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Thread: Do Cables Make A Difference?

  1. #41
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    Contentious, but that is my experience over the years.

    To sort of summarise my experience, if the cables you are using remove something (bass, treble etc.) then they are actively doing something wrong. If your system therefore sounds boomy or peaky (etc) then it is at fault and the cables are merely letting that be audible.
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  2. #42
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    Quote Originally Posted by YNWaN View Post
    If your system therefore sounds boomy or peaky (etc) then it is at fault and the cables are merely letting that be audible.
    Some cables sound dire in whatever context. Therefore the cable is at fault. The very cheap and nasty (in my opinion) QED Silver Anniversary speaker cable, sounded bright and coarse on every occasion I tried it, regardless of system components.
    It is impossible for anything digital to sound analogue, because it isn't analogue!

  3. #43
    Join Date: Oct 2012

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    Quote Originally Posted by YNWaN View Post
    Contentious, but that is my experience over the years.

    To sort of summarise my experience, if the cables you are using remove something (bass, treble etc.) then they are actively doing something wrong. If your system therefore sounds boomy or peaky (etc) then it is at fault and the cables are merely letting that be audible.
    With speaker cable it's just make it as short as practical for you and use thick cable. The longer the cable the thicker it will need to be for the same low resistance obviously. That's about it for me on speaker cable.

    I think I may be paraphrasing you here Mark but a thin cable with high resistance will allow the speakers impedance curve to alter its frequency response and so yes, thin/long cables actually will sound different to low resistance ones, however, this is because of the cables resistance allowing the speaker itself to interact with this resistance and hence kind of generate its own extra colouration. Lack of damping factor in other words!

    A mate once bought some of that DNM single strand stuff an was saying it definitely sounded different but he wasn't sure if good or bad.... I went round for a listen with a few tools and yep it sounded different! Not in a good way I thought. I noticed just how thin this stuff was and so measured it.. it was adding over 1 Ohm for only about 4 meters of cable! Instant almost SET like absence of damping factor.
    Arkless Electronics-Engineered to be better. Tel. 01670 530674 (after 1pm)

    Modded Thorens TD150, Audio Technica AT-1005 MkII, Technics EPC-300MC, Arkless Hybrid MC phono stage, Arkless passive pre, Arkless 50WPC Class A SS power amp, (or) Arkless modded Leak Stereo 20, Modded Kef Reference 105/3's
    ReVox PR99, Studer B62, Ferrograph Series 7, Tandberg TCD440, Hitachi FT-5500MkI, also FT-5500MkII
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    Cables- free interconnects that come with CD players, mains leads from B&Q, dead kettles etc, extension leads from Tesco

  4. #44
    Join Date: Sep 2013

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    A nice option to consider with speaker cables is to use the
    properties of coaxial shielding. It is easy enough to just use the inner core
    of a suitably dimensioned piece of coax for both positive and negative
    and have the shield floating unconnected on each.

    We live today with increasing RFI, so shielding speaker cables is very appealing
    With my own system I use the stranded inner core of RG58 coax, and allow the
    outer to act as a Faraday shield. I have had no desire to use any other cable
    as it does its job admirably.

    Think of when you go into an elevator with your mobile phone - should provoke
    thought, that similarly protecting speaker leads with shielding can be advantageous.

    Cheers / Chris

  5. #45
    Join Date: Oct 2012

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    Quote Originally Posted by Light Dependant Resistor View Post
    A nice option to consider with speaker cables is to use the
    properties of coaxial shielding. It is easy enough to just use the inner core
    of a suitably dimensioned piece of coax for both positive and negative
    and have the shield floating unconnected on each.

    We live today with increasing RFI, so shielding speaker cables is very appealing
    With my own system I use the stranded inner core of RG58 coax, and allow the
    outer to act as a Faraday shield. I have had no desire to use any other cable
    as it does its job admirably.

    Think of when you go into an elevator with your mobile phone - should provoke
    thought, that similarly protecting speaker leads with shielding can be advantageous.

    Cheers / Chris
    It would have to be pretty short for the resistance to be sufficiently negligible. A meter or two max maybe. There are much heavier duty coax cables available but not cheap or very flexible. I vaguely recall something from Cyril Bateman about using coax as speaker cable from several years ago but can't recall his conclusions...
    Arkless Electronics-Engineered to be better. Tel. 01670 530674 (after 1pm)

    Modded Thorens TD150, Audio Technica AT-1005 MkII, Technics EPC-300MC, Arkless Hybrid MC phono stage, Arkless passive pre, Arkless 50WPC Class A SS power amp, (or) Arkless modded Leak Stereo 20, Modded Kef Reference 105/3's
    ReVox PR99, Studer B62, Ferrograph Series 7, Tandberg TCD440, Hitachi FT-5500MkI, also FT-5500MkII
    Digital: Yamaha CDR-HD1500 (Digital Swiss army knife-CD recorder, player, hard drive, DAC and ADC in one), PC files via 24/96 sound card and SPDIF, modded Philips CD850, modded Philips CD104, modded DPA Little Bit DAC. Sennheiser HD580 cans with Arkless Headphone amp.
    Cables- free interconnects that come with CD players, mains leads from B&Q, dead kettles etc, extension leads from Tesco

  6. #46
    Join Date: Sep 2013

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    Hi Jez
    I created a thread a while back with Cyril's cable measurements :
    http://theartofsound.net/forum/showt...-Zobel-network

    He reaches conclusion in his article: Cables, Amplifiers and Speaker interactions. part 1.
    " Clearly as figures 3 through 12 have shown, speaker cables do
    comply with established transmission line behaviour. "

    and
    "At audible frequencies, the amplifier output impedance presents an exceptionally low load impedance
    compared to the cable Z0. These out of phase reflections will not enter the amplifier but will be reflected
    and phase inverted, becoming in phase with and absorbed in the amplifier output signal, delayed by
    twice the cable transit time plus any load phase angle. Assuming our typical 4.9metre length cable,
    this two way transit time will approximate 50nS equivalent to just 0.36° at 20kHz, or 0.018° at 1kHz."

    He further predicts the output Zobel, as preventing unwanted reflections, from entering back into the amplifier.

    Cheers / Chris

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