I appreciate the review, but there are some major flaws in the methodology.
In this review, only measurements were taken. Many of which, like common frequency response and input to output distortions, will indeed measure pretty much the same through any cable.
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.
These things, and distortions of these elements cannot be measured. Rather, they are heard and experienced through a proper stereo system, using ones ears.
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! If you measured a stereo playing the same thing, compared to the live event, they will measure the same, yet sound so much different. This is the “distortion” I am speaking of. Why is the recording of the live event sound so different from the actual live event? It is a form of distortion.
There are many things that are yet understood, how the ear/ brain works in deciphering the music. Cables do indeed sound different, even though they “measure” the same. Why this is, no one knows, and it is not placebo!
Somehow, with our cable design, the difference between recording and the live event becomes less. What you experience is that you are more “there”, the glass is less cloudy, the experience more real. There is greater musicality and realism, even though the measurements are the same.
I propose to the reviewer that he test all cable reviews in a real, properly set up stereo system. He might find that they “measure” the same, but when inserted into a stereo, the cables do indeed sound different. One will then experience the before unmeasurable distortions by using the best and final test, one’s ears. Test equipment measurements are fine, but listening is the real experience and is really what matters.
Mr. Morrow -
Your claim is that your cable sounds different from ordinary cables such as the ugly one that Amir cobbled together. If this is true, and if you truly know it to be true, there will have been a proper ABX double-blind test at some point, which proved that people truly can hear the difference between your cable and others. If you have
not done this, then you cannot be certain that people can hear the difference. If you
have actually done this, then you will have some documentation of that exercise. The documentation will reveal when and where it was done, how many listeners took part, etc. If you had actually done this and you had the documentation, you would already have shared that documentation with us, instead of writing the post that you wrote. It is thus apparent that this test has never been performed and that you do not have any genuine reason to claim that your cables sound different from ordinary cables such as the one that Amir cobbled together.
Your suggestion that there would be an audible difference that wouldn't be measurable doesn't deserve to be taken seriously. A speaker cable's performance is fully defined its resistance, capacitance and inductance, the three components of impedance. For any cable, if each of these three parameters is a sufficiently small fraction of the speaker's value for the same parameter, there is no possible way for the cable to have any affect on the sound. The only possible way for the cable to have any affect on the sound, when the cable is used to connect a speaker to an amplifier or other signal source, is if the cable appreciably affects the voltage at the speaker terminals, and if this occurs in a way that isn't constant with respect to frequency. If cable loss is less than a tenth of a decibel throughout the audible spectrum, the cable cannot possibly affect the sound of the speaker. And if this is the case for each of two different cables, then they necessarily sound exactly the same, because neither of them has any sound at all.
The only way that I can see that anyone would have any fair objection with the way Amir did those measurements would be if they thought that the particular speaker that he used is atypically high in one of the impedance parameters, inductance for example, such the benefit of the lower value of that parameter for the preferred cable was masked or obscured. Other than this, I don't see how there is any legitimate criticism with what he did. Perhaps you know of some other speaker that will reveal a difference between your cable and that other much uglier cable. If you do, then you should simply measure that impedance parameter for that speaker at frequency of your choosing, then measure that same impedance parameter for your cable and for off-the-shelf 16-gauge lamp cord. This is all you need in order to do the simple calculation that will reveal the theoretical loss in the cable, for each of the two cables. You should then be able to easily convince us that the calculated loss will be significant for the ugly cable but not for your cable.
The claim that your cable is better than the ugly cable is implicitly predicated on the claim that there is some flaw or shortcoming with the ugly cable. If you have not demonstrated and proven that the flaw with the other cable is real, then how would it make sense to claim that your cable overcomes that flaw? It is manifest that this wouldn't make sense. You have to start by measuring the three impedance parameters for a length of 16-gauge lamp wire and showing that the inductance or the capacitance or the resistance is great enough to have an audible effect when used with some speaker. If it happens that the audible effect of the ugly cable only exists with certain speakers, then you need to identify which speakers these are.
Instead of doing any of these things that you needed to have done, you appeared here and claimed in essence that your cables have magical properties by which the sound of the speaker connected to an amplifier with your cable will sound more "live" or real. Implicitly the improvement must be in comparison to some other cables, but you said nothing about this. You might as well have said that regardless of what other cable is used (and regardless of what speaker is used), this improvement will be apparent when the other cable, whatever it is, is replaced with your cable. How could you know this, without having listened to every other speaker cable that is available? It is indeed a magical property that your cable evidently possesses.