WHAT ? LOLWe should maintain the standard, keep our noses clean and not participate in their type of politics and rubbish. We can set our own standards and lead that way.
WHAT ? LOLWe should maintain the standard, keep our noses clean and not participate in their type of politics and rubbish. We can set our own standards and lead that way.
I‘m sure most people don’t want to be part of this club. You could be the most accomplished surgeon in the world but have absolutely no idea about cables. And really can’t be bothered to spend the time to research it. So you buy the expensive cable the ‘expert’ told you to buy to hook up the McIntosh stack you can finally afford. I give those people a pass and don’t presume them dumb. It’s the guy spending his kids college fund who geeks out gear and should know better that bothers me a bit.Why would anyone want to be a member of a club where ignorance and gullibility are the entrance requirements?
Good point Adam. Unfortunately many times telling the simple truth in a straightforward and honest manner leaves
those members dirty tidy-whiteys hanging on the line for all to see. If some of us find much of what gets written there
monthly to be false representations of the truth, their support of many things we mostly all believe to be the marketing
of snake-oil products, the line crossed between what's seen as respectful or not can get very gray.
Did they make lots of random cables and listen to them to verify the most "musical" by ear? Did they go by trial and error? Did they test them by listening to him play string quartets to see if "emotion, joy and tears" came through?
JA's list of "technically plausible" cable concerns strikes me as an embarrassing Gish Gallop of FUD.
When I was being lab tested in my Principles of Electron Flow electronics study near the end of the study we where given a fair sized sealed black box and told to determine what was inside by using the function generator, a multimeter and a oscilloscope. It was weighty so the weight was no hint at all etc. I worked away at it and was pretty excited/stressed and I really was drawing on my instructors hints that he always dropped in the class theory sessions about how the tricky stuff worked and what would be upcoming in tests and in real life work later. Anyway I was having a difficult time and then I started using the sine wave generator and oscilloscope to determine the corner/cutoff frequencies, bandwidth, linearity from input to output, voltage peak levels and anything that gave me information. So after I gathered all this info I sat down alone and was drafting schematics that might work and voila! I had several schematics drafted and I eliminated the obvious stuff based on the very strange waveform coming out of the black box and then started calculating reactance both capacitive and inductive and I eventually settled on the one schematic that worked and everything fit the information that I had gleaned. About 2 hours had passed by very quickly and I was running out of time so I said, "DONE!" Anyway... I had come up with a schematic that worked but it was different than the parts inside the black box and did not match the instructors' schematic. I was scared that I failed the lab test but I insisted that it worked. The instructor took all my lab paperwork and black box and disappeared for about 45 minutes to convene with his work mates in their instructors' office area. He came back and said you have done something different and interesting and it works so you have passed the lab test for the course. He said they would be reviewing the lab test black box test and maybe changing it so this does not happen again. I was so relieved. Anyway... It goes to show things can be deceiving, variations occur and theory works but the end result is not always the same.Scientific theory can come up with all sorts of things that are wrong, thats why testing and measurement are just as important and the only way to be sure the theory fits the real world.
Unless of course you are MIT (Music Interface Technologies.) A interconnect and speaker cable company that is absurd.I haven’t read the article nor the discussion, but “techically plausible” to me could simply mean this:
It is possible to design and manufacture an interconnect or speaker cable that audibly changes the sound, but you’d have to go out of your way to make it so. The threshold for competence in home audio cables is very low and much of it lies in electrical contact and termination.
What part is not clear or that you don't understand? I based that comment on a pet peeve that I have. It is about that statement of world class stuff and we can do the same as that etc etc. I say screw that let's set our own standard and make it exceed what this world class stuff is. World class is a leading statement that does not define what it is. It bugs me...LoL.WHAT ? LOL
1: The Essex echo has been debunked numerous times, not hard to find. My guess is JA hasn't tried, for obvious reasons.Well, I think "FUD" is a pretty dramatic way to characterize a standard cable review and Atkinson's response. But...whatever...
I thought perhaps we might also see some more direct explanations as to why Atkinson's points were wrong or implausible. But mostly it's been dismissed.
Thanks for the link.
Shield impedance is the key factor in the single ended link transfer. Loop current creates error voltage depending on shield impedance and this error voltage is added to the useful signal. The difference may be audible.Replacing one interconnect with another (unless
Your talking about ground loops? So low frequency impedance as in resistance? Yes shield resistance matters in ground loops but any decent cable should have low shield resistance. Its no justification for $1000 cables.Shield impedance is the key factor in the single ended link transfer. Loop current creates error voltage depending on shield impedance and this error voltage is added to the useful signal. The difference may be audible.
I'll stand by that comment and you bet I'll call his integrity into question.Atkinson's integrity and honesty have been called in to question in this and other threads, including by you. ("Atkinson is the king of blowing smoke up your butt.")
Well he did provide the measurements. There is worth in that. He did say he couldn't universally recommend it. Weak sauce I agree. Given that Stereophile philosophy has been ears are the ultimate arbiter of quality and sighted listening is how they do it I can understand why if a reviewer says thumbs up you do and publish the measurements even if they are dubious. For years there have been products that measure in a way raises suspicion and yet end up on the Recommended components list. That in the end is what bothered me. Unless someone thinks a product has no peer with better measurements even by their sighted review criteria those with substandard measures should not get on the recommended list. Yet they regularly did and do. Maybe in these cases JA should ask the reviewer to compare with similarly priced and powered device with good measurements and ask if the substandard one is superior. And put one or two devices the reviewer used as being lesser in the reviewer's opinion.I'll stand by that comment and you bet I'll call his integrity into question.
He has a very knowledgeable background in the technology, likely the best in residence, but never calls things like the claims over the sound of power cables made all around him into question.
No matter how bad a component measures he finds a way to put his findings aside and support the subjective findings of the reviewer. Witness the review of the Spec RPA-W7EX amp, This amp fell on it's face in almost every area examined, Yet it was given a glowing review by Ken Micallef. Then when it was all over the only thing John could say was,
KM very much liked the sound of the Spec RPA-W7EX. I, however, was disappointed by its measured performance—modern class-D amplifiers, especially those using one of the Hypex modules, measure very much better than this. And with its low input impedance, its dislike of load impedances below 4 ohms, and its high levels of radiated noise, this not an amplifier that can be universally recommended, I feel.—John Atkinson"
Read closely Micallef's conclusions on it's sound.
Then read the measured performance from John.Spec RPA-W7EX Real-Sound power amplifier Page 2
www.stereophile.com
Spec RPA-W7EX Real-Sound power amplifier Measurements
Sidebar 3: Measurements When I unpacked the Spec amplifier for testing, I was at first confused: Although Ken Micallef was supposed to have reviewed Spec's RPA-W7EX, a label on the amplifier's rear panel identified it as an "RPA-W5ST." It turned out that this very early export sample of the...www.stereophile.com
Talk about riding the fence and a refusal to take a stand in the interest of the consumer.
Who's interests were served here, as far as I can see, only the advertiser.
Sal1950
Since you can make the same filter with a cap or an inductor theres more than one way to build a circuit with the same transfer function. That seems an unfair question.When I was being lab tested in my Principles of Electron Flow electronics study near the end of the study we where given a fair sized sealed black box and told to determine what was inside by using the function generator, a multimeter and a oscilloscope. It was weighty so the weight was no hint at all etc. I worked away at it and was pretty excited/stressed and I really was drawing on my instructors hints that he always dropped in the class theory sessions about how the tricky stuff worked and what would be upcoming in tests and in real life work later. Anyway I was having a difficult time and then I started using the sine wave generator and oscilloscope to determine the corner/cutoff frequencies, bandwidth, linearity from input to output, voltage peak levels and anything that gave me information. So after I gathered all this info I sat down alone and was drafting schematics that might work and voila! I had several schematics drafted and I eliminated the obvious stuff based on the very strange waveform coming out of the black box and then started calculating reactance both capacitive and inductive and I eventually settled on the one schematic that worked and everything fit the information that I had gleaned. About 2 hours had passed by very quickly and I was running out of time so I said, "DONE!" Anyway... I had come up with a schematic that worked but it was different than the parts inside the black box and did not match the instructors' schematic. I was scared that I failed the lab test but I insisted that it worked. The instructor took all my lab paperwork and black box and disappeared for about 45 minutes to convene with his work mates in their instructors' office area. He came back and said you have done something different and interesting and it works so you have passed the lab test for the course. He said they would be reviewing the lab test black box test and maybe changing it so this does not happen again. I was so relieved. Anyway... It goes to show things can be deceiving, variations occur and theory works but the end result is not always the same.
I was very intimidated with the entire lab test black box method and I was not in a position to debate or complain...Since you can make the same filter with a cap or an inductor theres more than one way to build a circuit with the same transfer function. That seems an unfair question.
He has a very knowledgeable background in the technology, likely the best in residence, but never calls things like the claims over the sound of power cables made all around him into question.
No matter how bad a component measures he finds a way to put his findings aside and support the subjective findings of the reviewer.
Witness the review of the Spec RPA-W7EX amp, This amp fell on it's face in almost every area examined, Yet it was given a glowing review by Ken Micallef. Then when it was all over the only thing John could say was,
KM very much liked the sound of the Spec RPA-W7EX. I, however, was disappointed by its measured performance—modern class-D amplifiers, especially those using one of the Hypex modules, measure very much better than this. And with its low input impedance, its dislike of load impedances below 4 ohms, and its high levels of radiated noise, this not an amplifier that can be universally recommended, I feel.—John Atkinson"
Read closely Micallef's conclusions on it's sound.
Then read the measured performance from John.Spec RPA-W7EX Real-Sound power amplifier Page 2
www.stereophile.com
Spec RPA-W7EX Real-Sound power amplifier Measurements
Sidebar 3: Measurements When I unpacked the Spec amplifier for testing, I was at first confused: Although Ken Micallef was supposed to have reviewed Spec's RPA-W7EX, a label on the amplifier's rear panel identified it as an "RPA-W5ST." It turned out that this very early export sample of the...www.stereophile.com
Talk about riding the fence and a refusal to take a stand in the interest of the consumer.
Who's interests were served here, as far as I can see, only the advertiser.
Sal1950
Im surprised stereophile is still doing measurements when they constantly show the reviewers can't hear sh#t and just make a review up. Then JA has to come up with some techno bable to justify the review. Its like a snake oil salesman hiring a chemist who only finds water and lemon juice and than puts it on the snake oil poster. Cant be good for there business. Something is gonna give, and it won't be the reviews.
Sounds like you’re describing Jordan Petersen tbh. But I digressFor sure. But I wanted to make the finer point that even a PhD talking within her own discipline isn't necessarily trustworthy when operating outside of the scientific system.
There's a reason why sometimes otherwise good or important scientists have gone sort of cuckoo with speculations in their field, once they start operating outside the checks and balances of their discipline.
This is the key point. Atkinson is one relatively few people equipped to actually gather data and conduct proper tests of his conjectures. But he doesn't, he just throws his hands up in the air and says "who knows?"....
So we have a number of conjectures with a physical basis that are measurable. I eagerly await the data from those who claim these effects are audible.