• WANTED: Happy members who like to discuss audio and other topics related to our interest. Desire to learn and share knowledge of science required. There are many reviews of audio hardware and expert members to help answer your questions. Click here to have your audio equipment measured for free!

Morrow SP3 Review (Speaker Cable)

Inner Space

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
May 18, 2020
Messages
1,285
Likes
2,938
Yet the cable tweak seems so logical to so many who don't understand how it actually works.....big part of their success in selling silly cables.

Yes, exactly. Lay intuition about electricity involves a tsunami of electrons rushing through wires at tremendous speeds, in one direction, so naturally the wire might have a negative effect, if it's rough or scratchy inside, or has too many connections, or whatever. The customers drive the market as much as the sellers. Maybe more.
 

Chrispy

Master Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Feb 7, 2020
Messages
7,751
Likes
5,910
Location
PNW
Yes, exactly. Lay intuition about electricity involves a tsunami of electrons rushing through wires at tremendous speeds, in one direction, so naturally the wire might have a negative effect, if it's rough or scratchy inside, or has too many connections, or whatever. The customers drive the market as much as the sellers. Maybe more.

Plus it seems easy to technically employ (just change cables) and there's plenty of goofy support from the crap audio reviews and blogs and mags....
 

voodooless

Grand Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Jun 16, 2020
Messages
10,222
Likes
17,799
Location
Netherlands
The distortions we are talking about on the website are those that are not measurable with test equipment. They are rather distortions that affect soundstage, musicality, realism, etc… the musical presentation. Another example is the 3D roundness of the images within the sound field.

How can they not be measured, yet you claim to precisely pinpoint their cause, even seem to imply the physical processes involved in these so-called distortions? You make assertions about distortions that you cannot explain the physical process behind, nor can you objectively show they exist in any way, shape or form. If you ask me this is pure fraud!

There are many things that are yet understood, how the ear/ brain works in deciphering the music.

Sure, if you're willing to seclude yourself from the mountain of research done in the field. Typical audiophile of the gaps argument. Ignorance is bliss...

Somehow, with our cable design, the difference between recording and the live event becomes less.

So your design method is "somehow"? Interesting... I'm pretty sure the rebuttal will be something like: .. years of experience in high-end blabla..

I propose to the reviewer that he test all cable reviews in a real, properly set up stereo system.

As others have pointed out: we'd recommend a controlled double-blind test. I'm pretty sure you will have the usual battery of arguments for not doing those...

I'm also pretty sure you will not address a single one of the many arguments that have been made by now. I also hope you prove me wrong on this one. Good luck! You'll need it.

... and thus a perfectly fine made cable with an arguably okay price is bites the dust ...
 
Last edited:

B4ICU

Active Member
Joined
Feb 19, 2021
Messages
157
Likes
92
Directional cables:

As you know, Audio signal is A/C and basically can be translated at any complexity, into a series of sine waves (Nyquist theory).
As So, lets look at one sine wave, lets assume of 1kHz at 1V p-p.
You can see that it is absolutely symmetrical, and 50% of the time it's positive (above the 0V line) and 50% negative (below the 0V line).
That's mean' that the current flows 50% of the time in one direction <- and 50% of the time in the other direction ->.
If a cable is directional (No such thing), in which of the 50% the directional feature is doing "Good" to the signal, and in which 50% it ruin it?
 

pma

Major Contributor
Joined
Feb 23, 2019
Messages
4,591
Likes
10,727
Location
Prague
That's mean' that the current flows 50% of the time in one direction <- and 50% of the time in the other direction ->.

The statement above is a nonsense. The signal propagates as an electromagnetic field along the cable. Not 50% time in one direction and 50% time in other direction. If you send a sine through 100 m of a cable it will take about 500 nanoseconds for the signal to travel from the beginning to the end of the cable. One directional signal transfer.
 

Bruce Morgen

Addicted to Fun and Learning
Forum Donor
Joined
Aug 3, 2019
Messages
864
Likes
1,237
The statement above is a nonsense. The signal propagates as an electromagnetic field along the cable. Not 50% time in one direction and 50% time in other direction. If you send a sine through 100 m of a cable it will take about 500 nanoseconds for the signal to travel from the beginning to the end of the cable. One directional signal transfer.

:facepalm:
 

KSTR

Major Contributor
Joined
Sep 6, 2018
Messages
2,690
Likes
6,012
Location
Berlin, Germany
The distortions we are talking about on the website are those that are not measurable with test equipment.
They can, if you know how to do it: Subtractive analysis shows any difference in the signal not matter what type (and no matter what signal). Assuming a competitor cable with very similar LCR-parameters you are saying there is a difference with your cables, right? If so, it would show up immediately in a differential residue test, using the same (synthesized) speaker load and (precision) amplifier. There might be minor linear differences to start with (mainly from the LCR values not being exactly the same) but those tiny differences, showing up as miniscule frequency response (mag&phase) deviations, can be de-embedded so that only any non-linear stuff dominates the residual -- and that non-linear stuff is what is claimed to make the difference, right? A few 1/100th of a dB of frequency response change (or level) plus a single digit phase deviation at most sure don't make a difference here in perception (this can easily be tested seperately).
 

Francis Vaughan

Addicted to Fun and Learning
Forum Donor
Joined
Dec 6, 2018
Messages
933
Likes
4,697
Location
Adelaide Australia
The distortions we are talking about on the website are those that are not measurable with test equipment.
And yet you make specific apparently scientific assertions as to the reasons behind insulated strands in your cables. There is a whole section of psuedo-scientific BS that asserts physical properties to the wire and justifies its magical audio capabilities as being due to these effects. Yet you can't measure the claimed physical properties. Somewhere there is disconnect in honesty or competence.
Moreover the claim is that somehow the cable magically removes distortions that occurred earlier. Which is pretty impressive.

Here is an example… When attending an audiophile trade show, one walks by rooms where stereo systems are playing. For the most part, as you approach the room, you know that it is indeed a stereo system. Now, when you are in the lobby, which also contains stereos, you hear something different, you know that it is live music. As you round the corner, you discover that it indeed is!
One wonders if you have the slightest clue about acoustics and the recording process. In particular the manner in which venue acoustics are managed in the recording process and why the effect you note exists. It is hardly anything new. Just about any introductory source on recording will deal with exactly these issues.
You would probably do well to get out and listen to more live music. Even better, attend concerts that are recorded and later listen to the recordings. I do this quite a bit. From small jazz ensembles, string quartets, chamber orchestras, to full blown symphonic works. I have a lot of recordings of concerts I was present at. The idea that a speaker cable can somehow magically bridge the massive gap in the nature of the recorded versus live acoustics is sheer fantasy. There is well understood science that exactly says why there is a difference, and it isn't some magical unmeasurable effect.
 

Francis Vaughan

Addicted to Fun and Learning
Forum Donor
Joined
Dec 6, 2018
Messages
933
Likes
4,697
Location
Adelaide Australia
Sort of. It doesn't say what you paraphrase it as saying. It most certainly does not contradict the idea that AC current flows back and forth 50/50 in a conductor.
Note, current flow is not the same as signal transmission. They are intimately related, but a statement about the propagation of signals is not transferable to current flow. In a nutshell, signal is energy per unit time, current is charge per unit time. Current flow obeys Kirchhoff's Laws. We might note that these are derived from Maxwell's equations.
 

ahofer

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Jun 3, 2019
Messages
4,947
Likes
8,694
Location
New York City
Here are two posts addressing the assertion that you can make your stereo sound like live music (with a cable or something less nonsensical than a cable), or that there are unmeasurable attributes that electronics or speakers might address to achieve that goal. They both reside within threads that address the topics in detail. Nothing here that ASR regulars don't know, but worth remembering if you are tempted to believe the nonsense Mr. Morrow is peddling.

Alan Shaw: https://www.harbeth.co.uk/usergroup...n-a-few-home-thruths-in-hifi.78308/post-94047

And if I am completely honest with you and myself, the biggest challenge is the time needed to get over the disappointment that no matter how fine or expensive the replay equipment nor how well damped the room, reproduced sound is like looking down a pipe into the recording studio or the venue. It's a totally different experience to 'being there' and one has to set ones expectations of what the home hifi system can actually deliver realistically.

Since it's impossible to reproduce the scale, dispersion, airiness and dynamics of live sound in any meaningful way at home, it's madness to set that as an all-consuming goal, despite the teases in HiFiUpTheGardenPath monthly that it's just another cable, power conditioner, amplifier or DAC away. That is untruthful. They know it is, and in your heart, you (or more objectively) your wife does. It's an wholly unrealistic goal and wholly unachievable at any price.

see elsewhere in the thread:
Mistake No.1: Reading and trusting the subjective opinions of folk that you have never met nor are likely to ever meet and who are wholly non-technical, and have an agenda that is opaque

Mistake No. 2: Self doubt about your existing system (seeded by Mistake No. 1)

Mistake No. 3: Believing that spending money can solve all audiophile aspirations

Mistake No. 4: Expecting the salesman to deliberately restrain your spending when he is not a psychologist and cannot know precisely what you are seeking

Mistake No. 5: Believing in manufacturer's advertising. Frequently, the biggest advertisers have the least viable sets of financial accounts (public information)

Mistake No. 6: Being a victim of limited physical product availability - your product choice on any high street is merely a sub-set of what is available in that market. Conversely, it does not imply that if you expand your search to nearby cities and regions that you will necessarily make a better selection; you may be even more confused

Mistake No. 7: Not making enough personal effort to investigate brands and create a short-list before entering the retail environment

Mistake No. 8: Comparing audio equipment without controlling the loudness and using poorly recorded, low resolution knackered old recordings from your youth where your emotional involvement inhibits proper objectivity. You wouldn't buy a fancy camera by comparing one camera image quality pointing out the window onto the high street and another in the store room in the gloom would you? You'd surely compare them under the same lux level - the equivalent of comparing audio equipment at the same dB level

Mistake No. 9: Undervaluing the importance of a proper after-care service by the manufacturer and the long-term availability of component parts over many years or decades.

J.J. Johnston: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...-cannot-be-measured.20808/page-48#post-763427

(read the whole thing)


btw, since we now have Firstruncopper, can "HiFiUpTheGardenPath" be far behind? I like the title.
 

pma

Major Contributor
Joined
Feb 23, 2019
Messages
4,591
Likes
10,727
Location
Prague

Francis Vaughan

Addicted to Fun and Learning
Forum Donor
Joined
Dec 6, 2018
Messages
933
Likes
4,697
Location
Adelaide Australia
And it is the field that carries the signal, not the electrons
The posting you claimed was wrong specifically said current, not signal.

If there were no mobile electrons there would be no current flow. Both conductors and insulators are filled with electrons. But it is the mobility of electrons in the conductor that allows signal flow. If it were just an electric field that carried the signal, we could send it down a plastic rod.

The usual analogue is a hose full of marbles. If you push on the marble at one end of the hose another marble pops out of the other end. The marble velocity is very low compared to the velocity of the force pushing the marbles along the hose. But if the marbles didn't move at all, nothing would happen at the other end. So indeed, the actual speed of electrons is almost comically low. Snails pace. But their movement is an intrinsic part of an electrical circuit. In the marble filled hose the signal propagates at the speed of sound in glass (assuming glass marbles). In a wire the electron to electron force is mediated by the electromagnetic force, which moves at c.
Signal propagation is represented by Maxwell's equations. Which combine electrostatic and magnetic fields. Critically, you can't have a magnetic field without moving charge. Although the velocity of electrons in a conductor is really small, astoundingly, it is the combination of relativity and moving electrons that causes the magnetic component.
If you want to propagate an electromagnetic field without a wire, it works as the electrostatic and magnetic fields form a sort of mutual dance as they propagate. This is commonly called a radio wave. It is a different problem to what happens down a wire.

You might also consider how a chemical battery works. There most surely are moving electrons, as without them, the chemistry won't work.
 

oupee

Active Member
Joined
Oct 15, 2020
Messages
157
Likes
57
Directional cables:

As you know, Audio signal is A/C and basically can be translated at any complexity, into a series of sine waves (Nyquist theory).
As So, lets look at one sine wave, lets assume of 1kHz at 1V p-p.
You can see that it is absolutely symmetrical, and 50% of the time it's positive (above the 0V line) and 50% negative (below the 0V line).
That's mean' that the current flows 50% of the time in one direction <- and 50% of the time in the other direction ->.
If a cable is directional (No such thing), in which of the 50% the directional feature is doing "Good" to the signal, and in which 50% it ruin it?
The sine signal has a positive half wave and a negative one. The negative does not flow back but still into the speaker but with the opposite polarity (the whole thing is a bit more complicated).
I would like to know which moron was the first to print an arrow on the cable and declare the cable directional.
 

ahofer

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Jun 3, 2019
Messages
4,947
Likes
8,694
Location
New York City
I have almost no knowledge of the physics of electricity. However, one of the things I have noticed on other sites (and to some extent in earlier comments here) is the fear & doubt created by wildly disparate theories of what is important in the behavior of an audio signal traveling through a wire in a home. Enough to convince (motivated) people that wires make a big difference, and science is overmatched in measuring and designing their effects. This despite zero evidence that these effects, to the extent they exist, are strictly audible. Over at Audiogon, the notorious Geoff Kait used to go wild with assertions and vaguely targeted questions about electricity and quantum mechanics. Another source of doubt is real long-distance transmission issues applied, inappropriately, to the tiny distances in our living rooms.

I wonder to what extent ASR is capable of providing a decent guide or heuristic to separate nonsense from reasonable applied science in this field.
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom