[Rclark]

Danny, I trust you on crossovers. I built your kit! I know exactly how crossovers and nice components make a difference.

 And in my amp I've gone from stock caps to ClarityCaps and it was well worth the investment.

...It's the power cord thing I always kind of had issue with, and Ethan kind of drove it home there.

 $20,000 for a cable? Really?

[Danny Richie]

Danny, I trust you on crossovers. I built your kit! I know exactly how crossovers and nice components make a difference.

 And in my amp I've gone from stock caps to ClarityCaps and it was well worth the investment.

...It's the power cord thing I always kind of had issue with, and Ethan kind of drove it home there.

 $20,000 for a cable? Really?

Yep, $20,000 for a power cable is pretty crazy. But if you ever want to see (or hear) for yourself what a difference can or cannot be made, then I will send you some to try. You can decide for yourself. And they won't be anywhere near $20,000 a cable. When you are done with them, then you can send them back. The weight is little and shipping cost will be low.

[jonbee]

We all hear differently. Many people can't tell the difference between car radios and good stereos. For them, anything over $200 on a stereo is wasted money. "Audibility" is not nearly the same for different people.
We in this hobby obviously have higher sensitivities, but once again, on a scale. I've known 'philes over the years claim they could easily hear things which I could not (absolute phase is one example)... but that doesn't mean their observations are false. It just means that it doesn't matter to me if I can't hear it.
I've been in this hobby in a big way for 43 years. Many years ago, sonic differences between things like upgraded cabling, power cords, crossover parts, etc., seemed like a cognitive stretch, but as my budget and equipment quality level increased, and I got into hi-rez speakers like 'stats and ribbons in the '80s, changes that were obscured became clearer. 
I'm not one who believes that spending a lot more on cables and tweaks always gets better results, but I know that changes in these items is quite audible to me, and that they are like the final spices for the stew.  As such, it is the mixture, not the price, that gives the best flavor.

[Quiet Earth]

Hey that's pretty interesting.

That video was very interesting. I had to close my eyes to hear the "b" sound when the guy was making a "v" sound with his mouth. And I didn't hear it right away either.......

As to the topic of myth-busting, I embrace the efforts of myth-busting as long as I don't feel like there is a requirement to accept a new myth in place of the old one. Hope that is fair.

[PRELUDE]

I only hope some one come up with maybe $2000 receptacle or that $20,000 would be the waste if it is not now.
I am very sure when they demo that kinds of wires in hotel room,they are pluged into $.99 receptacles.

[Rclark]

I don't know, it would be difficult for me to come to that conclusion by watching a Youtube video but if it works for you.

I saw that video years ago and didn't watch it again when I saw this post so I'm going by memory for the most part. I really like Ethan and his no-nonsense approach. He certainly calls them as HE sees them. He also has a ton of great info on his website. The issue I have is that I believe there is so much we don't know about how we hear, and add to that the complexity of music it seems simplistic to say "It's right here measured by this microphone."
We have drug sniffing dogs at the airports because we haven't anything better for the job. I don't believe we have anything better for the job of interpreting music than ourselves. The problem is that it's so difficult to determine the results.

 Excellent posts and I generally agree with you. But the other argument is so well put and ...scientific. Us over here, we're still the undiscovered mountain gorillas that were always there.

 Or lemmings walking off a cliff. Still, I'd love to try a high end power cord on my gear, I'd need three to power all devices.

 I always wanted to try the cables from the famous "Sarah Lee" thread" but just haven't gotten around to ordering. The're like $5.00 a piece.

 Again, I'm a complete cable noob. In my view, if they make a difference, it has to be in the smallest of percentages. Like the gentleman above said, the final spices.

 I always thought I'd approach that area last or near last.

 I have paid for perceived quality already though, even as a noob, I bought Zman's speaker cables and I am using Mac Ultra Silver + IC's I bought off audiogon. Don't have experience with anything other than those two items and your typical radio shack stuff but can hear a difference between using 1 Mac Ultra between the Dac and CDP versus an inexpensive optical cable, however. So there may be something to it.

[cliffy]

Yep, $20,000 for a power cable is pretty crazy. But if you ever want to see (or hear) for yourself what a difference can or cannot be made, then I will send you some to try. You can decide for yourself. And they won't be anywhere near $20,000 a cable. When you are done with them, then you can send them back. The weight is little and shipping cost will be low.

What type of Power Cables are you offering?  I am interested in trying some aftermarket PC on my Nuforce Ref9SEv3's.

[Danny Richie]

What type of Power Cables are you offering?  I am interested in trying some aftermarket PC on my Nuforce Ref9SEv3's.

I still have a few of the Electra Cable PC's in stock, and some that were of a new prototype design that I can sell for the same price as their standard B-5 cable.

You can try them out for free though.

[TONEPUB]

I'd be willing to accept that, but....

How can you explain that million dollar professional studios don't use special cables at all. So the signal has traveled through tons of 'stock' cabling before being recorded, only to be played back with special cables that do what, add resolution that was never there in the first place? (Not to mention the power lines before the sockets in your house, and the 'normal' wiring on the inside of components themselves.)

Even the cables that are used for mic'ing vocals with $20,000 microphones are nothing special. Are these audiophile cable technologies so proprietary that they haven't made it to the professional engineers and producers yet?

Secret indeed! 

Actually a number of them do.  Bernie Grundman Mastering has upgraded everything in his studio over the last few years.  When I was at Kevin Gray's studio sitting in on a mastering session for the Music Matters Blue Notes, everything is wired in close to the best AudioQuest cables from top to bottom.  When I visited Metropolis in London last year, same thing.  I saw a lot of premium cables, power cords and power conditioners.  Roger Waters uses Running Springs power conditioners in his home studio, and Peter Gabriel is somewhat of an audiophile even on the recording side of his studio in the UK.  Going over there later this year, so I'll be curious to see what he's got.

So, actually there's a lot more of this stuff around than you might think.

[JohnR]

As to the topic of myth-busting, I embrace the efforts of myth-busting as long as I don't feel like there is a requirement to accept a new myth in place of the old one.

 

Fair enough.

Personally I find "myth-busting" gets old very quickly.

[Ethan Winer]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYTlN6wjcvQ

Makes me very leery of upgrading anything componentwise until I get my room treated, made me realize that I don't need to be in any hurry to upgrade my Emotiva gear and focus more on getting the accoustics right first, if anything, and has made me realize I don't need to spend any money upgrading power cables and the like. Excellent video. Deals with how the brain perceives sounds and how the brain picks and chooses what to focus on and talks about products being advertized to us that are ridiculous and have no effect. The Demagnetizer caught me off guard as there was a thread here about demagnetizing having an effect and the product shown is even a Furutech.

 I'll be much more careful from now on. I'm glad I haven't yet blown any money on these ancillary useless products.

Thanks for the heads-up to this thread RC. I stopped posting in most forums several months ago, because I'm working full time now on an audio book that picks up where my AES Myths video leaves off:

Ethan's Audio Book

Reading through this thread, it appears I missed some of the more colorful posts. Probably just as well they're gone. Regardless, I'm glad to discuss specific issues with anyone who's adult enough to stick to the facts without insults. It's pretty simple to prove that LP demagnetizers don't change the sound at all, and the same goes for many other tweak products. If you understand why Brilliant Pebbles can't change the sound even though sincere testimonials claim otherwise, it's not a big leap to seeing why after market power cords don't change the sound either.

If anyone has proof that such tweaks really work, I'd love to see it. And if anyone wants to discuss how appropriate tests can be established, we can discuss that too. Contrary to popular belief, this stuff is not rocket science. The most important variable is the short-term nature of human hearing, as JJ pointed out in the video. Once you understand that nobody's hearing is 100 percent reliable, the rest is all downhill.

Also, I saw a comment about the futility of assessing audio quality in a YouTube video. If you read the video description, you'll see a link to download the original full-quality Wav files from my web site.

--Ethan

[rollo]

   I'm with Danny on this one. How many times have I heard or read a Manf. measured away and then "tuned" the piece by ear for sale. As subjective as that is . It is what the Manf. desires to sell. That is why we have so many. Take speakers, do they all sound the same ? Amps ? and so on.
   If we took measurements alone then any 1970 Japenese receiver with super duper specs should be all one needs. Not.
  We are talking reproduction of the signal not the feed from the mike at a recording studio.
   To date every  home demo we conducted with the Uberbuss and Triode Wire Labs Powercords we sold them. We just install them sit back, shut up and let the customer decide. This is not meant as a commercial just our experience so far. Only the owner of the system can decide what they hear. Not us. 



charles
SMA

[Steve]

   I'm with Danny on this one. How many times have I heard or read a Manf. measured away and then "tuned" the piece by ear for sale. As subjective as that is . It is what the Manf. desires to sell. That is why we have so many. Take speakers, do they all sound the same ? Amps ? and so on.
   If we took measurements alone then any 1970 Japenese receiver with super duper specs should be all one needs. Not.
  We are talking reproduction of the signal not the feed from the mike at a recording studio.
   To date every  home demo we conducted with the Uberbuss and Triode Wire Labs Powercords we sold them. We just install them sit back, shut up and let the customer decide. This is not meant as a commercial just our experience so far. Only the owner of the system can decide what they hear. Not us. 



charles
SMA

I agree Charles. Below is a schematic and scientific explanation the general public may not be aware of.



Black boxes are 2 chassis. Red line is signal grounds. Notice the right and left signal grounds are connected. This is typical with either SS or tube preamplifiers and amplifiers.

Blue lines connecting RCA jacks between two chassis is IC shield (or IC internal ground wire). Blue wire outside chassis is pin 1, power cord ground wire and connects at AC Outlet.

Notice the blue pin 1 power cord wire is not only connected to the chassis but also to signal ground. This as per UL requirements.

Since (blue) pin 1 power cord wire is connected to signal ground in both chassis, blue pin 1 power cord wires is in parallel with the IC shields and has signal current "flowing" through it, just as the IC shields have. Kirchoff's current law must be satisfied.

In fact both left and right channels have return signal current flowing through pin 1 (blue) power cord ground wire, so mixing takes place.

Is this significant? As an experiment connect all the right channel RCA jack grounds together and use one 6" wire to signal ground.
Do the same with the left channel.

Now set the selector switch to CD. Connect a tuner to the Tuner input. Listen for bleed through from the tuner. We could hear bleed through tuner music some nine feet from the speakers.

Now connect individual 6" wires from each input jack to signal ground. We could not hear the tuner music even with one's ear on the speaker.
If a 6" piece of wire mixes sources together so to a 12 feet of blue pin 1 power cord ground wire. But there is more.

Another consideration is the resistance and inductance of both the pin 1 power cord ground wire, any romex (if different outlets used), and the IC shields.
Different power cords use different size and type of wire, so resistance and inductance will vary with frequency. Lab conditions will probably not be the same as home conditions.

Lastly, to be fair, there is ample evidence that there are scoundrels on both sides of the isle.

Hope this helps. Cheers.


 

[sebrof]

My personal take on all this is that it's difficult to tell for sure what we "hear." What we hear is not what enters our ears, it's the product of what our brain does with that information. That process is extremely complex and relatively unknown.
It's because of this that I don't believe we know:
That a (insert controversial item here) did not make a difference in what we hear because the measurements show no difference
AND
That a (insert controversial item here) did make a difference because the folks who saw me put it in the system bought it
IOW - It goes both ways.
Music is so complex, so 'human' for lack of a better word and invokes such an emotional response from most people who listen to it that it seems far to simplistic to make the cut and dry conclusions that are often made.

A phone call that improves your system
Pebbles or crystals
Upgraded AC fuses
Power cords
Interconnects
Speaker cables
Amplifiers

Different people will draw the line at different points in the above. Some will say no way a phone call, but pebbles yes. Some will say as long as the 2 amplifiers are operating within yada yada that there will be no difference between them. Neither really know for sure (OK, no way a phone call )

FWIW - I know there is so much BS in this hobby it ain't funny. But what is BS and what isn't BS? IMO, nobody really knows.

[Devil Doc]

FWIW - I know there is so much BS in this hobby it ain't funny. But what is BS and what isn't BS? IMO, nobody really knows.

And that's why it's best, IMO, to stick with the laws of Physics.

Doc.

[sebrof]

And that's why it's best, IMO, to stick with the laws of Physics.

Doc.

Ok if that works for you, but one thing is for sure: It ain't gonna be you who learns us something new.

[Devil Doc]

Ok if that works for you, but one thing is for sure: It ain't gonna be you who learns us something new.

Perhaps you should try learning English first.

Doc.

[sebrof]

Perhaps you should try learning English first.

Doc.

Improper English on an internet forum. Imagine that.

Ok if that works for you, but one thing is for sure: I doubt it will be you who teaches us anything new.

[Rclark]

 

 Come on guys, let's let this be a sort of definitive discussion without fights.

 Let's call it like this: if you believe a certain way, and others believe this other certain way, just let it be, time will eventually tell all.

 Since we're talking psychology, you CANNOT convince someone with facts if it goes against their ingrained belief, it is impossible. Facts actually only further entrench their beliefs, it's a wierd thing humans do. They have to take it in when they're ready.

 So let's just live and let live  please  I really want to talk about this. All the right players are here. Let's not ruin it.

 That said, Mr. Winer, what is your full take on power cables, and cables in general? I only saw your small rant there in the vid.

 And by the way, you have the best videos in all of audiophiledom. A lot of companies could learn a thing or two. You give us straight talk and real usable information. A lot of other companies that make videos for their products give us corporate, cheesy crap that is more about giving us fuzzies about the brand.

[*Scotty*]

 As I see it, this particular aspect of the hobby is a lot like the UFO controversy.
In many cases the UFO in question can be explained by, fill in the blank here. There are cases however for which there are no readily plausible explanations, what was observed remains ambiguous and unknowable. 
 It is at this point that the problems start. Hypotheses are offered which have no scientific foundation and go considerably beyond what has been observed. This behavior draws considerable criticism from onlookers and rightfully so as it is nothing more idle speculation.
 In one camp are those whose tolerance for ambiguity is very low. They insist that every case has a scientific explanation for what was observed even when there are none that are readily applicable,
the fall backs are swamp gas and Venus in that order. The second line of defense against the unknown is the attack on the observers capabilities,memory and mental state at the time the unknown was observed.
 In the other camp are another series of reactions to the observation of the unknown flying object.
The list of reactions includes flat out denial,skepticism, acceptance and finally possible religious frevor coupled with cultism.
 That there are striking similarities in behavior found within both communities is not too surprising considering that same things are being confronted by people in both cases,ambiguity and the unknown.
 Very few people are comfortable with the presence of ambiguity in this hobby and both sides seek some explanation for what is observed.
 It requires far less effort to accept that some things that we hear cannot be explained by the current body of knowledge we have available to us than the effort put forth to foster explanations by those in either of the two opposing camps.
 I find it easier accept that sometimes strange things happen and move on with my life rather than spending my time grasping after explanations for what I have experienced.
 
Life is too short.
Scotty