James Randi vs. Anjou Pear - once and for all

A small and barely audible difference is the most that could be expected

Well, at least that's a start.

If cables make no difference then why is Mr. Flat Earth not allowing the challenger (the person defending the fact cables make a difference) to select the high end cable of his or her choice to pit against the Monster Cable?

Seems obvious to me.

LM

LM,

Do you mean to say that because they have selected a well respected (already expensive) cable like Monster and chosen to make it go head to head with a $7,000 cable that it would be hard to tell the difference? If so, then I guess you agree with the general idea that "extraordinary" differences (the kind of claims made by many cable manufacturers and supported by reviewers) would not stand up to any serious test.

If you are suggesting that the challengers allow a 12 AWG wire to go up against a 30 AWG wire then no doubt the effect would be quite clearly audible (a million dollars would be quickly gone); deliberate selection of extreme cable resistance differences is bound to be audible due to the SPL drop. Similarly, if one were to select a cable with some active elements (capacitor/inductor) then the roll-off effect might become quite audible in some cases.

Dave,

Yes indeed a good start. You may be able to save me yet! What wire would you suggest for the mains?

Shadorne, I'd try some of the entry level Audioquest like Type 2 or Type 4. Both are solid core copper cables with the Type 4 being a heavier gauge. You can buy them raw for a few bucks a foot and not have to pay for termination.

Within the realm of slight audible differences, I find that these solid core cables sound a bit tighter in the bass than stranded cables generally. Solid core cables also tend to be a little smoother in the highs. No hocus pocus.

Shadorne,
What I am suggesting is that some "high-end" read "expensive" cables are in fact not worth their asking price and do in fact offer a negligible price to performance ratio as well as lower then acceptable ultimate performance given their asking prices. SO if cables DO NOT MAKE A DIFFERENCE then it should not matter which high end (expensive) cable challenges the Monster Cable and the choice of which cable takes on the Monster should be in the hands (and ears) of the challenger; and not a "ringer cable" selected by a person looking to prove ALL HIGH CABLES ARE JIVE; who will then take his "challenge results" to smear the real high end cable players whose cables do make a huge difference. Again if cables do not matter then the cable that takes on the Monster should not matter either. But it does matter, then this proves that (some) cables do in fact make a significant difference.

If I were I taking this bet I would select Synergistic Research Precision Reference Active Speaker cable ($2800) or Synergistic Research Active Apex speaker cables ($4600). These cables are significantly better then any cable I have ever heard in my system and I have owned cables that were several times more expensive then Synergistic Research Tesla Series cables. Perhaps some high end cables are little more then "snake oil" but Synergistic Research Tesla cables represent a paradigm shift in audio playback that is easily heard when compared to other high end cables- I'll bet you.

LM