‘pure, unaltered sound’ coming out of our speakers... how about the cables that were used during the recording session? I doubt all those record studios use ‘high end’ cables...

Many studios do use 'high-end' cables. I wired many with Mogami, Canare, Belden, Monster, etc. Some spent as much on cable as the mixing desk.

However, those same studios all have a different sound due to room,  electronics and microphones. We often drove across town to record in a specific space for its sonics. The Complex, Sunset, Record Plant, Oceanway, Capital 'A', Village, or cross country to Hit Factory, Sony, or offshore to Monserrat, Abbey Road, etc. So when you get a piece recorded in multiple rooms, whose cable would you use? Change cable per disc? Track? Chorus?

Add in EQ & compression by the earless A&R department in yet another facility.

Add in sonic changes from watermarking, disc stamping, etc.

Add in sonic thumbprints for player, pre, amplifier.

Add in sonic bootprint for speakers.

It's a wonder it's listenable at all.

I just roll my eyes when I read equipment reviews where the kazoo on this or the conga on that or the calliope on the next had some particular authority. All that has happened is the endless series of colorations has aligned to what the reviewer thinks something sounds like. BUNK!

>>> NO PLAYBACK SYSTEM ANYWHERE EVER SOUNDED LIVE <<<

@prof 
 +1 - keep on firing.

ieales

Many studios do use 'high-end' cables. I wired many with Mogami, Canare, Belden, Monster, etc.

Agreed.  Most of the studios whose cabling I know of, tended to use Canare or Belden or a combination for much of the equipment.  (I had a bunch of custom-length cables for my own systems made by a supplier to local professional studios).


But I would personally differentiate those cable companies from "High End" cable companies, which to me denote those in the audiophile-sales industry - the Nordost, Audioquest, Shunyatta's of the world - who charge far more, and make more extravagant and dubious claims,  than the industry average prices for Canare or Belden.

@prof 

e.g. capacitance

Funny you mention that capacitance thingee. Maybe you should wander over and see how cable assemblies made according to the Schroeder Method are being reviewed. The users found the results fantastic, and this with a cable design that has double the capacitance of an ordinary "by the books" design ( read, none of the rolled off high end as predicted by the One True LCR deity).

Its a mystery, or maybe its a miracle, or maybe alien technology direct from Zar-Dot. Bottom line extra-ordinary results are the result.