I've noticed that there are clearly differences in the sound of S/PDIF cables used in my system, but I'm curious if anyone has experienced the same sonic differences using a given cable in more than one system.

Why am I asking this?

I can see that the interaction of a digital source, connectors and cable, and the electronics associated with a digital input make for a complex set of interactions (especially since the asynchronous nature of S/PDIF transmission means that recovery of the data is an analog process).

This suggests that the "sound" of a given combination of source, cable and receiver could be highly variable based purely on how close the system is to a pure 75ohm transmission system. In other words, you can really only say "this cable sounds this way in this system".

What is harder to understand is how a specific cable could have a repeatable sonic signature, and yet I'm sure I've seen people report this.

So, have you experienced this consistency?
If so, any thoughts on how this could be?

Peter

 Yes and No... - Todd Krieger 18:42:20 08/06/03 (13)
 Re: Yes and No... - Commuteman 18:48:51 08/06/03 (12)
 Re: Yes and No... - Ted Smith 18:56:56 08/06/03 (11)

...

Show full thread outline!

 Yes and No... - Todd Krieger 18:42:20 08/06/03 (13)
 Re: Yes and No... - Commuteman 18:48:51 08/06/03 (12)
 Re: Yes and No... - Ted Smith 18:56:56 08/06/03 (11)
 Re: Yes and No... - Lymp Baygul 09:45:28 08/18/03 (0)
 Re: Yes and No... - Steve Eddy 22:13:10 08/06/03 (5)
 Re: Yes and No... - Ted Smith 23:07:59 08/06/03 (4)
 Re: Yes and No... - Steve Eddy 23:34:26 08/06/03 (3)
 Re: Yes and No... - Ted Smith 23:38:42 08/06/03 (2)
 Hi Ted.. - jneutron 07:04:12 08/07/03 (0)
 Re: Yes and No... - Steve Eddy 23:55:10 08/06/03 (0)
 I'll buy that, but... - Commuteman 21:05:31 08/06/03 (3)
 Re: I'll buy that, but... - Ted Smith 23:07:17 08/06/03 (2)
 That parallels my experience - Commuteman 10:36:36 08/07/03 (1)
 Re: That parallels my experience - Ted Smith 11:28:16 08/07/03 (0)

But...

When I listen to different digital cables, although the "best" for a one DAC may be different from the "best" for another DAC, the relative sonic characteristics amongst different digital cables seem to remain consistent. (This is not the case with interconnects or especially speaker cables and power cords.)

IMO, the variablity of the system environment would rule out a simple explanation based on the excellence or otherwise of the cable's traditional elecrtical parameters.

Qualifier: I suspect that the closer a cable gets to "perfect" adherence to the 75ohm ideal, the less character it should have, but the improvements it brings might be consistent from system to system.

Haven't I just contradicted myself? Well, I would think that more and more cables are getting close to the ideal, ruling out my qualifier, yet the subjective differences remain.

Peter

I'm not sure that the 75 Ohm ideal matters that much for short runs, I'd guess that RFI in the environment or the type of jitter rejection in the DAC (e.g. an asynchronous sample rate converter vs., say, a big buffer) would have more of an effect.

-Ted

Peter

In the post above, Commuteman says:

I suspect that the closer a cable gets to "perfect" adherence to the 75ohm ideal, the less character it should have...

In your reply you say:

I'm not sure that the 75 Ohm ideal matters that much for short runs, I'd guess that RFI in the environment or the type of jitter rejection in the DAC (e.g. an asynchronous sample rate converter vs., say, a big buffer) would have more of an effect.

You're basically shooting down Commuteman's idea about the 75 ohm ideal and then advancing your idea over his by suggesting that yours is the more likely.

What I'm confused about is how this squares with what you said just yesterday:

When brainstorming, we need to hold all criticism back and let the ideas flow. They trigger new ideas in others and progress is made. At some point a more structured weeding of ideas needs to take place but doing it too early is just counter productive.

Your reply to Commuteman seems to be completely contrary to this.

se

Well, I suppose it does, but like I said I'm just guessing: (based on my limited experience with just a few DACs and cables.)

FWIW: With my P-3A and a random Toshiba transport, Jena Labs Trio audio interconnect (which I'm sure has a high bandwidth, but probably is quite far from 75 Ohms) and Audience AU24 digital interconnect sounded much closer to each other (and better than) than they did to AudioQuest VSD-2 or AudioQuest VSD-1 which were definitely 75 Ohms coax.

I haven't done enough experiments to have much useful data on this and to tell the truth my current DAC is so jitter insensitive I doubt I'd hear as much differences between any kind of cable, but if I can get enough of my daughter's time (and if I can find the power supply for my old P-3A :) ) I may try four or five different kinds of cables on my three different DACs and report what I find.

-Ted

Somehow I believe there is a difference in our styles.

-Ted

Ok. So when you said we should hold all criticism back and let ideas flow, you didn't REALLY mean we should hold all criticism back and let ideas flow. Instead what you really meant was it actually is ok to criticize as long as you do it with a certain... style?

Ok, here's your style of criticism:

I'm not sure that the 75 Ohm ideal matters that much for short runs, I'd guess that RFI in the environment or the type of jitter rejection in the DAC (e.g. an asynchronous sample rate converter vs., say, a big buffer) would have more of an effect.

This style of criticism you say is ok. Could you quote an example of my style which apparently is not ok and explain the differences so I'll know what to change in my style in order for my criticism to pass muster along with yours?

se

No I won't play this game it's obviously not constructive.

-Ted

You're the one playing the games here Ted.

You say we're to hold all criticism back. Then you go and criticize. When this is pointed out, you say it's ok to criticize as long as it's done with a certain style. When I try to find out just what the proper style is, you pull this "I won't play this game" crap.

Of course it's not constructive. You make it a one-way street. A no-win situation. You say I'm doing something wrong. When I ask what it is, you can't tell me. It's just some vague whatever rattling around in your head that you either can't or won't elaborate. And if you can't or won't do that, how on earth can you expect anything constructive to come about?

se

As the policy does appear to be far too ambiguous..

Cheers, John

Of course, that doesn't stop people making generalizations along the lines of "Illuminations D-60 sounds XXXX while Purist Colossus sounds YYYY".

Anyway, it looks like this is a subject that is of very little interest judging by the small number of posts....

Peter

I think that the subject is probably of interest to the people that believe that cables can make a difference, but perhaps the lack of correlations is disheartening :)

-Ted