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Too good a post to waste

On a thread that is a running example of the textual equivalent of nonstop cat videos. So here it is again.


I could understand the cables are snake-oil doubters and take them seriously- in 1980. Back then there was no internet, Stereo Review was pretty much it, and Julian Hirsch was the Oracle of all things audio. Stereo Review and Julian Hirsch said if it measures the same it sounds the same. Wire is wire, and that was that. 

Even then though J. Gordon Holt had already started the movement that was to become Stereophile. JGH took the opposing view that our listening experience is what counts. Its nice if you can measure it but if you can’t that’s your problem not ours. 

Stereo Review and the measurers owned the market back then. The market gave us amplifier wars, as manufacturers competed for ever more power with ever lower distortion. For years this went on, until one day "measures great sounds bad" became a thing.

Could be some here besides me lived through and remember this. If you did, and if you were reading JGH back then, I tip my hat to you, sir! I fell prey to Hirsch and his siren song that you can have it all for cheap and don’t really have to learn to listen. Talk about snake-oil! A lot of us bought into it. Sorry to say.

But anyway like I was saying it was easy to believe the lie back then because it was so prevalent and also because what wire there was that sounded better didn’t really sound a whole lot better.

Now though even budget wire sounds so much better than what comes off a reel you’d have to be deaf not to notice. Really good wires sound so good you’d notice even if you ARE deaf! No kidding. My aunt Bessie was deaf as a stone but she could FEEL the sound at a high enough volume, knew it was music. The dynamic punch of my CTS cables is so much greater than ordinary 14 ga wire I would bet my deaf from birth aunt Bessie could "hear" the difference. Certain so-called audiophiles here, I'm not so sure.

Oh and not done beating the dead horse quite yet, according to my calendar its 2020, a solid 40 years past 1980. Stereo Review is dead and buried. Stereophile lives on. A whole multi-billion dollar industry built on wire not being wire thrives. Maybe the measurement people can chalk up and quantify from that just how many years, and billions, they are out of date and in denial. 
128x128millercarbon
jafreeman's avatar
jafreeman
689 posts
 
I looked at the Transparent, Kimber Kable and Nordost AC lines of cables, and none of these companies say anything except OFC and 99.99999% pure for the .00001% who can easily afford it. Some have silver plating. There's fancy geometry.  These are all $2k-5K and more per meter.  You'll usually need two meters.  

Uber, can you say what you made your power cords out of?  
uberwaltz's avatar
uberwaltz
13,381 posts
 
Jafreeman
Basically it is an industrial spec cable that might possibly be used between inverter drives and three phase motors. And obviously as everywhere there is industrial cabling and then there is INDUSTRIAL cabling, if you get my meaning.
I did experiment with servo drive cabling too but preferred the sq of the ac motor cabling.
Not particularly cheap but anything worth having usually is not anyway. However cost even with connectors and a bit of fancy outer braid is still a lot less than some designer cords.
All I will say is that my price was..... well , gratis.
Leftovers from various installation projects.
Just something I started toying with a couple years back tbh.
millercarbon's avatar
millercarbon OP
12,531 posts
 
Just so you guys know, the whole thing of OFC, five nine's purity, connectors, braids, and all that jazz, is nothing more than a variation on wire is wire. The original claim was all that matters is the gauge. Now instead of gauge you're saying its OFC. Connectors. Braid. Or whatever. All you're doing is putting lipstick on a pig. OFC instead of gauge. You can fool yourselves if you want. But it is in fact just lipstick. 
uberwaltz's avatar
uberwaltz
13,381 posts
 
I don’t believe I got around to mentioning actual gauge but I might have gone overboard on a couple...lol.
An Anaconda would be easier to wrestle into place behind my rack than a couple of the 2 foot cords I made.
Connectors are a necessity, bit of colored braid just makes it look purty.
Lipstick on an Anaconda if you like.
😎😎
kennyc
1,452 posts
 
Making great audio cables is much more than wrangling up ready available wire, terminations, wrappings. Both the materials used AND wire weave geometry make huge differences.

Understanding Audio Cables - construction, electrical properties, cost:

Galen Gareis, a (now retired) product development engineer at cable manufacturer Belden, created Iconoclast cables from scratch with the backing of Belden. I've found that the white papers from Iconoclast are especially helpful in understanding design goals and why some cables are so expensive.
https://www.iconoclastcable.com/story/
further white papers:
RCA/XLR design brief:  https://www.iconoclastcable.com/story/rcaxlr.pdf
Speaker design brief:  https://www.iconoclastcable.com/story/speaker.pdf

Sure, you can make your own cables to connect your components and it'll work of course, but moving up the audiophile cable chain should/will result in better audio quality. Also, the more transparent your system and/or the better your critical listening skills, the more you'll notice/hear the differences. Whether the price/performance is worth it is subjective, often a topic of heated debates.
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