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Why do digital cables sound different?

I have been talking to a few e-mail buddies and have a question that isn't being satisfactorily answered this far. So...I'm asking the experts on the forum to pitch in. This has probably been asked before but I can't find any references for it. Can someone explain why one DIGITAL cable (coaxial, BNC, etc.) can sound different than another? There are also similar claims for Toslink. In my mind, we're just trying to move bits from one place to another. Doesn't the digital stream get reconstituted and re-clocked on the receiving end anyway? Please enlighten me and maybe send along some URLs for my edification. Thanks, Dan
danielho
sean125
7 posts
 
Unlike other areas in cable design that are questionable to say the least there are actually scientific reasons why digital cables have to be correctly designed.So unlike power cords differences actually can exist in digital cables...
sean
6,231 posts
 
For sake of clarity, i am not Sean125. I didn't want anyone to confuse my departure with his arrival. Given our different points of view on power cords, it should be obvious that we aren't one and the same. Toodles... Sean
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edesilva
768 posts
 
Sean, "departure"? What did I miss?
gellis104df
2 posts
 
I use the i2s stock cable.Would upgrading this type of cable help my Dac & Transport sound better? If so, HOW? Are silver conductors better then copper for this type?
redkiwi
1,092 posts
 
I have a question for the engineers here. When playing around with cables I found something odd. Let me give you an example. If I used a particular belden cable design, albeit in different guages, using all teflon insulation and silver coated copper, I found a consistent flavour to these cables regardless of their application. You will have to trust me that I verified this with some blind testing, but once I recognised the flavour I could always hear when one was inserted into the system. This happened whether a fat one was used for a power cable, or a speaker cable, or a thinner one was used as an audio interconnect or a digital interconnect. I am not saying I didn't hear other things about these cables, but I am saying that there was a consistent additive quality, perhaps some form of ringing, regardless of the application of the particular type of cable.

I recently added such a cable to power a CD player that was connected to the system I was listening to but was not the source I was listening to and immediately heard its sonic signature. I was not expecting to hear it, and was stunned to hear it, so I don't think the issue was psychologically induced.

So other than me being mad (which is a whole 'nother question), is it possible that any cable connected to a system is an antenna of some sort and introduces audible effects even when used as a digital cable, provided there is some analogue component that is electrically connected in some way to that cable?
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