This audio cable business is getting out of hand...

[Sal1950]

Besides the high gain, note that he had to bring the source really, really close, like actually laying the source on the cable. Move it a couple inches and the noise goes away.

Now, star quad DOES what it says on the tin, it's very much not snake oil, but in general, it's not needed and is an extra expense. For pathological situations or for cost-no-object, sure.

My thoughts ran to applications such as my 5.2.4 multich rig. I've always tried to maintain the 90 deg crossing of interconnect and power cables but it's very difficult to do with soooo many power and interconnects behind the rack of components.
Or maybe shielded power cables would be a alternative approach. Except for the issue that many of my cords aren't the IEC plug-in types and are captively soldered in..

 

[SIY]

Fortunately, power cables do not radiate nearly as much as transformers. Note that in the video, John didn't just lay a power cable nearby...

 

[Blumlein 88]

Once when null testing interconnects I decided to see how this computer power supply noise interacted. I took various RCA IC's and wrapped them around a 500 watt PC power supply which I had outside the case. I had the computer running some intense video conversion so it was drawing on the power supply heavily.

There were some noisy portions only 50 or 60 db down from full level. And they were nasty enough they were much more audible than simple noise. For one thing it was more like some triangle waves and variable squares waves than simple smooth noise.

Unwrap it and lay it just beside it and those waves were still there in FFT's though not audible or not much with music playing.

Move the cables 6 inches away, and only a couple of the worse were visible on a 64 K FFT. Move it a foot away and it was effectively quiet again.

If you have noise problems, go balanced. I next took some long balanced cables and wrapped them 5 turns around the PC power supply. At least recording up to 192 khz rates, there was nothing different than moving the cable 3 feet away.

 

[Blumlein 88]

For a while, they had a shunt 100 ohm resistor on one end of their speaker cable, and a potted box containing... nothing on the other. The idea was, I guess, that the shunt resistor wouldn't screw anything up if it was there and there wouldn't be any noticeable change if it failed.

Yes, somewhere on the web is where a fellow cut them open and the one box is just a box of epoxy with the cable running thru.

 

[restorer-john]

es, somewhere on the web is where a fellow cut them open and the one box is just a box of epoxy with the cable running thru.

...And the cable industry wonders why it has a bad name.

 

[Blumlein 88]

...And the cable industry wonders why it has a bad name.

The situation is truly sad however.

Here is a thread where more than one person opened and described what they saw. No pictures, but even after plenty this plenty of the respondents described how good the cable sounds. And some are defending the design saying you need some special knowledge to know just which values of these networked pieces work.


https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/i-opened-both-mit-and-transparent-netwks

 

[RayDunzl]

I was wondering technically what it does. Act as a low pass filter at some frequency? Good for the class D paranoid user?

I'm trying (and failing) to get a little PartSim model of it to give a graph.

Ok...

A schematic of the parts added to the cable:

Result (ignoring the cable itself):

Voltage (blue) across and current (orange) through the Speaker (R1).

Voltage = Frequency Response in this case:

 

[FrantzM]

Ok...

A schematic of the parts added to the cable:

View attachment 27661

Result (ignoring the cable itself):

Voltage (blue) across and current (orange) through the Speaker (R1).

Voltage = Frequency Response in this case:


View attachment 27662

And to say that at one point in my audiophile life, I fell for this kind of BS.

 

[restorer-john]

And to say that at one point in my audiophile life, I fell for this kind of BS

It's OK. You've seen the light and turned the corner.

At least you didn't buy one of these...or did you?

 

[Wombat]

If it's good enough for John Atkinson ................. ??

https://www.musicdirect.com/equipment/audioprism-cd-stoplight

For audiophiliacs: https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/2Pcs-Sp...719638&hash=item3408b513dc:g:PEMAAOSwXSRbPYum

 

[Sal1950]

At least you didn't buy one of these...or did you

I never did!
But I did try Armor All on my CD's, totally useless.
It does work wonders on vinyl LP's though.

 

[Sal1950]

If it's good enough for John Atkinson ................. ??

https://www.musicdirect.com/equipment/audioprism-cd-stoplight

And Teresa Goodwin
http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue43/green_pen.htm
She told me recently she still stands by this review but no longer uses the product ????

 

[Ron Party]

Teresa Goodwin...

Sometimes you find one who is so *out there* that with a high degree of confidence you can just assume the exact opposite of what the person claims is more likely to be correct.

 

[restorer-john]

Teresa Goodwin...

Sometimes you find one who is so *out there* that with a high degree of confidence you can just assume the exact opposite of what the person claims is more likely to be correct.

This sig line has served me well. (Glengarry Glen Ross quote)

 

[DonH56]

Star quad cables cost more to make and offer little advantage in most home systems. They are of great benefit for microphone runs since signal levels are small, runs are often bundled with power and high-level signals, and may be long. That said, for the relatively small additional cost, using them for home audio doesn't hurt and might reduce the noise floor and sensitivity to EMI/RFI.

 

[McFly]

What cable length and types are you talking about, what amplifier and speakers are used ?
It is highly unlikely frequencies in that band are audibly louder unless:
A: the output resistance is unusually high
B: the impedance of the speaker drops considerably in that part of the FR range (unlikely)
C: the resistance of the cheap cable was poor somehow as in high in resistance (oxidation, poor contact somehow)

NO speaker cable can function as an equalizer (i.e. lift or drop a frequency band) in an audible way unless the impedance of the speaker varies tremendously and cable lengths are long or very thin wiring is used.

Indeed mood, time of day, mindset, 'listening out for effects' are usually the culprit of detecting differences. And that would be correct as one indeed hears differently, it just doesn't have a technical root cause in those cases.

Listening again today. Still hearing a brighter sound. But I have been sleeping better lately with a new bed!

setup is Roon core - Allo digione- RME adi2 dac - atc p1 - atc scm40

these speakers have never struck me as bright. speaker cable was 4mm2 twin from work, now trying those Mogami “worlds best cables” coax 2.0mm speaker cables from amazon as i mentioned a few pages back.

Cables are very nice, good banana plugs and much more flexible than the old twin. As I said earlier, the Mogami page lists a rather high capacitance for this cable, hence my question. I hear a brighter sound, but no one told me I would. I almost don’t prefer it to my twin Cable of old.

...maybe the difference is the reduction in copper size, less lows ? Both cables are around 18ft

 

[solderdude]

We can safely exclude the ATC's.
Also it is highly unlikely the higher capacitance will be problematic for the amp.
And if it does it would not increase upper mids.

That leaves the cable.

If you really want to know I would do the following.
Connect the old speaker cable.
Play pink noise.
Have someone connect the (unconnected to the speaker) the new cable in parallel to the old cable while listening to the noise.
Make sure the ends of the cable cannot short !
When the pink noise changes the extra capacitance is problematic for the amp.

Another possible test which may be easier and more conclusive:
Put both speakers next to each other (important as L and R position in the room may yield a different tonality)
Connect both speakers with the old cable and play the pink noise file again.
Turn the balance from left to right (or switch from left to right *)
When all is O.K. the tone should not change.
If this is the case connect 1 speaker with the new wire and the other with the old.
Switch* between L and R speaker.
If the tonality changes one of the cables is doing 'something'.
To be 100% sure switch the cables on both so the other channel has the new cable and repeat.
When there is a clear difference the cable is the cause.
When no differences are found you will know it is 'bias'.

I recommend not to do this using music because L and R can have quite a different sound which would throw it off.

Don't use white noise.... Pink noise it must be (to protect your tweeters)

* tip for switching between L and R which is only possible when one has a pre-amp/amp with more than one equal level inputs.
In this case connect L channel to input 1 and R to input 2 and switch between inputs.
For this particular situation one must probably do something with the RME or you may have a pre-amp or other switch at hand?

 

[McFly]

We can safely exclude the ATC's.
Also it is highly unlikely the higher capacitance will be problematic for the amp.
And if it does it would not increase upper mids.

That leaves the cable.

If you really want to know I would do the following.
Connect the old speaker cable.
Play pink noise.
Have someone connect the (unconnected to the speaker) the new cable in parallel to the old cable while listening to the noise.
Make sure the ends of the cable cannot short !
When the pink noise changes the extra capacitance is problematic for the amp.

Another possible test which may be easier and more conclusive:
Put both speakers next to each other (important as L and R position in the room may yield a different tonality)
Connect both speakers with the old cable and play the pink noise file again.
Turn the balance from left to right (or switch from left to right *)
When all is O.K. the tone should not change.
If this is the case connect 1 speaker with the new wire and the other with the old.
Switch* between L and R speaker.
If the tonality changes one of the cables is doing 'something'.
To be 100% sure switch the cables on both so the other channel has the new cable and repeat.
When there is a clear difference the cable is the cause.
When no differences are found you will know it is 'bias'.

I recommend not to do this using music because L and R can have quite a different sound which would throw it off.

Don't use white noise.... Pink noise it must be (to protect your tweeters)

* tip for switching between L and R which is only possible when one has a pre-amp/amp with more than one equal level inputs.
In this case connect L channel to input 1 and R to input 2 and switch between inputs.
For this particular situation one must probably do something with the RME or you may have a pre-amp or other switch at hand?

I think the rme can do this

 

[dkfan9]

For @McFly

A little modelling of the Mogami W3082 on the ATC SCM40s vs. a Mogami and a Belden 12AWG wire and a lower capacitance Belden 14AWG wire. I chose 12AWG based on the 4mm measure you gave, and 14 to compare similar resistance cable to the W3082. Just picked these wires because they looked like pretty standard wires and had easy to access spec sheets. Modeled using VirtuixCad based on this page from Blue Jeans Cable. Used vendor spec sheets for R, L, and C values. And all the graphs are from the perspective of moving to W3082 from these other cables.

Tiny FR differences, less than .025(!) dB until the top two octaves, and even there the differences hit .06 dB at max. All the variation up to the top octaves can be explained by the thinner wire having higher resistance and therefore interacting more with the speaker impedance.

So what's causing the differences up top? I modeled the Belden 5100UE against versions of itself modified with specs for the W3082 to find out.

So the higher capacitance isn't causing the variations up top--that line is almost flat. It's actually the lower inductance. From what I understand increasing capacitance lowers inductance in cables and vice versa, so it may be in a sense related--someone more knowledgeable than me would have to fill in any answers on that front.

But why is this happening?

As far as I can tell, it's due to the speaker's capacitive phase angle in the treble interacting with the relatively lower inductance. As with the relationship between capacitance and inductance in cables, someone who knows more than me would have to fill in here too.

Anyway, this all looks pretty inaudible, but very small differences between some cables feeding that speaker do exist. Oh, and all the measures were normalized to 0 at 1000Hz. The overall level differences will be slightly larger than what can be seen here. The largest difference is between 7 and 12kHz, where the two Mogami cables differ in level by ~.09dB, with the next largest difference at ~.06dB at 100Hz. So if your old cable was indeed 12AWG, then your speakers are now probably ever so slightly quieter.

 

[dkfan9]

Well color me sold! But seriously, that's the cheapest I can find speaker cables with that type of banana plug, so I will purchase and let people if they... work. All of my other banana plugs I have here eventually lose spring tension as they get old and wobble around in their sockets, I wonder if these will last longer.

I just found these for a little bit less. I'm surprised how difficult it is to find finished cables with BFA plugs. How do you like the connectors so far? I'm potentially looking at BFAs to terminate at least one end of my cables when I re-wire my system soon.