Digital cable suggestions

[magiccarpetride]

By way of an update. . .

I know he gets nothing but praise on here, but hats off once again to Mark Grant who supplied me with a Supra Trico cable with WBT silver connectors. Even gave me a bit of forum discount on what was already a stonking deal on this cable.

Normally I like to let a cable burn in (even though I'm not sure such a thing exists) before I make a decision, but there's no need here as this is so obviously much better than the Ecosse The Producer I was using.

I'm listening to Talking Heads at the moment and am gobsmacked at the extra detail especially on percussion.

This is my third cable purchase from Mark and I can't praise his customer service or products highly enough.

Does anyone have an explanation on how is it possible that two different brands of digital coax cables sound differently? I'm personally hearing huge differences between various brands, but am scratching my head as to what could contribute to these differences. It's digital, ain't it?

[Stratmangler]

It's digital, ain't it?

Nope!

[isuckedmandelsonslemons]

I'd be interested as well.

However there are people who say all mains cables sound the same, all interconnects sound the same and that you shouldn't spent more that six bob a metre on speaker cable. I'm thick so don't expect an answer from me. All I know is Talking in Tongues by Talking Heads has never sounded so good.

If cable burn in exists then I can't wait for the improvement.

Also I'm using four mono amps to biamp my Usher speakers. Apparently that's a waste of time as well.

Apologies if I've clouded the digital waters, I couldn't resist.

Harry

[isuckedmandelsonslemons]

Nope!

Bit of wire with plugs either end?

[magiccarpetride]

Bit of wire with plugs either end?

A series on ones-and-zeros enter on one end, that signal then travels across the wire, and is accepted at the other end. Upon entering the digital coax cable, the signal encoded as the series ones-and-zeros gets converted to a bunch of weak electrical signals. Upon being accepted, these weak electrical signals get declared as ones-and-zeros.

The above is how little uneducated minds, such as mine, imagine things to work. Assuming that errors can and will creep into the above process, how would those errors, or absence of errors thereof, affect the sound quality?

[Reid Malenfant]

Digital cables carry electrical pulses that are hopefully square waves. All cables suffer from capacitance from the centre conductor to the screen & the longer the cable is the more capacitance there will be.

While this capacitance will have next to zero effect on an audio signal which is a sine wave & thus has a maximum slew rate & frequency, in a digital cable we want to keep these nice straight edges of the square wave being sent down the line. Cable capacitance tends to round these nice straight edges off & this can introduce jitter, or if you like time induced distortion.

That's the first bit Then you have the quality of the phono plugs to take into account. Unfortunately when Sony & Philips came up with the S/PDIF interface they should have used only BNC connectors as these have a proper characteristic impedance of 50 or 75ohm. Digital cables (well single ended digital cables) have a characteristic impedance of 75ohm. Now while the frequencies going down it aren't too outlandish, it's those square waves again that push things up to stupid frequencies.

A phono plug has no characteristic impedance at all, so it's quite possible that there will be reflections (just as there are in radio) with a mismatched impedance. This will further screw up the timing of stuff & add to the jitter or time induced distortion

Cables & what go down them are in no way as simple as what you might think

[jon1]

I'd be interested as well.

However there are people who say all mains cables sound the same, all interconnects sound the same and that you shouldn't spent more that six bob a metre on speaker cable. I'm thick so don't expect an answer from me. All I know is Talking in Tongues by Talking Heads has never sounded so good.

If cable burn in exists then I can't wait for the improvement.

Also I'm using four mono amps to bi amp my Usher speakers. Apparently that's a waste of time as well.

Apologies if I've clouded the digital waters, I couldn't resist.

Harry

Harry if you ever what to listen to MG high end Oyaide digital cable 510..pm me


jon

[wee tee cee]

Harry if you ever what to listen to MG high end Oyaide digital cable 510..pm me


jon

John,
I run a trico/wtb I would be interested to hear your thoughts on the oyaide.
Regards Tony.

[jon1]

John,
I run a trico/wtb I would be interested to hear your thoughts on the oyaide.
Regards Tony.

Tony i have being through all marks cables except the trico..All i can say this is the best cable for clarity and detail i have had from mark..tony if you get a chance to try the oyaide 510 take it you will not be disappointed


jon

[Z-A]

Digital cables carry electrical pulses that are hopefully square waves. All cables suffer from capacitance from the centre conductor to the screen & the longer the cable is the more capacitance there will be.

While this capacitance will have next to zero effect on an audio signal which is a sine wave & thus has a maximum slew rate & frequency, in a digital cable we want to keep these nice straight edges of the square wave being sent down the line. Cable capacitance tends to round these nice straight edges off & this can introduce jitter, or if you like time induced distortion.

That's the first bit Then you have the quality of the phono plugs to take into account. Unfortunately when Sony & Philips came up with the S/PDIF interface they should have used only BNC connectors as these have a proper characteristic impedance of 50 or 75ohm. Digital cables (well single ended digital cables) have a characteristic impedance of 75ohm. Now while the frequencies going down it aren't too outlandish, it's those square waves again that push things up to stupid frequencies.

A phono plug has no characteristic impedance at all, so it's quite possible that there will be reflections (just as there are in radio) with a mismatched impedance. This will further screw up the timing of stuff & add to the jitter or time induced distortion

Cables & what go down them are in no way as simple as what you might think

Well described Mark, digital is more complex than just bits..