Slow speaker cables?

I just looked up Chuck's comment on our ability to perceive sound in terms of speed, I found an excerpt that might be helpful ...

Human auditory perception has its limits as well – the minimum time in between sonic events to be distinguished separately is on the order of 20 milliseconds. Inside this limit, sounds begin to blur together to create first a buzzing then a continuum. Although this may be the limit to distinguishing sounds as separate events, human hearing is extremely sensitive to timing quality of events spaces in time. Percussionists create musical sonic events that are distinct, typically separated by hundreds of milliseconds. The accuracy with which they articulate any given event, however, is on the order of a millisecond.

12-12-12: Csontos
Al, does the fact that I'm hearing an improvement rather than just verifying one on instrumentation outweigh any negative impact on the amp? Doesn't the fact that we're dealing with wire no more than 6" long render inductance a non-issue? I'm guessing the Acoustat amps were built this way for the reason you mentioned. But also with the ability to drive low impedance loads such as the Acoustat speakers. So does it not stand to reason inductance is not an issue?

Not sure what you mean by "negative impact on the amp," but I would not doubt that you may have heard an improvement that would not have been verifiable even with sophisticated instrumentation.

Yes, I would expect the 6 inch length to most likely make inductance a non-issue. When I submitted my earlier comment I missed that fact that you were referring to internal wiring of such short length. A short length of heavy gauge wire like that would also nullify or greatly minimize pretty much all other cable effects that I can envision as being of possible relevance, including not only resistance, inductance, and capacitance, but also skin effect, strand jumping, dielectric absorption, RF "transmission line" effects, etc., to the extent that they might have had any relevance at longer lengths.

My research seems to corroborate my experience that replacing power supply wiring with 8awg, 500 strand is a significant overall improvement.

Assuming that the previous wiring was not poorly chosen in some way, such as being marginal in gauge, and that it had not suffered some sort of age-related degradation, and assuming that the previous solder joints were good, the only explanation that occurs to me for the improvement you perceived is that minor differences in physical placement of the old wiring vs. the new wiring might have affected coupling of noise transients (perhaps associated with current surges caused by abrupt changes in the power demands of the music) to or from other circuit points. Perhaps there are other reasons, but it's hard to say without having knowledge of the specifics of the design.

Excellent comments by several of the others above.

Best regards,
-- Al

There is such a thing as the high end audio "twilight zone".

THings that are observed (or heard) to occur there cannot often be fully explained or quantified.

But they often do seem to really exist!

Its where tweaks like wire changes can be heard by many but predicting what one will actually hear in any particular case is often futile, as is expecting that another will hear exactly the same thing and react similarly.

All sorts of creatures, both dark and light inhabit the high end audio twilight zone. You have to identify the ones you can trust and the ones you cannot!

Eerie music plays......

Al, I was referring to your suggestion of a "downside by increasing induction" and it's possible result to the amp but that is now moot. Wiring I'm dealing with is the stock 12 and 14awg wire that virtually all the amps I have were built with. It's this wire that I've replaced with similar 8awg wire the stock Acoustat amps are built with. I've simply come to the conclusion that cost factor is the driving force behind building an amp just adequately rather than building it to reach it's full potential. There are probably lots of amp circuits capable of sota performance if given the correct internal accessories.

12-12-12: B_limo
I'm also thinking that, just like some people can break down all the qualities of a particular wine (not me by the way), others are better at picking up on all of these nuances of audio qualities.

I'm not much of a wine connoisseur either. However, I have a few friends that are, and just like in picking up audio nuances, most connoisseur's learn from training their senses, they are not born with a gift. I've learned to listen with a ear trained over the decades of listening. It's more about learning what to listen for, this just takes time and experience.

Why is it that with some cables I am barely able to hear instruments in the background that with other cables just get muddled up? Is it because they are "faster", i.e. quicker attack and less decay resulting in more space between notes resulting in better definition and less congestion within a certain piece of music? If so, then why also can I hear certain instruments better even if they are overlapping other instruments? Less distortion?

This is hard to answer, it could have something to do with more speed and resolution, with faster attack and decay it leaves more silence between the notes to hear other sounds. However, it also could have something to do with the cables soundstaging ability. Some cables are more 3 dimensional with a deeper soundstage, while some have a larger, but a flatter, more 2 dimensional stage. Sometimes cables with a flatter stage can make background sounds appear more immediate, or clearer. I still prefer cables that have a deeper soundstage, some might call it the mid-hall perspective. However, I know others who prefer that feeling of sitting in the front row. You pay your money, you make your choices.