Lets talk cables

[amirm]

But what we all want to see, of course, is tests of the Nordosts, Transparents, and MITs.

I have a few Transparent cables: XLR, RCA and speaker wires. I tested one of them and like the MIT above, it rolls off high frequencies if the source impedance is high:

With 20 ohm source impedance, it is no different than generic cable. With 600 ohms, it rolls off much more than generic cable although in audible band (< 20 kHz), there is not much attenuation.

 

[Jakob1863]

Which cable construction serves the best depends on this specific interface where you want to use them and it additionally depends on the environment in which the system works.
The phono input already was mentioned, loading by the cables capacitance occurs and has to be taken into consideration; but constructions of the cable is important too, as usually the phono cartrigde isn´t grounded while the preamplifier provides the reference ground for the combination of turntable and amplifier.
So a balanced shielded cable where the shield is only connected (inside the cable) at one end is a good choice. Construction details - for example the shield connection in the jacks- can be quite important.

Loudspeaker cable parameters will have an impact due to different loudspeaker and amplifier characteristica; it makes a difference if a loudspeaker has some impedance linearization network or not, it makes a difference what kind of output network is used inside the amplifier and it might depend what kind of EM fields are at play.

 

[Timbo2]

They would sound better in blue. And with a nice heavy outer sheath (braided sleeves, or big garden hose, whatever).

DonH56, everyone knows that shrink tubing and a sheath adds depth and transparency!

These were the right size and $6 for two on Amazon. But it's very visible coming from my DAC to my O2 headphone amp and I hated the mirror finish and the logos on every plug. Fortunately I have plenty of left over loom and shrink tubing from other projects.

Please let me go about what it has done to the sound...

 

[amirm]

DonH56, everyone knows that shrink tubing and a sheath adds depth and transparency!

Someone loaned me a DC cable with that sheathing on it. I liked it! So I bought some to put on my DC cables. Givens one the good feeling you get when you say, wash your car and then drive it.

 

[palamudin]

Someone loaned me a DC cable with that sheathing on it. I liked it! So I bought some to put on my DC cables. Givens one the good feeling you get when you say, wash your car and then drive it.

Washed car will go faster and have better handling characteristics due to less drag and better aerodynamic properties. Everyone knows that.

 

[Blumlein 88]

@amirm tested relatively inexpensive speaker cables.

But what we all want to see, of course, is tests of the Nordosts, Transparents, and MITs. The problem is that those cables are obscenely priced, and finding an affluent audiophile open-minded enough to part with his precious cables for testing will be difficult.

I did some nulling tests a few years ago using interconnects. I did have some moderately expensive cables (Audioquest Diamond X3 Hyperlitz and others). Also have done using some less expensive XLR cables and the AQ Diamond X3. I nulled both music and test signals against themselves.

You get nothing other than thermal noise left over. I could try it again with better ADCs, but I don't think the results would differ.

 

[SIY]

IMO, rational phono systems run balanced. I can touch the pins of my cartridge with a finger and there's barely any noise.

Besides capacitance, phono cables can have two other issues: microphonics from triboelectricity, and mechanical coupling (floppy and thin is better). The former is especially bad with MM cartridges paired with Teflon/silver cables.

Yes, in theory you only worry about cable capacitance and preamp input capacitance. The trouble is that the latter is rarely specified accurately, and often the spec is wildly wrong, especially with high end gear where the "designer" doesn't understand Miller capacitance very well.

 

[Blumlein 88]

Attached is a zip file with some short triboelectric cable sounds. One of which is Audioquest silver/and telfon. Which was by far the worst. Next worst is Monoprice Premium XLR (I think because of the multiple layers in that cable), and least, nearly non-existent some cheap GLS microphone cable. I had to use like several strands for that.

But don't get the idea this is a problem with tonearm cabling as mostly it isn't. This is the cable fed into a microphone preamp with 75 db of gain (even moving coil phono stages are only about 55 db usually). The cable was physically bent to create the triboelectric noise. Not like sound waves on it would cause this. Nor do i think it likely the movement of the tonearm during LP play would either.

 

[RayDunzl]

Attached is a zip file with some short triboelectric cable sounds.

The amplitude differs.

The waveform is an (almost) impulse.

 

[SIY]

But don't get the idea this is a problem with tonearm cabling as mostly it isn't. This is the cable fed into a microphone preamp with 75 db of gain (even moving coil phono stages are only about 55 db usually). The cable was physically bent to create the triboelectric noise. Not like sound waves on it would cause this. Nor do i think it likely the movement of the tonearm during LP play would either.

I've had this audibly happen with some silver-Teflon cables. I thought at the time that there was something wrong with the preamp I had built, and I went crazy trying to figure out which component had gone microphonic. I ended up chucking the preamp into a box, then many years later, I experienced the same issue with a different unit (this time, an electronic crossover). I remembered the old preamp, realized that I used the same Teflon cables, and the lightbulb went on. I had also seen similar problems with my guitar cables dragging across the stage, making audible noise.

The key is gain, as you mentioned, but also source and load impedance. That's why cabling for MM is paradoxically a worse problem than for MC.

 

[Fitzcaraldo215]

Well, I would never shell out the money for a silver-Teflon cable. But, could it have been just a bad cable rather than the concept in general?

I didn't think MM cable matching was that big a deal back in the day when I used Shure V15s. Yes, capacitive loading is an issue with MM, but so is resistive loading with MCs. I was not always, but as I got finicky about it, I was usually able to get what I thought were adequate specs on capacitance directly from tonearm, interconnect and preamp manufacturers to bring the total into the proper range, good enough given all the other compromises of vinyl. Often the sum total was too high, but low capacitance mic cable used as the interconnect can be the cure trimmed to the right length. It is surprising to see how much higher the capacitance of many high end cables is compared to mic cable, which is often comparatively inexpensive.

No more vinyl, but I still use comparatively inexpensive, low capacitance XLR mic cables as ICs throughout my system, some in 10-meter runs to surround channel amps. They sounded slightly better to me at 10-meters than some expensive Cardas 1-meter ICs, though neither sounded bad. Lesson learned. I was delighted that I did not have to spend big bucks on ICs ever again.

I also once tried some DIY experiments with a recommended Belden cable using RCAs in quasi-balanced configuration. That particular cable was fairly high in capacitance/ft. But, I made a 10 meter pair and tried it between CD player and preamp. The highs were gone, although the same cable was fine at 1-2 meters. Another lesson learned.

 

[Jakob1863]

Sure it depends on construction details. Iirc i´ve written something about it wrt Grimm Audio Cables.

But in any case it´s important to remember that for good reasons different cable constructions were developed already _before_ cables got the attention of "audiophiles" ,

 

[SIY]

Well, I would never shell out the money for a silver-Teflon cable. But, could it have been just a bad cable rather than the concept in general?
.

Nope, it acted exactly as you'd expect from the materials' positions on the triboelectric series. The Teflon-silver audiophile fad is wack.

 

[Blumlein 88]

Nope, it acted exactly as you'd expect from the materials' positions on the triboelectric series. The Teflon-silver audiophile fad is wack.

Maybe that is so you will then need cable lifters to prevent movement and noise.

 

[SIY]

Yeah, it's wonderful how the high end pyramid works.

 

[palamudin]

Maybe that is so you will then need cable lifters to prevent movement and noise.

I think its cause they weren't cryo treated.

 

[Jakob1863]

Nope, it acted exactly as you'd expect from the materials' positions on the triboelectric series. The Teflon-silver audiophile fad is wack.

Maybe that is so you will then need cable lifters to prevent movement and noise.

Yeah, it's wonderful how the high end pyramid works.

Turn opinion into fact the fast way.....

Some people obvious don´t like the combination from silver and teflon in an audio interconnect (or other field where triboelectricity and microphony effects could do harm) because of the so-called triboelectric series. It´s not a quantitative information but rather a qualitative one where in general the triboelectric effect gets bigger if two materials (contacting each other) are more seperated.

So from this (quite raw) qualitative list at a first glance, yes the combination silver/teflon isn´t a good choice wrt triboelectricity, but what metal would be a better choice?
Answer from the list....copper wouldn´t be better either (same position in the list as silver). So what about another insulator; what about the most often (probably) used pvc?

It´s place in the list is higher as teflon´s, but not that much, so is it really better and to what degree? Unfortunately you can´t say because the lists don´t provide the informations needed for that.

And while you obviously don´t need detailed informations (just look at a list and add some strong belief and you´ll get every answer you want ) in reality it doesn´t seem to be that simple, because it depends on many variables.

For many insulator materials used in cables there exists a relationship between the so-called workfunction of the metal and the charge density that results, but teflon is special in this regard as the charge densitiy is independent from this workfunction. But in experiments it was found that the charge densitiy was dependent on the specific teflon (means supplier/manufacturer is a variable or more precisely the fabrication process) and the treatment of material (rawness, pollution and so on).

Taking the actual information available into consideration, it depends strongly on several variables like form (tube or tape) and the specific formulation (which kind of PTFE, pure or for example air filled) and the resulting range is quite large. In fact the range is so broad that you can produce a cable from silver/copper and pvc that is much more worse wrt triboelectricity than a carefully designed and manufactured cable made from silver and teflon.
But the opposite is true too.......

Edit: (tube or tape) ......

 

[SIY]

I didn't think MM cable matching was that big a deal back in the day when I used Shure V15s. Yes, capacitive loading is an issue with MM, but so is resistive loading with MCs. I was not always, but as I got finicky about it, I was usually able to get what I thought were adequate specs on capacitance directly from tonearm, interconnect and preamp manufacturers to bring the total into the proper range, good enough given all the other compromises of vinyl. Often the sum total was too high, but low capacitance mic cable used as the interconnect can be the cure trimmed to the right length. It is surprising to see how much higher the capacitance of many high end cables is compared to mic cable, which is often comparatively inexpensive.

The specs from preamp manufacturers on input capacitance are often wildly incorrect. And incorrect on the low side. If a preamp has a common source FET or high mu triode input stage and shows anything below 200 pF in a spec as a minimum option, be very suspicious.

 

[SIY]

Turn opinion into fact the fast way.....


So from this (quite raw) qualitative list at a first glance, yes the combination silver/teflon isn´t a good choice wrt triboelectricity, but what metal would be a better choice?

The better question is, "What would be a more suitable dielectric material?"

 

[DonH56]

Triboelectric effects come into play with ESD as well as a cable's sensitivity to movement. Real enough, but the effect (and its audibility) depend upon a lot of other factors, natch. I've written a couple of articles and made a few presentations but it is not something I claim to know much about.

Alpha has this article: https://www.alphalabinc.com/triboelectric-series/
Wikipedia has an intro, sort of: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triboelectric_effect

Not sure why audio cables would use Teflon (PTFE) except to say they did for marketing, not seeing the advantage (are several disadvantages, including charge trapping, cost, etc.)... Teflon is often used for plenum (in-wall) cables. Foamed polyethylene is the normal dielectric in e.g. RG-6 interconnects.