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RE: Call me crazy but the difference in cables Isn't that much

Posted by jrlaudio (P) on November 24, 2012 at 20:43:44

In Reply to: RE: Call me crazy but the difference in cables Isn't that much posted by geoffkait on November 24, 2012 at 16:25:03:

The affects claimed from people who are proponents of cryo, cable cookers and such have never been documented as quantifiable phenomenon. While changes in sound are perceived, they are not likely due to things like the crystalline structure of copper or silver, the insulation dialectrics, tribo issues or any of that. This is based on assumptions made through observation, leaving them in the realm of unproven theory.

For instance it's like me putting 100% pure h2o in a glass that has salt in the glass. I do not tell you the water was pure, or that the glass had salt in it. I ask you to taste and tell me what you perceive. By tasting the water from this glass you might say the water wasn't pure in the first place. Or you may correctly assume the glass was contaminated. Or you may conclude some unseen angel put salt in before I handed it to you. Or some combination of each. If I don't tell you the facts, your subjective taste test alone cannot with certainty tell you what the truth is. You come to a conclusion based on subjective testing & observation.

Many ideas put forth by audiophiles and audiophile companies are sometimes incorrect conclusions based in subjective observation and subsequent erroneous conclusions. And they are sometimes self-sustaining. Like the idea of OFC wire. There is no conclusive peer reveiwed evidence anywhere, (scientific, academic or otherwise meaning reliable sources without pecuniary intrest that is) proving that OFC has any affect vs regular high purity copper. Only subjective listening tests conducted in uncontrolled conditions with many many variables that could account for the differences observed. The amount of torque applied to the connections being ONLY ONE good example.

In fact the prevailing tests, peer reviewed, in the academia say there is no correlation between OFC and signal changes in cables in general. Remember, OFC was orignally developed to reduce oxidation (green stuff) inside cable jackets and insulations, which makes them more prone to mechanical failure. This was an issue for aerospace applications and is what lead to the development of OFC wire in the first place. I was involved in that development many years ago at MIT, so I know the origin first hand.

I have only seen a handful of cable manufacturers deal with issue of bonding connectors to wire. This is the single biggest source of cable signal anomalies and subsequent signal change over time. Very few audiophile cable companies use molecular bonding techniques (exothermically welded connections, for instance) in making their connections. This may account for much of the so-called break-in issues. Many use soldered connections, or crimped or pressure fitted connection, but few use things like CADWELL bonding or the like.

We made studies back in the late 70's at MIT in regards to this issue and found crimped connections changed in electrical characteristics, particularly in resitivity, over several weeks once manufactured. This was due to relaxing mechanical stresses in the struture of the metals of the crimped interface. These affects included changes in inherant or average impedence (frequency dependancy), capcitance and even certain levels of inductance, as well a resitivity and piezoelectric affects. Also it had a variable affect on triboelelctric charges particularly if the connections were jacketed in some fashion. All of which within the values capable of effecting audio frequencies and certainly RF frequencies. Using a solder connection reduced the time frame and variance stabilized faster. Silver or tin solder only differentiated in terms of the affected piezo and triboelectric anonmalies. Exothermically welded connections where discovered to not have any of these affects and in fact showed time constants for these affects to be within the timeframe of only the cooling period after making the connection.

I do know, and the actual data & physics supports it, that these issues have the affect described by people who break-in cables. We measured it at MIT and I have heard it as well.

Now this is real data to support the POSSIBLE actual reason for cable break-in times. (I'm not saying this is what is happeneing ... however...) This data already exists and is peer reveiwed. This would be a better starting point then assumptions based on subjective listening A/B comparision and assumptions based on what are certainly a multitude of variables in uncontrolled situations. I'm not saying people aren't hearing a difference, I just dissagree with reasons being used to explain the phenomenon. Mostly made by people trying to sell something and then becoming self sustaining like any legend observed. We once thought ships would fall off the end of the earth until we got data saying the earth was round and gravity existed. While religion kept the earth flat, now it's money driving myths to promulgate onward. Not data.

Be careful what you spend money on. It may be better to be safe than sorry you spent money poorly based on self-propagated myth.

Edits: 11/24/12 11/24/12

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