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AudioQuest Victoria Audio Cable with DBS Review

JohnBooty

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What are the margins on these boutique cables like? They must be ridiculous, like 10x the cost to manufacture?
I don't have a definitive source, but I've often seen it written that 10% is a pretty typical parts cost for a typical consumer item. For this kind of audiophool nonsense it's surely much greater.
 

CDMC

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Thomas savage

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"The AQ Fire interconnects are part of AudioQuest’s Elements Series featuring advanced geometry, Solid Perfect-Surface Silver conductors, 72V Dielectric-Bias System, FEP Air Tube insulation for the conductors, and some of the very best sound we’ve ever had in Music Room II."

$3500 and it doesn't even produce the best sound heard in that room AND it isn't good enough for what I assume is the place called Music Room 1!!!

:facepalm::facepalm::facepalm::facepalm::facepalm::facepalm::facepalm::facepalm::facepalm:
Music room one , is that where they keep the rubber mats and lube?
 

KSTR

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I hate DIN connectors, every single one of them from the evil little two pin ones they used for speakers, and all the combinations of pins and angular spacing. Nearly as much as Scart connectors and my personal favorite in the "virtually impossible to terminate", the S-VHS (Y/C) mini connector.

Thank goodness they have pretty much all gone the way of the dodo.
1594753788526.png

Seems that IKEA has bought the overstock and finally put them to some good use in a LED lamp supply ;-)
Doubles up as polarity tester for legacy speakers with this dumb connector (please do not try, though).
 

KSTR

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As for the topic, I would hesitate to think this is total crap from a physical standpoint. The idea is to put away with a low-level crossover-distortion like error. The electrical field has a very strong superimposed DC component which forces the charges in the isolator to "lock-in" on fixed positions/orientations rather than "moving around" and dissipate energy, slightly deforming a low level waveform when fed from a high impedance source. With low source impedance and high drive (volts) it's probably way down south of -120dB and irrelevant. In a phono cable though, error magnitudes may or may not be different and above hearing threshold. To get a grip on this one would need a more complex test setup, using a high-Z source at microvolt levels and a low-noise preamp, then some prost-processing on the ADC data with eg. time-tomain averaging, using the same cable with DC bias on and off in a subtractive test, maybe with giving it time to settle and/or "degauss" the cable with a high-level noise signal and all that. All in all a lot of effort with questionable outcome.
The good news is that microphones with +48V phantom power are using DC bias all the time, so if there is something to it, at least our recordings are not totally spoiled to begin with...
 

Harmonie

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Frankly, I bought them really a while ago, maybe the price is still in DM !
LoL
 
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amirm

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As for the topic, I would hesitate to think this is total crap from a physical standpoint. The idea is to put away with a low-level crossover-distortion like error. The electrical field has a very strong superimposed DC component which forces the charges in the isolator to "lock-in" on fixed positions/orientations rather than "moving around" and dissipate energy, slightly deforming a low level waveform when fed from a high impedance source. With low source impedance and high drive (volts) it's probably way down south of -120dB and irrelevant. In a phono cable though, error magnitudes may or may not be different and above hearing threshold. To get a grip on this one would need a more complex test setup, using a high-Z source at microvolt levels and a low-noise preamp, then some prost-processing on the ADC data with eg. time-tomain averaging, using the same cable with DC bias on and off in a subtractive test, maybe with giving it time to settle and/or "degauss" the cable with a high-level noise signal and all that. All in all a lot of effort with questionable outcome.
The good news is that microphones with +48V phantom power are using DC bias all the time, so if there is something to it, at least our recordings are not totally spoiled to begin with...
That's not what this cable does. The DC is NOT applied to signal carrying wires. It is connected to a wire that is not connected to anything.
 

KSTR

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Well, assuming a cable that is a standard 3-wire + shield mic cable, used unbalanced and with the "cold" wire connected to the DC bias on one end, this would create a DC "bias" field in the dielectric, wouldn't it? And the signal wire would simply overlay that with AC field one or two orders lower in magnitude, in terms of polarizing power.

In a true triax with the inner shield applied to the bias voltage this would work equally well if not better.. still under the assumption that the dielectric losses are indeed not perfectly linear and time-invariant in some way at very low signal levels, of course... OTOH, in high impedance sensor precision interfacing dielectric loss is definitely an issue, and when it is non-linear it will introduce distortion. I personally would not dismiss the whole concept, though generally speaking I agree this is a non-issue for the most part, for high-level signals driven from standard low-Z (100Ohms or less) outputs.
 

Alice of Old Vincennes

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1000% markup. I am in the wrong business, clearly. Amir - you probably are as well......
Similar to door to door vinyl window installers. Also, roofers who provide financing secured by a second or third mortgage. Don't forget the best of all, buy here pay here used car lots. I had a client pay $10,000 for a car with 350,000 miles. The vehicle wasn't worth $200. Fortunately, chapter 13 saved the day under the pre 2005 statute. Crammed down to $200 at 4% for 36 months. Now that's a low car payment.
 
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