Would you pay $1000 for a 1-metre cable?

If an interconnect cable costs $1000 or more, does it make $1000 worth of difference to your audio?
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[@ScottGrammer]

About 25 years ago, I was asked to check out the system of a well-heeled audiophile to find out why, after investing almost $100K in his system, it sounded so bad. He had some serious hardware in that rig: Krell amps, Wilson speakers, etc. He had just dropped $5K on some Teflon-insulated, solid silver speaker cables in an effort to improve the sound. The system did, in fact, sound terrible. But that was because it was in a room with a wood floor, wood paneling, plaster ceiling, a large bay window without curtains between the speakers, and only one chair. No carpets. Nothing at all to dampen reflections. I told him to stop wasting thousands on cables and buy some carpet, a cloth-covered couch, and some curtains. Two weeks later he called and thanked me profusely, saying he had spent about $6K on those items and it was the best "system upgrade" he had ever made.

[@AmazonasBiotop]

Yes, there is audiophiles that spend their whole life by carrying in and out expensive equipment, in the same lousy room. And then thinking that they could get a different result..😢 First off fix the room there's plenty of companies to choose from if you can't do the DIY route. Then when the physical domain is done it is time to learn and fix the rest of the acoustic issues with DSP and verify with REW.👍 I can not imagine how my TT, CD and streaming would have sounded without the DSP. Only the imagination is the limit. Can implement ISO226:2006 and Interaural Crosstalk Cancellation and other enhancing technology from researchers and doc:s. 👍

[@TheSpoonwood]

He bought $200,000.00 rugs?

[@ScottGrammer]

@@TheSpoonwood Where do you get that figure from? He said he spent $6,000 on carpet, a couch, and curtains.

[@6doublefive3two1]

If he only had a chair why did you tell him to buy a couch?

[@ScottGrammer]

@@6doublefive3two1 to soak up some of the reverberation in the room. Upholstered furniture is very good at deadening a room.

[@totalplonker824]

The missus said to me... "let me get this straight, you spend over a £1,000 on speaker cables because you can 'hear the difference' but you can't hear me calling you from the kitchen" 😊

[@DixonMarshall]

I choked on my coffee reading that 🤣 and I would bet this has happened!

[@AudioMasterclass]

Try this, if you dare... kzbin.info/www/bejne/mWHNn3Wwq7eeftU&ab_channel=IowaPBS

[@lotsofcouscous]

@@AudioMasterclass 🤣 Fabulous !!! Was that PTF...O(ld)

[@richardheumann1887]

@@AudioMasterclass I would love for you to ask the cable company for a review cable... And I bet you that they will not do so!

[@brianstuntman4368]

The $1000 dollar cable needs to be cryogenically treated for at least 48 hours, then the cable needs to be subjected to a period of 'burn in' of at least 6 weeks. Finally, you need to strap a small plastic bag of magic pebbles to the cable approximately 127.683mm from the tip of the cable at the output end. Before connecting the input end to an amp, wait at least 3 days or until the next full moon, unless rain is forecast within the next 8 hours.

[@gracenotes5379]

You forgot the quantum dots to be placed on the ceiling at a golden ratio distance between the tweeter and the listening position.

[@seymourclearly]

You also have to sacrifice an unused minidisc player at the winter solstice otherwise won't work

[@pedrolimatube]

Good tip! 😅

[@silversurfer493]

And the outer part of the cables insulators need to be handwoven by seven virgins under the full moon! Don’t forget this essential ingredient!

[@202One]

Audiophile basics..! 😂

[@steverobertsbbc]

A few years back, some French chaps visited BBC Archives to take a copy of a concert we held on 16mm sepmag film. They brought with them a very expensive Devialet ADC and some phono leads that were as thick as hosepipes and cost over 5000 Euros (Absolue TIM Signature). Not only were they directional, but they also stipulated which was the right and which the left. Le sigh. Only thing is... in the professional audio world we are balanced and phono is of course unbalanced. This totally threw them, as they hadn't brought a balancing box with them. Evil BBC engineer wot I am, I went down to my store and brought back the crustiest, rustiest Alice MatchPak I could find... :P

[@endrizo]

typically english.

[@wolfjarl4959]

That was something I wondered about when I first encountered these "hosepipes" 25 years ago. If an unbalanced set of interconnects could be so bulky, what might a balanced pair look like? I did get the chance to use a pair of unbalanced directional interconnects once. It was at a live gig in a pub where we had cobbled together a bunch of known equipment between a few of us for a rock act. At the last minute the brother of the guy who owned the speakers and amplifiers produced a set of freshly constructed and yet to be "burned in" directional cables which we used to patch the FOH EQs to the power amps. We rang the PA out as usual - halfway through the gig and we were adjusting the upper bands on the EQ to compensate for ever increasing levels of unexpected high frequency content. Which we were assured was part of the cables "burning in" process; all I know is it did our heads in. I've used more conventional interconnects ever since. YMMV of course.

[@mgrsdgfsdafsdgrsdgfsdg6980]

My RCA cables were 15k (each). Yeah, I had to sell my car, but now I can hear a guy cough on take 33 of a Thelonious Monk record. Well worth it, in my opinion.

[@andrewbrazier9664]

😂 👍

[@filipedasilva8512]

In my system the guy was wearing sneakers

[@ScottGrammer]

@@filipedasilva8512 but can your system resolve whether or not they were Keds or Adidas?

[@fabiosantesarti4081]

🤣@@filipedasilva8512

[@robertjermantowicz-uw3iw]

LOL!

[@multicyclist]

Give an audiophile 50 sets of cables to try out, and the response back will be 50 hallucinations.

[@anahatamelodeon]

My favourite theory about expensive cables sounding better is that when you pull out your cheap cable and plug in the new expensive one, all the contacts get a good wipe clean and some very low levels of distortion might be reduced. You could achieve exactly the same, of course, by unplugging your old cable and then plugging it straight back again.

[@ScottGrammer]

I service vintage audio gear for a living, been working with audio professionally since 1977. I can verify that this is a legitimate thing you're describing, and the longer the system has been set up, the more likely it is that connections have corroded and become semiconductive. Cleaning those connections (and the pots and switches inside the units) can make a massive difference.

[@editingsecrets]

If only there was a telephone service you could call where they would tell you to pull out the cable and plug it back in.

[@anahatamelodeon]

@@Douglas_Blake Yes, likewise I've read that many audio professionals (i.e. studio and broadcast engineers) give all their XLR connectors and TRS jacks a good clean periodically. A lot cheaper than replacing with snake oil cables.

[@colinwright4139]

My dad was a tv and audio engineer. Serviciing them and later in R&D and training. When I worked selling hifi we were discussing gold connections. That's when he confirmed it. I sold more gold cables than most because I was honest. No one wanted to think about having tarnished connectors.

[@colinwright4139]

@Douglas Blake for the purposes of selling cables for a high street retailer it was enough, and I'm sure customers appreciated the lack of bullshit that so many other sales people exhibited.

[@jonnybhoy7098]

Love this level of snake oil, only beaten by the ceramics that keep your cables off the ground

[@kearygallagher]

and those $1000 hdmi cables from wireworld lol

[@Kowinaida]

What is your system?

[@ianjohnhorwood2605]

the non snake oil part in a passive audio system is, every rca cable and every speaker sounds different on a system that is very good at revealing differences. Personally i use nordost leif blue heaven 2m speaker cables. My shielded rca cables are custom made by GOTHIC AUDIO in the UK, with same gauge wiring as my nordost speaker cables with 0.4mm strands of pure silver with 4+ 4- and are connected with silver plated copper aeco connectors . My two way and now old speakers are my modified and now only a two way only and not a 2.5 way Monitor Audio GR20. Their original bass units are now used for the mids / bass . Cabinet walls internally lined with dead internal resonance . They are excellent two ways, especially with my two old AVI S2000MI amplification each used as mono amplifier. My short circuit active preamp buffer used for my DAP PLAYERS is my old linn kolektor, because it uses top of line burr brown TI instruments out put amps, and you can cut or boost bass by 10db below 40hz, and at 20khz. . Personally i cut the bass by 10. I also cut down the low frequencies from DAP PLAYERS line output. This means the mids and bass are always clear clean with no distortions with excellent dynamics no matter how loud i play them. There always is a vice grip on the drivers with no long excursions leading to driver excursion distortions, zero port noise, no cabinet resonances .

[@kearygallagher]

@@Kowinaida what does that have to do with what I commented

[@Kowinaida]

@Keary Gallagher I'm not asking you. If you look my reply is to the initial post.

[@harseybaber]

The best part of this video was referring to signal path in an audio console. Such a great analogy that totally killed the $1000 one meter cable thing!

[@mat.b.]

yes but as we know, once it goes in a box, it doesnt count

[@guyboisvert66]

It's about by the same crap people are buying 1000$ IEC power cables... forgetting the whole 20 cents a foot cable running in walls from power panel to the socket!!! I remember being in an HiFi boutique and the guy changed the regular IEC cable for a 1000$ one, saying just after "See, it's much better!" I said "i hear no difference at all". He responded "you're about the first person who doesn't hear the difference, you may have hearing problem" !!! I said "Well thanks, i have to go"!

[@lotsofcouscous]

@@guyboisvert66 Some days ago a friend of mine was showing me some catalog photos of AC Circuit Breakers made for "AUDIO" together with Goldened Fuses for the distribution box. Well...

[@guyboisvert66]

@@lotsofcouscous Gosh... as BS as it can be! The video (URL provided just after this sentence) shows a guy putting a dimmer feeding the power supply of a DAC and demonstrate that properly engineered power supplies are designed knowing AC may be a unstable and filled with noise. kzbin.info/www/bejne/hX2VZKuhgcuDirc The result: Audio not affected at all by this very bad AC supply! So when i see "Audio fuses", "high end" audio IEC cords and all that audiofool's / peddler's crap, all i have to say is spend your money elsewhere, much better get a proper room!

[@joeldoxtator9804]

Every audiophile would do well to learn the physics of electricity

[@ronanzann4851]

Back in 1980 or thereabouts, I was working with a country band. One day we were setting up at a random bar nightclub when the bass player suddenly came unglued ! Apparently he couldn't find his special cord, (from his bass to his amplifier). I had picked it up thinking it was one of mine. I had already finished connecting my system and was noodling around on my guitar when the bass player noticed what had happened. I had not heard of (audiophiles, or audio extremists at that time), so I thought he was making some kind of joke. He said I had ruined his cable by sending a guitar signal through it, and now I owed him 100 bucks. The guy went completely nuts as the situation escalated into a total brawl. I left that band that night. It's next to impossible to reason with delusional people !!!

[@jackevans2386]

@Ronin Zanan - I'm a bass player and EE and would be pissed off if someone had stolen my bass lead, but a mistake would not have been a problem. The dude was obviously nuts.

[@Astronomator]

Whoah. It's a good thing you didn't plug it into an electric ukulele. That would have let all the smoke out of the cable.

[@MOSMASTERING]

Holy crap! I can believe this story too... some people are brainwashed into what they need to own or buy to improve their sound. Audiophile gear really does exist - expensive, quality gear.. but swimming in that same pool are the sharks making money from people that don't know better but want good sound still. It's been tested consistently.. so long as metal is conductive, cables aren't going to make a blind bit of difference to the sound quality whatsoever. I've seen blind testing and audio analysers tested with coat-hanger wire as compared with "Monster Cables" costing $2,000 a meter... zero difference. It's the ultimate in Audiophile snake oil. Some of the descriptions on ultra expensive HDMI cables on Amazon are hilarious.. higher transfer speed and superior digital transfer.. Zeros and Ones. Either are or Aren't. There's no inbetween. Also, thanks to redundancy and error-correction encoded into many digital file types - you can lose chunks of data and it still be reconstructed to the original without loss . CD-DA had excellent error-correction redundancy built into the file format itself - it was made so that any scratches or dust on the disc that were interrupting the laser reading the data could reconstruct the original audio stream without any loss whatsoever.

[@rhodaborrocks1654]

I think if you're going to buy one of these then you absolutely have to go for the Quantum Science audiophile mains fuses too, these sell for upwards of 4000 pounds each and are presented in little jewellery boxes so they have to be good, and if you manage to pop one it will be the most high fidelity bang you ever heard, your listening pleasure guaranteed.

[@stuartcoyle1626]

That's $1 per buzzword. Just give me a nice bit of copper with well soldered connectors. Having worked in live theatre sound, the bit of cable I care about is the solder and strain relief, a busted cable has a pretty bad frequency response and distortion figures.

[@petermoss7505]

Over 10 years ago I paid (for work purposes) over £3000 for a pair of half-metre interconnects. For a 40GHz network analyser!

[@bobkitchin8346]

Those 7mm precision connectors Keysight uses do cost a pretty penny.

[@Astronomator]

Back in the early 1990s, I had a friend who was an audiophile who gleefully purchased $1000 cables for his home theater setup. One cable he was particularly in love with was the digital audio cable that connected his DVD player to his amplifier. He said it ensured the wave-fronts of the digital signals were nice and square, that all the digital signals were the same height (voltage), and that the timing was as close to perfect as possible. Yes, this was a *digital* cable he was talking about. I explained that the voltage of a digital signal needed only to cross a threshold voltage to be classified as a "1" instead of a "0", and that "height" considerations beyond that were pointless. I also explained that the receiver uses a timer to sample the voltage on the cable, and that the wavefront doesn't matter because the receiver samples in the center--not the leading edge--of each pulse. For the same reason, the timing of the pulse wavefronts doesn't matter because the receiver isn't even looking (sampling) when the wavefront hits the receiver. I further explained that the digital pulses that come in through the cable are not digitized sound. Rather, they comprise digitized sound that has been packetized with checksums and other failsafe mechanisms that are not directly related to the sound. I told him to think of digital data as being instructions--like a recipe--telling the receiver how to reconstruct the sound, not the sound itself. (I made another dig by telling him that saying he can hear whether the timing of the digital pulses is optimal is like knowing a cake recipe was written in italics by the taste of the cake. He didn't appreciate that at all.) And even if I was wrong about all that, the digitized packets the wire delivers are *buffered* in short-term memory circuits within the receiver. so that when the sound is reconstructed, it is done so from the buffered data, not the data from the wire itself, rendering completely moot any concern about the timing or wave shape of the digital data delivered by the wire. But he continued to insist that his super-expensive digital cable sounded "warmer, more full and robust". I proposed a single-blind study in which I would switch out his digital cable with mine to see if he could hear a difference. We did the test, and he declared quite emphatically that "Cable B" was his because it sounded so much warmer and fuller than "Cable A" I invited him to come around to the back of the receiver and showed him that "Cable B" was my cable, not his. Moreover, I had constructed my "Cable B" from two clothes-hanger wires bent into random shapes to keep them from touching (so they wouldn't short out). We haven't spoken since that day.

[@jimsimpson1006]

😂 oh dear. How NOT to win friends and influence people?

[@Astronomator]

@@jimsimpson1006 I know, right? That guy was SUCH a complete... Wait... You're referring to me, aren't you? 😏

[@jimsimpson1006]

@@Astronomator yes, but light-heartedly. 🙂

[@Astronomator]

@@jimsimpson1006 I guess I'll let it slide, then... THIS time. 😎 In all seriousness, I can't say I've missed his company. But I do wonder to what extent his ability to hear whether there's dust on the speaker cables (and other miraculous aural feats) has helped him in life.

[@Cypeq]

Buyers remorse and denial in face of facts helps snake oil audio companies safe from a crowd with pitchforks. Unfortunately most people aren't tech savvy or engineers, so it's your word against word of the guy who gushed over and sold him 1000$ cable + buyer's remorse. All the person who doesn't understand anything about it can do is chose who to believe.

[@keith9876]

Many years ago I did the opposite as an experiment. I had three cables. One was a nice $20 cable, the other a cheap $1 cable, and the last was an identical $1 cable that I whacked with a hammer on a cement floor and made it about as bad as I could. I flattened the one cable so much that no one would even think to use it in anything. I tried my best to stress it without ruining it. I walked on it, tied it around stuff, used it as a whip. The result did surprise me. They all sounded the same. They sounded exactly the same on some decent equipment.

[@AudioMasterclass]

Oddly enough, some analogists swear by flat speaker cable because it 'sounds better'. Of course, for practical purposes it runs better under carpet. DM

[@jeff666p]

I heard a difference from the cheap cables they included with cable boxes and the mogami cables I made. It was warmer and fuller sounding more bass too. I had one side the mogami cable and one the cheap cable. I used the balance to shift left and right and swapped the cables over to the other side after to confirm both sides sounding the same. I wouldn’t spend more on cables then the $40 they co

[@YouHaventSeenMeRight]

@@jeff666p The problem with your experiment is that you know which cable is on which side, so mentally you could be biased towards one of the cables. Only when you have someone else plugging in the cables without you knowing which is where can you have a real test to determine which cable sounds better. It might still come up the same as you have decided now, but it would eliminate the bias.

[@jeff666p]

@@YouHaventSeenMeRight I don’t listen with bias.. I have extremely sensitive hearing. People said coat hangers was an audiophile secret that it sounds much better. I tested it before buying solid wire . I could hear a big difference it made really warm but got rid of the higher frequencies. I didn’t like it so I didn’t buy it. I don’t fellow the crowd I make my own decisions. Even if I got $1000 cables for free I wouldn’t use them if I didn’t like how they sounded . I would sell them. I don’t like spending money on things that I find wasteful/useless. I spent 3 hours testing the difference on multiple days.

[@jeff666p]

@@YouHaventSeenMeRight add in to the last post. (My tablet won’t let me hit edit). I always test things. My last monitor I spend 6 months deciding before I picked one. My mouse . I went to the store t

[@martinlindberg1983]

OMG! What is people talking about in the comment section, just rambling?! Big thank you for this video and very thought out presentation! Very strange that people in general does not mention your intention in this video that is straight forward and concise... Has anybody done some serious listening comparisons between an expensive IC cable vs a cheap one? Is it only fake or can we really hear a difference? What is your story? I am sick and tired of all bull in this hobby. I mean, I can have a bad day when I think my rig is not giving me the pleasure until the next listening session without changing any cables or equipment - it is just me. That tells me that we (humans) has the over all most impact of a systems response - not a single IC cable... C´mon get mature!

[@NeungView]

I've recently paid £20 for a 3 meter cable, and I thought that was overpriced.

[@passenger62]

These obsessive end-users are incredible. Don't get me wrong, you're free to spend your money on whatever you like. But don't forget that Nebraska by Bruce Springsteen was recorded on a Tascam 4-track, and two SM-57s.

[@_lecro_]

Bought an interconnect last month for just over a tenner and thought that expensive :)

[@Cypeq]

much cheaper than that isn't usually build that well and it carries a risk find cables made out of chinisum that has perceivable quality on a negative spectrum.

[@maidsandmuses]

I made a lot of my own interconnects over the years. Always used a decent quality cable and connectors, but nothing that would even remotely break the bank. Never had any issues with the sound quality being affected. You have to start scratching your head if the cost of interconnects means you can't afford to stack your components in a more convenient order 😁 Also, after travelling through this $1000 signal superhighway, the signal may go through 20cm, $0.20 worth of cabling to the volume control inside the amp...

[@frankgeeraerts6243]

All componenents do extract something from the music.....and some do less harm...

[@davidlowndes737]

Around 1979 I was working at Rists Wires & Cables, who at that time produced a lot of cable and car wiring harnesses. One of my colleagues spotted a review in a hi-fi magazine for speaker cables. The winner was something like Sony "oxygen free copper" cables costing an arm and a leg; second place came a homemade cable made with Rists household cable (just a few pence). The company were only geared up for producing miles of cable so couldn't get on the bandwagon.

[@tobiaxelsson]

Ooooh, as someone who worked with RF and EMI and other messy stuff it sooo refreshing to hear someone mention relevant parameters for cables and instead of the normal "anti-cable" bunch that argues from "it's impossible" but rather the, and a lot more correct, "how much" perspective. I felt it included a lot more nuanced and relevant information than any other cable review I've ever seen (regardless of camp). I really liked your take/view on cables and would definitely watch more on the subject, a suggestion for new videos it would be regarding what makes a bad cable/good cable (as in when does issues become audible). Personally I don't trust any cable makers and think they are crazy overprized, so I buy by the meter so that I can get the materials/geometry I like for a fraction of the price.

[@Mikexception]

The most exposed disadvantages of audio systems are hidden in phase shifts. In analog systems phase shifts are affected by anything because they are result od 3 parameters - R, L and C. And their exact combination (with linear character each has infinite number of values) are hard to replicate even we make them from the same materials and in same size of products. In digital we face even more problems because they are on fact hybrids of two. Wise conduct is to make them not exposed because it is only interfernence . But many say they prefer to listen just to revealing deatils charactristics with tweters working to 40 kHz and amplifiers working to 100kHz and sounding artificialy exposing that unusual bands It is as to build by purpose systems for detecting differences which in naturakl sound are covered and masked, in result are unnoticed. That is why in my opinion such differences are said to be observed only in High End price systems.

[@Mikexception]

​@Douglas Blake It is big mistake suspecting that cable will "consume " signal internally and there will be noticeable difference between in and out from cable Cable has too low serial resistance and on both sides will be of course tha same data. Anyway this "perfect cable" is affecting signal because electronic cannot handle nor equqlize it's deviations caused by own created in cable operation electrostatic and magnetic fields. Sorry if not easy but tried hard to explain it i shortest way and you are misleaded by all that long lines behaviours which have nothing to do in audio . This are separate subjects.

[@nicoras8803]

@@Mikexception You do not make any sense. Go look at transmission line theory. As soon as you have alternating current, DC resistance is not the only factor any longer.

[@Mikexception]

​@@nicoras8803 . Three sentences and three "agendas" without sign of valuable information. Nothing to negate and no any input. Are you politician?

[@twistedmister1]

The direction thing is real. An outer shield needs to be connected at only one side, the source.

[@jackevans2386]

@Cary Scheck - Both ends need the ground return, normally supplied through the outer shield. Without it and using your source only grounding, means we have to employ the power supply's ground connection. A circuit needs a return path, whether that be a battery and bulb or a pre-amp and power amp.

[@rabarebra]

@@twistedmister1 This is not always the rule. Have you ever made balanced XLR cables? 😉

[@fogf1]

A few years ago I had a conversation with a customer at a very high end audio store in northern NJ. I did some bench tech work repairing gear for them. This guy went on and on about how much better cable 'X' was than any other cable out there. How it 'opened the soundstage', etc... I went along with him because I wasn't going to deny a sale to the owner of the store, knowing full well that what he was spending on 2 meters of speaker cable was ridiculous. When he finally bought his cables and left I noticed he was wearing not one, but two hearing aids. He must have been 70+ years old. Yet his 'perfect ears' heard the difference in cables. Many , many years ago I had a conversation with a guy who, I'm sure, forgot more about electronics and sound than I'll ever know. Basically he said to get nothing less than 10 gauge stranded cable for speaker lines and you'll be set.

[@danieldrz251]

Inside the devices the audio signal travels through copper tracks and thin wires full of impedance, parasitic capacitances and inductance. And when the signal leaves the device, the person demands cables made with copper purified by the monks of Tibet. Trust me, it will be great.

[@AudioMasterclass]

I used to dabble in electronics and I found that the layout of the printed circuit board was important and getting things wrong could easily result in high frequency (above audio range) oscillation. When I'd dabbled enough in that, I decided it was best to leave things to the experts. DM

[@MikhailKulkov]

I recalled one story happened here in Moscow in Moscow Technical University of Communications and Informatics. They have an Department of Electroacoustics and they once invited head of the department of communication lines to bring two sets of his own cables with absolutely same measurements in which he is absolutely sure, to check if there will be listenable difference between them. He came, they listened his cables, after that he gets up and says: "I hear the difference, but it is impossible!" and gets out.

[@tmzwcky]

Several years ago I was trying to research SPDIF vs optical digital audio and found a great thread - there was a huge debate raging with audiophiles SWEARING that some $400+ SPDIF cable made a huge difference, citing pretty much all of the things that you mentioned for these cables - "bass is much tighter!" "transients are WAY more accurate!", etc. Never mind that digital audio has no physical way of responding like that to any cable. Anyway, the thread culminated in a double blind experiment at a local audiophile shop with the expensive SPDIF cable vs literally a coat hanger with RCA plugs soldered to either end. The coat hanger won.

[@russritchey6970]

Blue Jean Cables out of Seattle Washington make cables using Belden and Canare wire mostly, and they describe them using plain language. I have no relationship with them, but I do appreciate what they do and have bought their products in the past (when I was too lazy to build my own). I am especially amused that they were sued by one of the "Colossal" cable companies for patent infringement and did not back down from the frivolous claims of the much larger company. If you do a Google search for Blue Jean Cables and lawsuit you will find the story. It's a good read.

[@AudioMasterclass]

Yes, it's a monster of a story. DM

[@editingsecrets]

@@AudioMasterclass Video about this and other frivolous lawsuits in audio, perhaps? I could look it up, but it might be more fun to have Betty explain the claims to us...

[@TerryClarkAccordioncrazy]

They also sued Monster Mini Golf.

[@AudioMasterclass]

@@TerryClarkAccordioncrazy Unbelievable. In the UK, I don't know about anywhere else, trademarks are issued in classes. Audio cable is Class 9, golf is Class 28. But of course when lawyers get busy, it's usually whoever has the most money wins. DM (NAL)

[@charliewood6616]

Yes a cable video. I love audiophile cable talk as much as the next person, more perhaps.

[@darryldouglas6004]

You’d be better off spending the money to build a Faraday Cage around your listening room. 😃

[@LushContrive]

I remember a 'high end' audio cable company mentions in an explanation video that the direction markers on there cable are only to prevent customers to call the service hotline. Recently, I soldered my own RCA interconnect with 2 wire + shield per channel. Happens to be 1m long and has cost me about €25,- (parts). I think I hear a small difference in the sound compared to the €10,- cable from amazon. But maybe that is only because I made it my self. And we all know, self made cakes are better. No idea how to make a A-B compare which is objective. Or how to measure a cable without very expensive equipment and no knowledge how to do it. Spending > €1000,- on a cable? Never!! If I had that money I would spend it on CD's, because then I have defenitly a different sound coming from my loudspeakers.

[@editingsecrets]

" No idea how to make a A-B compare which is objective. Or how to measure a cable without very expensive equipment and no knowledge how to do it." High end oscilloscopes and spectrum analyzers would do it. But it's surprising, isn't it, that in a century of audio engineering there's not yet been a famous hit where the producer said it's all because they spent a week choosing the best sounding cables.

[@thepuma2012]

@@editingsecrets no, instead they produce music with distortion in it (too much loudness). So why bother distortion-free cable. If it was an issue. Normal cables are good.

[@AudioMasterclass]

This is a useful perspective. For £1000 GBP I could buy 500 or more CDs secondhand from boot sales. DM

[@rm-mastering]

Good video, great presentation and attention to detail. Cables are sold by there marketing and not by their performance. With regards to fancy silver plating etc there's a natural flaw in this argument, any plumber will tell you that two different metals touching each other is a definite no no as it will react with each other over time and the metals will be inferior. Sticking to one metal if high purity will offer the best and consistent performance over time. Stick to high purity copper with good dielectric and you wont/cant go wrong. They will always be the best in all circumstances. Avoid the pitiful marketing and save lots of money and disappoint.

[@knowbuddy6139]

You are 100% correct and that effect is known as galvanic corrosion...or electrolysis. I don't know how much it affects audio signals, but it can definitely be an issue in plumbing and HVAC.

[@AudioMasterclass]

I remember my school chemistry, or was it physics. Two different metals in an acid makes an electrical cell and one of the electrodes will corrode. It doesn't take much of an acid for corrosion to occur over time and, as we know with our motor vehicles, rainwater will do. But where there is no electrolyte there shouldn't be any corrosion. If any chemists or physicists can expand or correct this, please do. DM

[@Mikexception]

@@AudioMasterclass Two different metals may be also source of voltage. Some little some more - the value of voltage depends on temperature. It may in some cases create problem. Beacuse the internal resistance of such thermosource is low. At least I observed in my systemsome 10 yeras ago that periodic washing with alcohol repeatedly made something noticealby better in sopranos (which have naturaly lowest voltage in audio signal) . So I started to repeat it each few days. Now I switched sounding to natural and I do not notice any disadvantages which could do better by "servicing".

[@factorylad5071]

@@AudioMasterclass Physics Cables are not gas right so oxygen comes into contact with the metal and the corrosion is the metal "burning" 2nd law of thermodynamics.

[@AudioMasterclass]

@Douglas Blake As in a thermocouple. I didn't know it could cause break down so I'll look into that for future reference. DM

[@ianship5058]

There is a lot of snake oil in the Hi Fi business

[@WhatEver-dx3eu]

Working my way through your videos after having discovered your channel. Entertaining and educational. I like to think I've got a pretty decent system that I enjoy to listen to my favourite music. I've dabbled with cables (although never near as expensive as the subject here) and I couldn't discern differences objectively. What really made a big difference was going for room correction (an incorrect name as one doesn't correct the room). I'm a convert now where I used to be highly sceptical. What a difference; Thight and fast controlled bass; open, clear midrange; better timing, dynamics. Get a Mini-DSP or NAD with Dirac and spend 30m setting up. No amount of cable or other modifications to your precious systems will give you the improvement a decent RC system will. Would love to see/hear you investigate that.

[@VintageGearMan]

This just keeps getting better!

[@tmzwcky]

Don't know if they're still around, but I've seen "audiophile" AC power cords selling for hundreds of dollars, too. They even had different models for 60Hz vs 50Hz AC lol. Even if the premise was plausible, I can't fathom the logic of thinking that this 1m power cord is going to make up for the 50km of whatever back to the power station.

[@jimsimpson1006]

I can remember, back sometime in the eighties I think it was, when the colour of the insulation on the cables was being seriously considered as a possible contributor to the sound.

[@watdanuqta-mf5ms]

Yes, two Shunyata power cords, $1500.00 a piece plus a Kimber cable, $2500.00 for the first meter, and $2000.00 a meter after that. I have also had good results with an interconnect of pure copper with solid copper RCAs for $30.00 made somewhere in Asia.

[@Cchogan]

An interconnect? Wow, and I went for all those decades in central London studios calling them "leads" and "wires" and "multi-cores" and, yes, "cables." I didn't realise we were so terribly wrong.

[@benirw1n]

I just found a $6000, 1-meter RCA cable. The Chord Company's ChordMusic Analogue RCA Cable. They use their own Taylon® insulation. That alone apparently "reveal[s] a musical landscape so believable that you can step into it."

[@VintageGearMan]

HA!!!! Another fantastic realistic factual vid! I just cannot get enough! Thanks greatly!

[@nikthefix8918]

An Audio enthusiast friend once told me to forget about buying posh RCA cables, just replace the 5amp fuses in the mains plugs for 13amp versions as it makes much more of a difference. After a brief demonstration I got my coat.

[@AudioMasterclass]

For the sake of comment readers everywhere, not an electrician but I'm absolutely sure that replacing a fuse with a higher rated one is a safety hazard. DM

[@frankgeeraerts6243]

Sounds even better without a fuse ...

[@jimc9823]

If you want to have some fun, google "poles of articulation" you'll only see it mentioned in one place.. I get a couple print audiophile magazines - when done reading at home I take them into work so my electrical engineering and physicist colleagues can get a good chuckle. It's amazing what people concern themselves with, all in fantasy. I often wonder what the typical buyer of one of these products would do if they ever looked into their home wiring that goes to the outlet they plug their power conditioner into? They'd likely flip over and play dead like a frightened Opossum (one of my favorite animals).

[@AudioMasterclass]

I feel another video coming along. DM

[@SimonLloydGuitar]

$1000 is a bargain if it gets rid of my 8k tinnitus hell.

[@jimsimpson1006]

Ditto, brother.

[@andrewbrazier9664]

Even if £1000 was loose change to myself I wouldn't spend it on an exotic Interconnect. That amount buys a decent amp or pair of speakers. If I could afford to give £1000 for a cable I would rather give it to a good local charity.

[@michelvondenhoff9673]

Probably the least affecting yor sound are the cables. Not saying that it doesn't but there are far more important and often simple things that matter. Positioning of your speakers (1st reflection point...), audio rack or furniture, the floor where to put everything upon and the power supplies. Cables matter but from my own experience by far the least of all the above. Tip: spend the money on a good MC cartridge 😊

[@rabarebra]

Cables only need to have good contact, made properly, and have enough strands (thickness) for doing its job for its purpose of choice. A good cable per metre shouldn't cost more than £1, which you can find from e.g. Klotz or others. Solder yourself.

[@russritchey6970]

"Magic" parts in audio has always been a particular annoyance to me, cabling especially. I used to make the argument that, in the USA at least, typical household wiring for a 15 amp circuit is 14 AWG Romex (around $0.50 / foot) and could be as long as 80 feet. So you want to tell me that that final 3 feet is going to make a difference? Sure is pretty though.

[@juliocohen]

Perfect! That's what I always said to my audiophile friends... And, as he mentioned, the cables inside the equipment. any equipment hi-end or not, doesn't cost $1000/m. It's cents...

[@Cypeq]

Those RCA cables have 3 orings on them! Every audiophile knows it's worthy investment, none of the music detail will ever leak out through loose unsealed connector.

[@peters7949]

Digital audio & video design guru John Watkinson stated in one of his “Slaying Dragons” articles, sadly I forget the pro audio magazine they were published in. “if changing the interconnect cable, changes the sound. The audio interfaces have not been designed properly”. In my 40 years in the Pro Audio industry, as long as the cable was well constructed & used non tarnishing connectors (brass PO & Bantam jacks needed regular cleaning), they all sounded the same; ie did not affect sound quality. And don’t get me started on gold plated Toslink (optical fibre) connectors, yes they do exist! Remember the old saying about a fool and his money………

[@Mikexception]

That is exactly what I was hoping to explain here but Iv'e got no success because it takes serious knowledge - it is rare to find in YT. . Cables do not harm the current but they make unstability to audio interfaces.

[@AudioMasterclass]

The mag was 'Resolution'. Some of the Slaying Dragons articles are available freely at ips.org.uk/category/slaying-dragons/, others behind a paywall. DM

[@philipketchum1407]

Jays Lab just released a video today with speaker cables costing $80,000. I also saw today a mono block amp stand costing $130,000. But it had double isolation. So there’s that.

[@AudioMasterclass]

I suspect that the amp will provide more value per dollar than the cables. But if I had $130,000 to spend on an amplifier, I'd probably spend it on something else. DM

[@zetmoon]

@@AudioMasterclass I think the $130,000 was for the stand, not the amp!😳

[@AudioMasterclass]

@@zetmoon I don't think there's an emoji sufficient to comment on that. DM

[@IndigoDavei]

I've no idea about this, but I did hear of a musician/producer/audio engineer who used 2-core 5-amp cable professionally for his interconnects. I don't know the technicalities of this, but I've taken the "If it's good enough for him" view. (The only difference is that I got 6-amp cable instead of 5-amp, as that was what came most readily to hand.) Obviously, I had no idea what I was doing - I relied on the self-reported practice of one expert - but I have been very happy with these cables' performance (well, it's not bell wire). Anyway, this came in at rather less that £1,000 a metre.

[@DavidTurnbull-c2f]

At the end of the day, it is a length of wire that takes a signal from point A to point B. The most perfect cable or interconnect in the world would convey the signal without any change. Therefore any changes you hear (or think you hear) will be caused by the cable degrading the signal. True story - I have a Spotify family account that is used for casual listening, For the same money I can get an Amazon lossless account, so I took out the free trail. Sat down and listened to some of my favourite all time songs, tracks I was familiar with. Sure, enough when I went to the lossless stream, I could pick up out subtle nuances in the music. WOW! Being a bit of a nerd, I switched back to Spotify, guess what I heard the same nuances that had heard in the lossless stream. After switching back and forth between the two service I concluded that to my ears there was no real difference and quiet honestly was not worth the hassle of changing. My point is if you convince your self that you are going to hear a difference then you will. People are free to spend their money as they choose, but remember to enjoy the music .

[@christopherward5065]

You should borrow it and see if it’s got any merit. I think in professional equipment the interfaces are built to the same specifications. So the cables change the sound less than with domestic equipment where impedances and capacitances at either end of the cable depend on how fastidious about technical standards each equipment manufacturer is. Cables that stray from technical norms connecting equipment that strays from rechnical norms will change the sound. The trip is to choose something that excites your ear if you are an audiophile. In the studio cables will affect the outcome but probably less noticeably or significantly. Balanced feeds and impedance matched interfaces combined with correctly used cables level the playing field in professional use. However some professionals stray to the dark side and buy audiophile wires to spice things up…

[@davidcampbell2845]

An excellent example of the application of just the right amount of knowledge to deliver common sense analysis and a breath of fresh air. Well done. I forgot to add: yes, I'd watch a part II, but it would be a challenge indeed to improve upon part I !!

[@bobsykes]

"She got that from Chat GPT because Google thought she just wanted to buy one"! I lve that.

[@nicc5122]

Unless I'm very much mistaken most copper cables are oxygen free or they'd break easily. The elephant in the room is, once those interconnects complete a circuit, what are the internal cables constructed of? What solder, what PCB grade of copper? It's akin the utterly pointless purchase of a silver mains cable. Unless your home ring main has been rewired with silver cable, and you've got your electricity company to run silver from the local substation, the phrase 'an utter waste of money ' is appropriate. If we're talking shielding of interconnects, then star quad xlr (balanced) will out perform any single core without question. Ignorance separates a fool from their money.

[@nicoras8803]

I always ask myself, do these audiophools spend as much money on the down cable from their TV dishes. I guess not! Just by the way, hard drawn copper is not oxygen free, but annealed copper is since it is heated after drawing, allowing oxygen to escape during the heating process.

[@PilipDilip]

Love your channel. The absurdity I think you captured perfectly using the mixing desk as a "benchmark" of miles of audio cable spaghetti. I would like these cable cuckoos to explain why the internal PCB tracks are not made of thick gold with an extra layer of shielding and why my supposedly "top 20" of all tested amplifiers the Nilai Hypex class D uses a down and dirty 4 pin CPU power connector for the audio signal in on the PCB🤣 As well automotive crimp connectors on the speaker cable terminals. Outrageous sacrilege! In fact the audio in cable was mistakenly not supplied so I had to hack up a connector with modified automotive crimp connectors pressed onto the pins of the PCB male connector, beyond sacrilege!

[@sorepaws]

The mere mention of cables (aka Interconnects) will send audiophiles into apoplectic fits, claiming that cables "improve" the sound of their system. I was fortunate years ago to have a conversation with an Engineer from a famous cable manufacturer BICC about their manufacturing process and quality management, we got onto the subject of "HiFi" cables - his response "we love Hifi enthusiasts, they will pay so much more for 'special' cables than our normal cables, in reality they come off the same production line". I have never found measurable evidence that expensive cables are better than a properly manufacture budget cable, but then I don't have audiophile ears - I'm just a simple electronics engineer who listens to the music ! Always love the enthusiasm in the videos

[@AudioMasterclass]

One worry for me is that a cable might indeed improve the sound. I prefer the sound that the producer intended, without improvements. DM

[@sorepaws]

@@AudioMasterclass If the cable in question is a passive component then while it is possible to alter the frequency response due to IRC, an "improvement" is unlikely. But as you have said so many times, this is subjective change only the performer/producer/mastering engineer are really in a position to know. "Buying expensive cables produces a miserable difference" 😀

[@nicoras8803]

I love your analogies, as a transmission engineer of more than 50 years, I had a good chuckle. Strange that us old folks know so much more than expected.

[@madcrabber1113]

There's something to be said for being blissfully unaware.

[@namegoeshere2903]

I appreciate Paul MaCartney's wise words on this topic, it has been on my mind for some time now.

[@timmy707707]

There is such a thing as "bad wire" but at some point...wire is just wire. I look for quality build and that's about it. Back in the seventies I was in Wally Heider's studio in SF...there was some problem with a cable.....we were told to go get some coffee while they straightened it out. As we were going out the door...one of the assistants was also leaving...he said "Don't go far...there's a Radio Shack right around the corner. It was fixed and we began recording again.

[@dell177]

I build one meter cables using the best materials for about $35 a pair. It may not look as fancy as an expensive cable but it sounds just as good and takes about 15 minutes to build a pair. My cables have twisted conductors with a copper braid shield, the wire and connectors are best quality.. Because one of the inner conductors carries the ground I do not connect the shield at both ends to lower the noise. This means the cable is "directional" because you want that shield connected at the source end

[@legtrax2021]

Go ask Abbey Road if they use £1000 per metre cables 😊 Completely for those with more money than sense - if you can't hear something on 'decent' mid price cables you are not supposed to hear it! And if you have noise in your system, find out where it originates from and repair/replace as necessary. Oh....and treat your room....properly. Otherwise just enjoy the music and stop obsessing.

[@user-yk4gd1fl4z]

I am here for his face when Betty is talking! Who else :)? Keep up the good content.

[@nabman_]

Great piece! Pity the ones who fall for this snake oil. Yeah, 'audiophiles' are in denial of how roughly the signal is handled on the professional side before it reaches their esoteric systems. Have they seen the cables used inside audio electronics or speakers (even 'high-end' ones)?

[@nicoras8803]

Regardless of that. Have you seen the mess of cables on a mixing desk, there are cables everywhere?

[@tori8380]

Exactly

[@HeathcliffBlair]

A cable that seems designed to test the old adage "There's one born every minute".

[@MMID303]

My RCA cables cost about $30 from Amazon, and my speaker cables were found in a cardboard box in a storage unit. My system sounds awesome.

[@schemkesa]

can you believe people actually buy these cables with free burn in service

[@Pootycat8359]

For a LOT less money, per meter, you can get 3 1/2" Andrews rigid co-ax. With a pump/dehydrator or cylinder of nitrogen (to pressurize it), total cost would still be less, at least, for say, a two meter run. This set-up worked very well for the 50KW AM broadcast transmitter I used to work on, to connect its output to the antenna tower. So it would PROBABLY suffice for connecting stereo components together.

[@AudioMasterclass]

Newflash - Audiophiles rush to pressurise their cables. DM

[@msingh1932]

A fool and his money is easily parted, and the Master makes that point so well. And Betty helps with her knowledgeable asides to drive it home further. I hope the Master will now take the time to tell us whether we should go for a second sub-woofer...now that we are all going to save a bundle by refraining from the urge to purchase that one-meter cable or the...aahh...interconnect.

[@rickmilam413]

My interconnects retail for $11,700 for a 1 meter pair. If you can explain to me why the manufacturer specifies interconnects and digital cables in mettric and speaker cables in feet. The lady's comments were as over the top like many in this industry I'm in. I highly recommend to my customers and anyone interested that they follow the advice of early 20th Century composer Charles Ives "Stand up and use your ears like a man". I loan this stuff out (the 12K ones are the most expensive, with the starting point being a couple of hundred US dollars). There is a great deal more to the sound than the things you mention. Yeah, most anything will give you flat frequency response. One of the first things I hear in lesser cables is what I call "smearing". Cable insulation is a dielectric - it stores and releases energy. There are many other elements that are over my head. I simply listen and decide if the improvement, assuming there is any, is worth the money for my budget. Skin effect is more complicated than you mention. Based on your comments, and assuming you have a competent system, ile. decent, not necessarily high end, I suggest you follow Mr. Ives's advice...

[@Sound-Traveller]

I've never believed in the big differences in sound between RCA cables, I used the cheapest OFC I could find. It has to be said that they looked simply good for their price +/- 3€/m. Then, I wanted something more solid and pretty in keeping with my more high-end system and I ended up using Chinese cables made from a low-capacitance microphone cable CANARE L-4E6S STAR QUAD that was well protected against electromagnetic pollution because it was made to run for dozens of metres on concert stages in the middle of lots of emitters and other cables. Believe it or not, the sound became better, it wasn't night and day but better, price +/- 20€/m. Since then, I've switched to active 4-way and entirely to XLR, so I needed a bunch of cables. Given that XLR is by definition technically less sensitive to electromagnetic pollution, I opted for the cheapest 1m OFC I could find, which cost me 35€ for 10 cables, and the sound is just perfect. I've had a lot of audiophiles in my home and I only let them in on my 'secret' when they leave, which is rarely before 2-3 hours of listening and then 'surprise, look at this cables'. My speaker cables are OFC, bought very cheaply, like 20€/10m, so...

[@andymouse]

I agree but what really gets my goat is that you explain Science to these people and they do that smile thing as if they feel sorry for you ! I would love to see some numbers, basically the measurements you suggested...cheers.

[@38bass]

I have to admit that ten years ago, I allowed myself to get sucked into the idea that purchasing a $100 (Canadian) Monster™️ 20 foot instrument cable, “designed for Bass Guitar”, was a good idea. 😂 I can’t honestly attest to it sounding any better than a normal inexpensive cable but it truly is VERY robust, having withstood the test of time and incredible amounts of heavy abuse with zero problems in connectivity or anything. It is still the cable that I use to connect to my Bass amplifier to this very day. Every once in a while, you do get what you pay for.

[@AudioMasterclass]

Hi-fi cables are one thing, instrument cables are most definitely another, potential problems being the tone being dull due to capacitance, interference, and of course crackling as the cable moves. This would be a different topic for another video, but if you have a cable that works for you I'd say buy another one in case you lose it. DM

[@peters7949]

Due to the high impeadences that guitar amps work at, high cable capacitance can result in loss of high frequencies. So good quality long cables are a must, whether you need to spend as much as $100 is outside my experience.

[@Wizardofgosz]

@@peters7949 Define long. Some years ago someone tested the HF rolloff on guitar cables and determined you should keep your (high impedance) instrument cable under 18 ft.

[@peters7949]

@@Wizardofgosz I would always suggest keeping cables as short as is practical, but on large stages with lead guitarists that wander all over the place, cables longer than 18ft (6m) are not uncommon. Although radio guitar transmitters are often used these days to overcome this problem. An alternative approach is to use a DI box close to the guitarist (or their foot pedals) then run a low impedance balanced cable to the amp. However the interaction of specific guitar & amplifier can be part of what makes the particular sound the guitarist wants, changing the lead & anything else in the signal path can have a noticeable effect on the sound.

[@CallowG]

How is it for flexing? One thing I always run into even with Fender(tm) cables is they tend to break at the plugs and I have to keep resoldering them. I finally got fed up and went wireless but the tone isn't quite as warm or at least that's my impression.

[@universeisundernoobligatio3283]

At a local electronic surplus store I asked why the price of silver placed teflon wire had gone up in price. The owner said all the audiophiles are buying it up because they say it makes the music sound better. We both laughed at the stupidly and lack of knowledge of transmission lines.

[@DeltaJazzUK]

Don't forget to give Jack a ring when the instructions say 'insert connector and phone jack'. Improves your sound no end.

[@nickwallette6201]

"Would you pay $1000 for a 1-meter cable?" No. Next question.

[@particularlynothing]

I'm so sick of the "snake oil" cable deniers. And if someone wants to pay $1K for a cable, so what? People act like it's their money. Are there other things that should be addressed first? Yes. Is it out of my reach (given my economics)? Yes. Do I have money invested in my cables? Yes. If you have a resolving system, cables make a difference. I have cables that work better with one piece of gear than another. My question to the deniers is, have you ever rolled tubes in a tube amp? Does that make a sonic difference? Of course it does. What's the difference between that and cables? Functionally identical. And what difference does it make that the studio used x cable to produce to record/mix/master etc? They used studio monitors too and some amplifiers I wouldn't have in my own system. How we play back what was produced is irrelevant to the production of the music. Cables, again in a system capable of revealing those differences, are part of those playback decisions. You don't hear criticism about using a particular tonearm or cartridge. For some reason that's legit. The proof is in the listening, not the marketing speak trying to sell you the product or worse yet in the "measurements". You could say the same about any piece of audio gear.

[@steveDC51]

When you pay that much for a cable you are going to convince yourself that you can hear the improvement. Nobody else will though!

[@robertbox5399]

Open the back of the amp and there's a tin plated pin to a solder pad going to a PCB trace of course.

[@FrankHeuvelman]

I've always had the idea to let 'audiophiles' listen to three different 'interconnections' from different brands and let them put these three into the right order with 'the best' on top and 'the worst' below. I think that will turn out to be quite hilarious. (and pretty painful for those who fail this easy task,,,)

[@YouHaventSeenMeRight]

I once did a test with an ex-audiophile colleague of mine, on one of the audiophile forums that he frequented. We used some reference audio tracks that he provided, compressed them with a whole range of MP3 compressors (from terrible ones to the best you could get at that time). We then converted those MP3's back to WAV files and created a set of A/B tests that the forum users then had to judge on quality to see which was the original recording and which was the one pulled through the MP3 compression/decompression cycle. All but one of the forum users miserably failed to identify the original tracks. When informed of their results they of course came up with all kinds of reasons why they failed, the most hilarious one was the guy who always boasted about the fact that he could hear the difference between good and bad power leads, who claimed that he had used the wrong power lead.

[@FrankHeuvelman]

@@YouHaventSeenMeRight I'm afraid that only one of your candidates knows how mp3 compression works and therefore was able to choose right. (Or he neither understands mp3 compression but simply got a lucky shot, of course.) I also think that most audiophiles suffer from a nasty 'keeping up with the Joneses' virus infection for which no vaccine has been developed. I mean, buying a Tesla doesn't automatically turn you into an EV technology expert.

[@StopAndGetGas]

I am a fan. But not of 1m $1,250 'interconnects' of course, but rather, a fan of yours and this terrific channel. My two (2) 1m pairs of £13.5 RCA connect (unbalanced) 'audio cables' will arrive next week from...'the east'. I remain a bit excited about that, with anticipation. ;)

[@casperghst42]

It is like the discussion about special USB cables to prices which us cry, as the advertisement say; it will make sure that the bits will arrive correctly - if that was a problem then we would have even bigger problems in the computer industry.

[@vapno92]

"If it’s measurable" ... well, audiophiles have this "It’s not measurable, but I can hear it!"

[@petertreyde3212]

Excellent discussion. Thanks.

[@theheathster2]

Most interconnects are expensive, fixed parameter tone controls. I’ve heard differences between interconnects, but it’s usually attributable to emphasis on a particular part of the audio frequency spectrum.

[@theheathster2]

@@Douglas_Blake With electrical characteristics, which have the potential to alter the signal, albeit by relatively minor amounts.

[@theheathster2]

@@Douglas_Blake So cable manufacturers quoting capacitance & impedance figures etc is pointless then? Thanks for the 101, btw 😉

[@RocknRollkat]

Hello DM, I'm doing my best not to laugh out loud ! What's next, SWR meters for these cables ? P.T. Barnum must be howling right about now ! Best regards, Bill P.

[@AudioMasterclass]

It wouldn't surprise me. Here's a link for anyone interested... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWR_meter DM

[@garyfred88]

This is the kind of Clickbait that I adore! Please click bait your way into distributing your data over dogma content with my blessing!

[@darryldouglas6004]

You can call me A. You can call me Ray. You can call me A Ray. But you don’t have to pay £1000 for a cable! 😃

[@editingsecrets]

It's nice to have such an affordable pal who appreciates the true value of friendship.

[@georgeswanson9483]

In the US, just this - Blue Jeans Cable. Professional quality cables of all sorts made to your specs for a great price that will last a lifetime. You're welcome. (No affiliation, by the way)

[@martinrw42]

Loving the delivery, content and punch ! Entertainingly informative, or is it informative entertainment. :)

[@meilstone]

I wish more veteran experts of advanced age would do such high quality videos on YT. There are so many twens who think they know everything (which is understandable, we've all been there), but I believe real wisdom only comes with age. Just a thought! 🤷‍♂️

[@meilstone]

@@Douglas_Blake agree, goes all the way back to Socrates...

[@thetaylorcronkproject2473]

Perceived value. The higher the price the better it must be.

[@last1059]

I was brought up to understand that signal currents move along the wire surface and not within. Hence a multi-core cable will be better than a solid core one, especially at higher frequencies (it's why Litz wire is sometimes used in radio coils at LW/MW for those who remember AM radio). Thus ordinary 13A mains rated multi-core wiring will work well for speaker connections. I regularly used 50m and greater lengths of such cable in theatre work without obvious problems. For example, reactance at about 150pF per metre is like putting a 6.8 nF capacitor across the amplifier output or a 2.5K resistor - something any respectable PA will take into its stride having a typical output impedance of some milliohms!! But then, my hearing is defective due to the effects of rather loud music.

[@last1059]

@Douglas Blake You are of course right. Skin effect becomes measurable at >45kHz, way above our audible range and even then small. Apologies for getting my impedances in a twist - I was schooled in my youth by an old radar technician. (Who told me he had worked with Watson-Watt!) At least the multi-core is more flexible!

[@rabarebra]

@Bob T The typical mansplainer. No one cares about a 6.8nF capacitor across the amplifier output or a 2.5K resistor. If you want to talk about Ω and farrads, go else where.

[@last1059]

@@rabarebra You would obviously prefer to spend the $1000 in perfect ignorance.

[@rabarebra]

@@last1059 What do you mean? I solder my own cables.

[@last1059]

@@rabarebra So you really agree that ordinary cable can do the job without resorting to special (costly) alternatives. Have a nice day.

[@usaturnuranus]

It's really important to include the fine-structure constant when calculating optimal speaker placement, room-treatment composition acoustic coupling coefficients, and ideal qubit density/sq. cm. for the quantum regenerative AI back propagation amplification modules. As the rest can get messy pretty quickly, a good slide rule is your friend.

[@howardskeivys4184]

A slide rule my friend is futile. A microscope, electron accelerator and quantum physicist is more useful. You will also need 3 cable ties, 2 non ferrous locking nuts and a dead parrot.

[@simonbeasley989]

I definitely agree it's not a transmission line and it's just resistance and capacitance that counts on a short audio cable. I needed a 3m cable to connect the turntable. So I used "shotgun" satellite cable with F type plugs and F type to RCA adaptors at each end. Well screened so it won't pick up any noise on that tiny signal and as it's designed to carry radio frequencies it's not going to lose anything due to capacitance.

[@frankgeeraerts6243]

Capacitance loading of Cartridges must be scammmmmmmmmmmm....?!

[@Stelios.Posantzis]

4:06 There's a whole theory that claims the amount of metal used in cables (probably referring primarily to those metal parts that have a shielding effect) and the materials that are found within the electromagnetic field created by the cable both have a quantifiable but very hard to measure effect on the signal. So, on the basis of this theory, the less materials are used and the further away from the two conductors, the better. I never quite bothered to check the details and to properly scrutinize it (quite a few equations were involved, I believe, and there was never that much spare time to check something like that) and I have forgotten where I read about it: those websites now are probably long gone but I'm sure if anyone digs they will found the relevant information easily.

[@cjbartoz]

It can be solid, stranded, copper, oxygen free copper, silver, etc.--or even "magic" wire--as long as the resistance is kept to be less than 5% of the speaker impedance. There is no listening difference as long as the wire is of adequate size. Remember that a nominal impedance value is not always accurate because most systems vary with frequency. A speaker that is rated by the manufacturer as 4 ohms may not be 4 ohms at all frequencies. It can wander above or below this value and is unique for different systems. If you have doubts about your system impedance, it's best to contact the manufacturer concerning the lowest impedance of the system that you plan to use and select a connecting wire based on the lowest impedance value. It's not easy to set up a similar wire listening test. Very few people are able to make speaker impedance measurements or wire resistance measurements down to 0.1 ohms. Also knowledge of the speaker impedance over the entire frequency range is a very important factor in an A-B listening test. In some listening tests, this can cause a difference in sound that could result in false conclusions because the wire is not heavy enough. Suppose a speaker is used that has an advertised impedance of 8-ohms but the impedance actually drops to 4 or 5 ohms at one or several frequencies. Suppose further that wire A used in the test is heavy enough for an 8-ohm speaker but not for a 4-ohm speaker. When making a comparison test with a heavier wire B, differences can then be heard. Although the resistance of wire A may be correct for the advertised impedance, it may be too high if the speaker impedance goes lower than that. It has nothing to do with the kind of wire, only that the resistance of one wire may be too high for that particular speaker used for the listening test. This lack of understanding for the impedance behavior of a speaker used for a listening test may explain listening differences that people can truly hear. One wire can truly appear to sound different than the other but for the wrong reasons. A speaker that has a constant impedance at all frequencies (most speakers do not) will only show a difference in listening level and not alter the response when the wire size is too small for A or B. Of course, the listening levels will be different unless they are compensated for in advance. Otherwise, the louder sounding one will likely be chosen. To avoid these difficulties, whether the speaker has constant impedance or varies, the two wires to be compared should have the same total resistance and that could mean different lengths would be needed to make the resistances equal. Otherwise, under these adverse conditions of different resistance, a person can select one wire consistently. It may be easy to hear differences in the frequency range or ranges where the speaker being used has impedance dips that are below the rated value of the speaker. In some marginal cases it may even be possible, depending on the bandwidth of the speaker impedance dips, to hear differences that go near but not below the rated impedance. However it is a false conclusion that the wire selected is because of a unique wire construction or other advertised features. Only the difference in wire resistance is being heard due to the speaker being used in the listening test. Of course, a different speaker will most likely have a different impedance curve depending on the crossover design and whether it is a single wide-range driver, two-way, three-way, etc. system. In that case an impedance dip or dips can be in a different frequency range and have a different bandwidth. A listening test will then reveal yet a new set of sonic differences. Again, resistance is the key. Bear in mind that if both wires in the test are much heavier than needed for the particular speaker that is used and the speaker impedance is fairly constant, small wire resistance differences may have little influence in the test. Several speaker wire manufacturers make wire that has high capacitance yet almost none of them publish exactly what the capacitance actually is. Capacitance is of concern not so much that it could cause a possible high frequency rolloff but that it can affect the amplifier feedback and cause the leading edge of transients to overshoot. This in turn can make an audible difference in the system sound. It can make the sound brighter, which some audiophiles mistake as greater detail. The degree of influence when using high capacitance wire depends on three factors. 1. The total capacitance of the wire used (capacitance per foot times the number of feet). 2. The complex impedance of the speaker being used. 3. The stability of the amplifier being used to drive the speaker. When there is an audible difference in speaker wire due to wire capacitance, it can be interpreted as an improvement when one wire appears to have more clarity but is actually altering the sound and departing from accuracy. Perhaps this change in sound then paves the way to sell more wire. Further, perhaps the wire companies already know this and what will sell. If the speaker wire companies had not introduced wire having high capacitance, either out of ignorance or by intention, then there would have been no controversy like this and ordinary low resistance wire, which incidentally has very low capacitance, would have remained king from the beginning. Although some expensive wires can have low resistance, several have a high capacitance of 100 to 300 picofarads (pf) per foot. These can introduce a significant amount of capacitive load, particularly for longer lengths. For a 50 foot length, this adds up to 5000 to 15,000 pf, which is the same as .005 to .015 microfarads (mfd). Unfortunately, in addition to sounding different with a small amount of overshoot, a few unstable or borderline amplifiers can even go into oscillation. Low power oscillation, even if ultrasonic, will further affect the listening performance of a system and could lead to an apparent mysterious burnout of a tweeter. Oscillation at full power could cause an amplifier and/or speaker system to burn out.