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Parlor trick exposed

Sal1950

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Coming from the technology industry I am fascinated, amused and horrified at how strange myths exist in audio as a hobby.

Power. Cables. < possible winner

Suspended cables to improve sound.
Your missing one of my favorites,
Don't you know that SATA drive cables make ALL the difference in sound.
LOL
 

Hypnotoad

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Whingeing = Whining.

Selling high priced power cables is the perfect crime IMO. You have the audiophile with too much money, they are eager to improve their system, someone tells them just buy our Mirabilus Dolus for $10,000.00 (they give it some fancy name, this really means astonishing scam in latin) cable and plug it in, it couldn't be easier.
 

Sal1950

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Selling high priced power cables is the perfect crime IMO. You have the audiophile with too much money, they are eager to improve their system, someone tells them just buy our Mirabilus Dolus for $10,000.00 (they give it some fancy name, this really means astonishing scam in latin) cable and plug it in, it could'n't be easier.
Very true but same situation applies to the entire cable industry.
 

agtp

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You guys think the cable industry is a big money scam? That ain’t nothin’. The really big money is in selling the idea of an invisible magical friend who watches over you and promises immortality. There are actually people on this site who give money to these types of scammers, while at the same time they ridicule audiophile beliefs. The amount of wealth from this scam is staggering.


 

RayDunzl

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Last edited:

Hypnotoad

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Yep its sad, and it's mainly people who can't really afford it that throw money at these people, like the one in Houston while I was living there, gave his wife a Lamborghini for her birthday. Another one had a few mansions out of town on a huge property, his own private helicopter, limos etc. It was at the end of a road that no one would travel on, didn't want his flock to see where all their money was going I guess.
 

MattHooper

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Very true but same situation applies to the entire cable industry.

I see you've unleashed both gun barrels over on the Stereophile comments section ;-)
 

Sal1950

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I see you've unleashed both gun barrels over on the Stereophile comments section ;-)

Couldn't have been me.
Ted Denney of Synergistic said I was a faked account?
Not sure what he even meant by that. LOL
Guess it was just a lame attempt to discredit my post.
 

agtp

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I’m surprised more focus and scrutiny isn’t put on Denney and his products. He seems to me to be the worst of the fraudsters.

At one show I attended, he was outside his demo room frantically looking for credulous victims to fill it with, he turned to me and asked if I was interested in having a listen. I responded with a look of disgust and just kept walking. Unfazed, he continued on with his same rehearsed sales-pitch to the next passerby. A shameless huckster, IMO.
 

MattHooper

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On the Stereophile thread he's been asked, with civility, several times how he measures the phenomena his product addresses, and if he has measurements showing the physical changes. The evasion is amazing. He won't even touch the question. It seems with some of these companies, raising the question of objective measurements is like holding up a cross in front of a vampire.
 

SIY

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On the Stereophile thread he's been asked, with civility, several times how he measures the phenomena his product addresses, and if he has measurements showing the physical changes. The evasion is amazing. He won't even touch the question. It seems with some of these companies, raising the question of objective measurements is like holding up a cross in front of a vampire.

He certainly comes off as a rather slimy marchand de tapis, and my experience with one of his products certainly confirmed that they are engaging in what looks to me like fraudulent behavior. My analysis and measurements were removed from Head Fi's website (apparently at Denney's request) but I managed to sneak some of them into an AudioXpress article.

But the one that really took the cake for me was High Fidelity Cables.

...the inventor of their special magnetic cables put on an entire show with explanations of how conductivity works that would come as a surprise to anyone with a physics background. The talk and Q&A afterward emphasized that the investors were aggressive litigation attorneys, so I'll merely quote from my conversation about the MC-0.5. "We call this 'the Skepticism Eliminator.' Plug it into the wall socket and it reduces noise in all of the other circuits in the room." I asked the obvious question, "OK, so if I attach a spectrum analyzer to this wall socket, then plug the MC-0.5 into another socket, I'll see the noise spectrum reduce in amplitude?" This was also not the right question to ask, apparently, because there's noise that we can hear but not measure. I was told again about their investors being litigation attorneys.
 

MattHooper

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SIY,

Wow.

I actually tend to give the tweaky companies some benefit of the doubt, allowing that they actually believe in their own product. After all, even if a cable or tweak doesn't actually "work" the person making the device can be just as influenced by their own bias as the customer who thinks he hears a difference. So I think a lot of the tweaky products are designed and sold by people who think they actually work.

That said...it can be hard to escape the feeling that some of them know what they are doing. The evasiveness just becomes too hard to ignore.
 

SIY

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They all know what they're doing. After many years of dealing with them, testing their products, and watching them (and their flying monkeys) in action, I give them no benefit of the doubt.
 

Sal1950

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That said...it can be hard to escape the feeling that some of them know what they are doing.
You have a good heart Matt. But I'd bet the vast majority are just laughing all the way to the bank. ;)
 

Hypnotoad

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That said...it can be hard to escape the feeling that some of them know what they are doing. The evasiveness just becomes too hard to ignore.

I knew a guy who ran a franchise concrete products store, he would tell everyone that his concrete sealer was premium and couldn't be bettered, of course it cost more. He would even tell people that a company that made and sold it nearby was rubbish, come to find out the sealer he sold was made by the company he was lambasting, just different labeling on the same drums.
 

zalive

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Yes, he does. There is a cease and desist order from Nordost's attorneys about Waldrep's potentially libelous postings. If Waldrep does not comply, he will be sued. Since Waldrep has no real evidence, like that demo disc which likely has already been shredded, he has got no defense. I cannot blame Waldrep for capitulating.

But what is this without a hard evidence? Anecdotal evidence?
I really thought this forum doesn't support anecdotal evidence...but obviously logic used depends on which church is being attended...
 

Sal1950

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But what is this without a hard evidence? Anecdotal evidence?
I really thought this forum doesn't support anecdotal evidence...but obviously logic used depends on which church is being attended...
Any demo that produces a increase in volume level with a power cord change is hard evidence in and of itself. ;)
 
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