2. tech-talk
  3. 1365047770

Small difference equating to a big difference?

My system had started to sound a bit dull and lifeless to me ever since I put in some blue jeans interconnects. I'm getting a lightspeed attenuator in a week or two so I purchased two pairs of short, inexpensive interconnects with a really low rated capacitance in order to use them with the lightspeed. Anyways, I replaced a pair of audioquest diamond back rca's between my dac and pre, and a pair of signal cable silver resolution xlr's between my amp and pre amp with the blue jeans so that I could have them broken in by the time the lightspeed gets here.
Anyhow, my system had, what I thought, lost a lot of detail and "life" and couldn't really figure out exactly why. So I grabbed two pairs of analysis plus oval interconnects to demo tonight and voila, right from the first song, I had my detail and "life" back. When I a/b compared them to the blue jeans I couldn't spot big differences like I thought I'd be able to, but for some reason it does in fact sound like a big difference and I can't put my finger, errrr, ear on it. The analysis plus do have slightly more detail and sound slightly more fleshed out but the don't sound day and night different but they do; does that make sense to anyone?
At the end, I a/b compared the original diamond back from dac to pre, signal cable silver res xlr between the pre and amp to the analysis plus between dac and pre and also between pre and amp. The diamond back / signal set up had more bass and equaled the analysis plus in all other areas but for some reason I still slightly prefer the analysis plus.

I've found also that sometimes it's hard for me to give a product an honest assesment if I've read reviews on the product before I listen to it because I'll be anticipate hearing the pros and cons about that product before I even begin to listen.

So what do you think is going on here with such perceived slight differences making a bigger difference? Is it possible I'm picking up on things in the sound that I'm not consciously aware of analysing like tone or prat?
128x128b_limo
csontos
1,311 posts
 
So did I;), more than once.
b_limo's avatar
b_limo OP
2,274 posts
 
Damn, I really didn't want to hear a negative difference with these blue jeans interconnects because I don't want to have to go through the hassle of mailing them back and waiting three weeks to get my money back, but they just really suck in my system. I can tell a big difference now between signal cable silver res xlrs between the amp and pre, and audioquest diamond back rca's between my dac and pre vs. blue jeans rca's in both locations. Whoever says they can't hear a difference can come over and listen to some cymbals and high hats on the same song between the two set-ups and you'll be a believer also.
csontos
1,311 posts
 
I use Diamond Back on everything. Not junky and not expensive. In keeping with my little rant, they are also the models with cold welded rca's. Which model Diamond Backs are you using and do the Blue Jeans cables have cold welded rca's?
ivan_nosnibor's avatar
ivan_nosnibor
1,047 posts
 
Csontos, "I think the thing with cables(and I'm probably wrong about this)is that just pulling them out and then plugging them back in changes the sound. So the connection skews the perceived improvement in that the same change would have occurred had you simply re-plugged the original. We're dealing with the flow of millions upon millions of electrons so does it not stand to reason achieving a level playing field is literally impossible? The best connector is no connector at all. I wonder what differences you'd hear if these cables were hard wired into the component. In any case, I don't think the differences are important enough except in cases where a component requires a very specific characteristic. In which case differences among those wouldn't amount to more than with other cables."

Basically I agree 100%
csontos
1,311 posts
 
Wow, haven't enjoyed such support as of yet! Looking forward to more of the same:) (I think?)
More to discover