WHY CABLES MATTER!

Why is it that cable deniers always want some kind of measurement or "blind testing" result that PROVES what I hear vs what they hear?

I don’t care if you can hear a difference in your system or not.

What’s the point?

Do you actually want to GET TO a point in your system where you CAN hear a difference?

Or are you happy with your current equipment that you cannot hear a difference with, and therefore no one else (no matter what equipment they have and use) can hear a difference either?

Fools don’t tend to be affluent, just saying. Quite the opposite.

Affluent hobbyists (audiophiles) tend to be successful because they’re NOT fools. If cables didn’t matter, people wouldn’t continue to buy them.

You do you. Once you get to a certain level of equipment and setup, everything makes a difference.

+1 coralkong!

Hello, new poster here. Been reading here for some time.

I'm posting to ask a question or two on the subject of cables.

I can say that I have yet to experience the change in cables and burn in.

Also not stating that it does not happen. What I am wondering is what happens  within the cable itself that is changed that contributes to the betterment in sound?

I have googled this and have read much of what's out there. I have consulted a couple of professors at the local University about the questions I'm asking.

I am asking this here because there is a large number of people that have actual 

experience with this subject.

Thanks for your thoughts.

coralkong

Why is it that cable deniers always want some kind of measurement or "blind testing" result that PROVES what I hear vs what they hear? ... What’s the point?

They're not interested in conversation - they seek to disrupt it.

Hello all,

I have no intentions of insulting anyone, but...

For years, I used a pair of silver cables I made myself (~$100) for my CD player (CAL Icon 2 to Klyne System 7 ver. 4 pre-amp), a pair of Discovery cables to my amps (Lectron JH-50 and Conrad-Johnson MF2550), and a pair of long Mapleshade cables to my ProAc Response 3.8 speakers. Some time ago, I replaced all IC’s with Odin II IC’s and Valhalla speaker cables I purchased from Hi-Fi Store on AliExpress. After less than a half an hour that it took me to install new IC’s, I started to evaluate the sound. I listened hard, but I could not convince myself if I heard any difference. I thought before that my system sounded very good and I was not surprised – I admit I was very skeptical about effects of cables for years and this just confirmed my previous skepticism. Then, I installed the new speaker cables and played a CD I listened for decades. I got this CD as a bonus when I purchased my Lectron JH-50, the first piece of high-end equipment I ever got. The year was 1991! The CD was Two of a Kind by Karin Krog and Bengt Hallberg. This is a very natural sounding music and I listen this CD quite often. The music with my new cables sounded more rich and more dynamic, the bass was deeper and it all sounded better to my ears. The difference was small but I believe I heard it. The localization of instruments on the stage got a little more diffuse (and this I heard very well), but the beauty of sound convinced me this was better. When I listened through my new IC’s I was using the old thin Mapleshade speaker wires and apparently, they were the main problem in my system. So, I dropped them in the garbage, and went to bed happy that I made improvement to the sound of my system and I admitted to myself that my previous belief that cables were irrelevant was wrong.

Next day, I returned to my music room with anticipation – am I going to enjoy my better sound more than ever before? Of course, I will… everybody says so! So, I played the same songs that I always do when I want to get impressed. I have loved them for years because of their beauty and their sound and I knew them well… So, what did I hear? They had sounded awesome before, and they sounded awesome again. Did they sound better? I could not tell. My aural memory betrayed me! So, did my system really sound better? I could not tell that either but I concluded a day before that it did, so I felt the new cables were worth of keeping in my system. They were quite inexpensive so I did not make a fool of myself by spending some major amount of money expecting a miracle from several pieces of wire.

However, I must admit, the change in sound I heard when I replaced the cables was small. I had to listen for the sound to hear them. And, while I was listening for the sound differences, I lost my connection with music – I heard more sound than music. I play acoustic guitar and, when I listen to the music, I listen for the song, structure of the song, chord progression, fingerpicking pattern, lyrics, bridges, voice, pronunciation… I try to learn the song while listening. While focusing on these items, I do not hear cables. I already concluded that my system sounded better so I do not have to hear these tiny differences every time - I can now continue to listen the way I prefer and focus on music.  

Listening to cables does not make much sense to me and I will never try any expensive cables no matter where they are made and what they are made of. Am I missing some major effect that only expensive cables can reveal (expensive cables sound better, don’t they)? I doubt and I do not care. My love is for music and, for the way I listen to the music, it is irrelevant what different cables may sound like. I listen to the songs, not cables. This is why cables do not matter to me.

 LectronJH50