2. cables
  3. 1239698075

Can you Analyze this?

A buddy at work ran into me with a picture in hand wanted to show off his newly purchased road bike “Trek”. I gave it a close look while he was explaining the advance technology behind it… he then turned to me and asked, “what’s your hobby?”
I logged in A’gon and showed him a picture of a Shunyata power cord that cost the same price as his bike, $1k. Put both image side by side, the bike and the cable, and we both stare at them to value other’s hobby.
If consider both as design, parts, and labor, I clearly understand how and why the road bike would have cost $1K or more. The engineering behind it and the amount of materials to make a complete bike if not considering the time to put all parts together and tuning, adjusting, etc. The power cord, on the other hand, just lay there… I could not find any good reason to explain to him what would it take to make this P/C a $1,000?
I chose not to value it with his bike but to acknowledge him that ”this P/C is bigger (in size) and it’d sound much better than the cheapo OEM ones, dude.”
To be honest, this incident made me realize something. A quick revaluation gives me a thought that I think I need to slow it down. Because:
For $1k, I can buy a set of tires that could last (at least) a year.
For $1k, I can buy a decent CD player that I could enjoy and value it for years.
For $1K, I can buy a decent set of monitor /bookshelf that I can clearly hear greater “differences”
For $1K, I may not come back shopping for clothing for a long time.
For $1K, I could have couple business “meals” that could land me some $$$
For $1K, I can build a section of the patio for the wife for our quality time.
I fully understand that manufactures have been paid great amount of money for markupting, (oops, I misspelled it again) but C’mon now, $1K?

There was a man freshly walked inside a casino. Right at the front doors he saw people playing cards around the $10 tables, he rolled his eyes, shook his head, and mumbled “too much! where do these people get their money from?”. But much later after mid-night, he realized that he was having so much fun playing Black Jack on a $1,000 table and he could not get up and walked away…does any1 have or know a term for that? hehehe

In conclusion, for me to get this $1,000 P/C, I would have to come up with a very good lie to the boss lady… unless I’m being selfish and not telling her anything……. like I’ve been doing. Lol

Enjoy listeing everyone.
NasaMan
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uru975
684 posts
 
If it does what you want it to do and then goes beyond your expectations and experiences such that you really are floored then it is worth what it costs. If it doesn't do it, it doesn't do it and anything more than free is probably to much.
There will always be better whatevers and worse, we make decisions, we choose our happiness as it is, if a $1,000 cable does it fine, it not look elsewhere
mb9061
137 posts
 
Gray Goose goes beyond my expectations. Maybe that's just my imagination since all vodkas should be the same if they're crystal clear and 80 proof. Or maybe the proof is in the hangover.

I think most people are of sane enough mind to determine if what they're spending money on is worth it or not and thankfully most dealers and manufacturers do offer demo periods. I still want to know what's in a BMI cord though (or who this BMI guy is exactly). I'm in the wrong line of work...
samhar
1,048 posts
 
Where did you find such a reasonably priced cable!!! Seriously I'm very fortunate that my wife will listen and when she does she can hear the improvements so she knows why I'm spending mo money. When I had an optical shop I was always asked why I charged what I did (more than Costco etc.) and I would say your paying for quality materials and my knowledge and experience.
t_bone
1,182 posts
 
Mb9061, take a walk over to the Bottlehead forum on Audioasylum and search for posts with the word "gin" in them. A couple of gents there infuse their own gin, using cheap vodka as a starter (filter it through a Brita water filter several times and the cheap vodka will improve in quality, or so the story goes).

Samhar, whenever people compare any product or service to something obtainable at Costco or Walmart, the best way to deal with it is just agree with them. Simply by saying that they have demonstrated their argument is irrefutable. Eventually, when all health care in the U.S. comes from the part-timer behind the glass wall at RiteAid, all banking comes from ATMs, and huge numbers of people never venture out because they live off the 'net and 'last-mile' delivery services, people will wake up and wonder what happened. Sometimes I think that the portrayal of American society in the opening chapter of Neal Stephenson's novel 'Snowcrash' is closer to being possible than any of us think.
palewin
58 posts
 
I can't stay away from this thread, since my two largest lists of "favorite URLs" are cycling (lots of years as an amateur racer) and audio (about as many years listening to music). One can get a bicycle for $200 (Walmart), $3K (lots of very good race bikes) and $8K and up (top of the line pro race bikes). There is a huge difference between the $200 and $3K bikes (weight, precision of components, efficiency of the frame) but much less between $3K and $8K. But even between the $3K and $8K bikes, there will be (small) differences in weight due to the quality of the carbon fiber, and aerodynamics due to the carbon fiber wheels. Now lets try and apply this to power cables. First, just as with bikes, there must be a point of diminishing returns, at which point the improvements become very small, possibly insignificant (in the bike case, 99% of the time the same rider would win on either the $3K or $8K bike). So we would love to know where power cable diminishing returns set in. One can buy or make the well-regarded (at least in the AA forum) Audio Asylum PC (shielded Belden wire, Wattgate or P&S connectors) for about $70, and I don't know how much difference there is between that and a $1000 PC (I use the AA cords). Also between the bikes one can measure the differences that money buys in weight, aero drag, and bearing friction; unfortunately with power cables the differences are restricted to what the buyer hears, there is little measurable difference other than wire gauge and resistance (which definitely don't correlate with price). It will always be difficult to compare one case where differences are entirely subjective (power cables) with another where they are largely objective (bicycles and to some extent active electronic components).
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