A New Believer

I have an extensive background of study and experience in signal transmission, but recently spent some years studying human hearing and managed to make some connections between those. I have been working with some professors from two different universities on getting funding for some real research, but the funding hasn't materialised yet. The guys most interested are the physical chemistry professors. We have some hypotheses, for sure, and have written those up.

The purity one is not clear to me. My personal view is that it is the softness of the material, not its purity, that is most important (though they are related) and that the effect is more down to resonance than electron flows and eddy currents (as proposed by others). But the honest answer is that we are still divided on that one.

Dielectrics store and release the signal with some smearing of the signal over time. This is an area where conventional thinking accepts there is an issue but dismisses the relevance at audio frequencies. Our ears tell us otherwise, which leaves little room for much more than the typical "Tis, tisn't" debate.

Mechanical resonance seems to create an electrical resonance, though we only have theories on why this might be so. This is the particular area where my academic collaborators are most interested (though they find the idea of burn in fascinating too). The theory we have developed here would be a very long post.

Geometry affects resonance, but also there is mutual interference between conductors that needs to be kept low and constant along the wire. Most designs are poor at the former and average at the latter. Reducing this interference creates other problems and I find no easy solution other than striking a compromise.

I fear many will find that too waffly. Each of those a big areas and not simple. In most cases we have evidence of an effect, but are at the theory stage with inadequate funding to take it much further than that. I suspect all high end audio cable firms are in the same boat on that one. We can observe, develop theories, apply them in practise and observe again to hear if we like the change. Going much further is hard/expensive given the measurement difficulties. I am well aware that the alternative view is that the measurement difficulties aren't difficulties at all - just proof that we are deluded. The debate becomes entirely belief-based, which never goes anywhere. Hopefully I will get one of these research studies funded some day.

Rok2ID,
I have done that test over the short term, in my apartment, with multiple people present, and noone able to know whether I had changed something or not (I had a screen in front of the pre/CDP to allow me to switch cables (or pretend to) and not let anyone see what I had done. I have done multi-hour test a few times. It has been enlightening each time. I can let you know results if you want but people clearly heard differences between cables used.

HOWEVER, what it brought to me was that a certain chain of products sounded different, not that the cables themselves sounded different. I have no way of testing the wires by themselves without attaching such mundane test equipment as pres, CDPs, phono stages, amps and speakers into the mix. Some of the wires obviously had different electrical properties (resistance, capacitance, inductance). I am pretty sure that they all carried music. Some did not do the details as well. I have no idea whether that was "time domain issues", an electrical issue, a resonance issue, or what it was. Everyone heard it very clearly. But what everyone took away was that everyone could hear it clearly on that setup, not another.

If you think that all cables have equal electrical properties, then you obviously have not done enough testing yourself. I have not done the tests with scientific equipment to say that the signal can be changed (which is not the same thing), but I expect that given the way you have presented your ideas (or rather, your attack on others' comments), neither have you. Personally, I am unwilling to believe that the electrical properties of the carrier have zero effect on how the piece at one end of the wire perceives the electrical signal

The nice thing about the 'wire is wire' argument for people like you is that it is easy to be satisfied. You can simply buy the cheapest CDPs and amps which look good. You don't need to worry about tubes vs transistors (it's just wire vs wire) and you don't need to worry about Class A vs Class B vs Class D (it's also just wire vs wire). CDPs are simple - bits is bits. Jitter is a figment of people's imagination or an artifact of the CD manufacturing process. Speakers and phono cartridges you might be able to claim are key, because they are not electronic signal carriers but physical transducers. But everything between tonearm output to speaker input can be garage sale castoffs linked with lamp cord.

But somehow I don't think that's the way you found yourself on Audiogon...

To T_bone:
you make a lot of good points, and I will try to respond to them all.
I would love to have the results of your test. Now we are getting somewhere.
As far as having to involve cd players and the rest of the system, well thats what we are talking about. HIFI systems. Some people are trying to twist this thread into some discussion of physics lab results, but the question is, does wire change what comes out of the speaker. If you can hear a difference, that is actually what you are saying. What happens on the wire surface at a Lab at MIT or some place is not the question. The question is HOW does it affect my hifi playing Beethoven's 9th to such a degree that I can hear it?

To T_bone:
'The nice thing about the 'wire is wire' argument for people like you is that it is easy to be satisfied. You can simply buy the cheapest CDPs and amps which look good. You don't need to worry about tubes vs transistors (it's just wire vs wire) and you don't need to worry about Class A vs Class B vs Class D (it's also just wire vs wire). CDPs are simple - bits is bits. Jitter is a figment of people's imagination or an artifact of the CD manufacturing process. Speakers and phono cartridges you might be able to claim are key, because they are not electronic signal carriers but physical transducers. But everything between tonearm output to speaker input can be garage sale castoffs linked with lamp cord.'

Now this is where you lost me. Why does my position on wire mean I buy the cheapest components? I don't get the connection. Tubes went out Econs ago. I have had class A and class AB amps. My current amp is both. I don't know whether jitter is real or not, but I paid a grand for my CD Player, so I better not hear any. I threw my phono cart away with my Thorens, or at least I threw them into the garage. Your last sentence is nonsense. BTW, I never said amps is amps or cdps is cdps, BUT some very prominent people have, including my guru's Len Feldman, Julian Hirsch and Peter Aczel. So who am I to disagree? BTW, most 'high end" amps cost what they cost to a large degree because of what it took to make them LOOK like they do. And they look GOOD.

To T_Bone:

'but I expect that given the way you have presented your ideas (or rather, your attack on others' comments)'

This seems to be a recurring theme on this site, concerning my comments. Am I doing something wrong? Breaking some rule? If I am, please set me straight. I am relatively new here.