Anyone have some spare cash, enough to do a serious debunking?

What I'd like to see is someone buy the Cardas (or other) replacement cable for the Sennheiser HD-580/600 headphones, and strip it down completely. Strip off the insulation, desolder the plugs, and have a good look at the whole thing. Copious hi-res pictures at each step would be good.

I want to know if a capacitor, resistor or other crap like this was inserted in the cable to alter the sound from the standard HD580/600 cable.

This could make for a loud uproar in the 'audiophile' community if something was discovered, and since reverse engineering is perfectly legal I don't think Cardas or the other manufacturers could win any lawsuits.

I would be willing to pitch in some cash for a venture like this! If about 7 or 8 of us got together it might not be too bad ($25/apiece). The whole thing should include measurements of capacitance and impedance as compared to the stock HD580/600 cable sold by Sennheiser, and any other possible comparisons.

Any fellow HD580/600 users interested? A used cable could be purchased for ~50% of the typical retail price, although something straight from the manufacturer would be a better proof.

Why the interest? Well, a lot of HD600 people end up buying an aftermarket cable -- almost as a knee-jerk reaction to the statement "it makes the headphones sound better." I think many people just assume that it does, and so spend the ~$150-$200 on the cable on top of the ~$250-$300 for the headphones. And many even say the HD600s don't sound good at all without it. Imagine if this "improvement" could be gained with a 25 cent ceramic cap...

I don't think that the presence of a capacitor would shock any audiophile. Many expensive cables feature and advertise filters in the path of the signal, so as to remove noise, correct the group delay, the phase response, etc , many audiophile also advise to use cheap ferrite rings, capacitors etc instead of expensive cables.
Cardas defense would be the same pseudo scientific discourse as always : the capacitor is an audiophile grade one, the copper is 99.9999 OFC, the dielectric is pure PTFE, the solderings are pure silver soldered under vacuum...

But it would be fairly easy to prove via measurements that those cables alter the signal much more than the regular stock cables. Hey, for that, even no dissection of the cables would be needed.

I believe Headrooom offers a 30-day money-back guarantee (http://www.headphone.com/layout.php?topicID=6&subTopicID=51), so if you're so inclined and have the proper measuring tools, the whole deal would run you less than 10 bucks to cover the return shipping.

That said, I think it would be a rather useless experiment. You cannot logically argue with audiophiles, and as for this forum's regulars, it'd be preaching to the choir.

Forgive my n00b-ness with expensive cables...other than consumer-grade Monster, I've never tried anything else. But is it true that many of these fancy, expensive cables really alter the sound somehow, and cheaper cables generally don't? Wouldn't this go against the whole "transparency" and "uncolored sound" sales-points I'm always hearing from "audiophile equipment" manufacturers?

I'm not experienced with a variety of cables, but I think I'd prefer (audibly) raw, unfettered sound passing between my components. If I need to alter anything, I'll use EQ/DSP/etc, as I can control it with some level of granularity that way, rather than having a permanent sound-altering component in my cable path.

Fewtch's experiment would be interesting in this respect. But it'll take a monetary donation.....from me?.....ummm........Oh! Someone's calling me! I gotta go.....

The problem is that many of these so-called "audiophiles" really don't care what's happening. They know the cable costs some good bucks, they know it makes the headphones sound different, so they assume the logic conclusion, which is that the cables improve the sound. But since stock cables are already transparent, it's clear it's the other way around. But most of them won't accept this simple explanation, because it's totally confrontational with their beliefs, experience, and well spent buck$. And if they did, they should acknowledge it in public, so all their "audiophile" reputation would be ruined.

I'd think of it the other way around...if they'd step up and admit that they've been wrong, that many high-dollar cables are actually less transparent (i.e., lower fidelity) than stock cables, or otherwise provide no improvement is fidelity, then it might salvage their "audiophile reputation".

Sticking with a flawed concept about audio fidelity once it's shown to be flawed is a sure way to never get real respect among real audiophiles. Then again, their circles are usually peopled with "audiophiles" that measure sound quality with their wallets rather than with their ears, right? The old more money = more fidelity approach.

Many people are willing to pay for something they neither need or use. Possessing objects improves self and impresses others. Why should the audio business be any different?

Trust me on this. Any test performed for these pseudo-audiophiles will most likely be declared FUD. Going after Zealots can be fun, but don't expect them to change their stance. Ultimately, they'll simply respond by saying, "You're wrong.... You have to be"

Amen, brother! I've learned this the hard way only a couple of times, and if you even lay out your method and tools for all to use to reach their own unbiased conclusions, it's the same as attacking their very nature. Their defensiveness spikes drastically, and like you say, they'll do anything to hold their position.

The "zeolot groupies" that follow them generally polarize in an argument...most will stand by their "messiah" no matter what is said. And then a few you can "pry away" with logic. But it's still not worth the effort. The more logical minds will find HydrogenAudio of their own accord.

So, I gave up on trying to convince anyone of anything. I'll give answers when asked a question, but that's all. Like atherean stated, you can't argue with "audiophiles", and around here it's just preaching to the choir.

I don't know if the term 'zealots' is applicable (there are some, but probably in the minority)... many seem to be 'escapists' and 'avoiders' however, from what I've found hanging on some of those boards -- the sort of people who believe what they want to believe (often based purely on a group consensus), and don't think in a very organized, logical way. The general level of education tends not to be too high, either -- this isn't hard to determine from checking out people's user profiles/bio's, etc. so I'm not making a snobby sort of judgment here.

There are exceptions, of course... it doesn't do to label people too much, and painting a picture of 'a typical audiophile' is more than a little specious... but certain things can be said. I still have fun hanging on a few 'audiophile' boards (my enjoyment of discussing audio hardware), but it can get very irritating at times -- particularly as relates to cables, power cords and anti-soundcard bias. Ah well...

Sometimes I don't get people at all...

The professor running the course I'm taking is a PhD in EE... and he's going to buy megabuck cables for his audio setup too!

Ahh... I hang out and sometimes participate in Creationism/Evolution flamewars (as well as political discussions). To my knowledge, no one has ever changed their opinion based on evidence. And in terms of debates, these are like shooting fish in a barrel, yet they still cling to their beliefs.

@Joe Bloggs, that's nothing new. There are accreditted medical schools that teach 'alternative medicine,' (or as I like to call it, the placebo effect).

Yep... that's the nature of beliefs anyway (afaic), they provide an illusory feeling of comfort and safety, and/or some faux sense of knowledge. Most people are completely unwilling to give them up, and once that's accepted it gets easier to mix with 'belief-based' crowds without getting into flamewars and such (unless you enjoy those ).

I generally try to stay out of the cable/tweaks related discussions, but occasionally get involved in one and try to drop a few gentle hints. Mostly I just enjoy talking about audio hardware, in the same way some people enjoy talking automobiles (whether or not they can afford a good one ).

Oh there could be other reasons for spending big on cables. If I won the lottery, I'd have the most expensive cables money could buy for one reason:

Aesthetic Value

They'd have to be beautiful...and match the carpet perfectly! I'd venture to say that this is one of the most measurable effects that big-buck cables provide.

Once you spend just enough to get acceptable construction, good connectors on each end, and enough shielding, then honest reasons to have more costly cables might include:

--- Brand-related status (keeping up with the Joneses)
--- Because you're best friend owns a company that produces expensive "audiophile" cables (in which case, I'd expect some free "samples")
--- Because you received them as a gift from an "audiophile" friend, and to be gracious you should just nod and tell them "You're right...they do sound better! And more importantly, they match my carpet perfectly!"

LOL I don't think he is eligible for any of the criteria (except rich)... unless you count some people on an audio forum as the 'Joneses'

That, and build quality (although it's not expensive at all to reach good build quality... afaic, Radio Shack "Gold Series" has already reached it). ~$30 or less for a pair of RCA interconnects seems reasonable to me, even on the generous side.

There's some kind of audiophile 'wisdom' that says you should spend something like 10% to 20% of the price of a system on cables... as if somehow it's a matter of price matching. I guess if it makes people feel better about their system...

You think you've seen insane speaker cables?

You ain't seen nothin' yet.

OMFG!!!

OK, this has got to be a load of sh*t...
>>>
8 ft. quadruple Single Crystal Magic Tweeter Speaker cable (12 AWG each) : $1,450.00
8 ft. quadruple Single Crystal Magic Woofer Speaker cable (10 AWG each) : $2,000.00
3 Meter Magic Power Cord : $2,500.00
1 Meter Pair, Single Ended Single Crystal Copper Link One Interconnect Cable : $700.00
<<<

So for a very basic two woofer and two tweeter stereo setup, and two system components needing an interconnect and AC power, you're talking some $9100 for the wires.

And if the percentage that some people justify for cabling (as noted by fewtch) is 10% to 20% of the total system price, then anyone who buys these wires are spending (at minimum) in the range of $91000 to $182000 on one audio system. Sheeesh!!! Where I live, you can have a nice house and a nice car within that price range.

I'll bet that no "audiophile" could ABX such an extraneous wet-dream setup that would cost >$100000 from an entire system I could put together for less than the cost of their cabling alone.

In fact, I'm in the wrong business. I'm a pretty decent salesman...If people are paying this much for wires, I wonder what I could sell them. I'll bet all you need is charisma and a bunch of impressive technical terms...and a bank account to deposit all the suckers' money in.

Not quite that easy (if it were, everyone would be selling cables). I think what you also need are industry connections, which aren't easy to come by (in fact, your best bet in getting a start would be to hang around subjectivist audiophile forums for a few years! ). The more you believe your own hype, the easier to write good advertising copy...

Hmmm, so if you're spending $2,500 dollars on a 3 meter power cable, I suppose you'd want to re-wire the entire power circuit in your house, to justify it?

Having been in audiophile circles in my town, I rather think that to succeed in selling audiophile gear what you need is reputation. You need to be known for a very long time by the highest audiophiles of the town, that would trust you, and spend all their time in your auditorium.


What ? These ridiculous tiny pieces of wire are speaker cables ? You must be joking ! Here are speaker cables :



The one on the right (12 mm2 solid copper) has been my speaker cable for a long time (it's a cable for urban digital TV). I tried the one on the left once. 240 mm2 Alu (it's a high voltage 12 kV cable).
Yes I was an audiophile once




[The devil's advocate]
Audiophile would answer that numbers don't tell you how the cable sounds, that there are things that can't be measured, and the proof would be the sound of tube amps, much better than transistor amps while the distortion is much higher, or vinyl, that sounds better than CD...

Well, the ones that would read your technical analyses, that is, because a true audiophile can just HEAR that the cable sounds MUCH BETTER than a cheap one. That's all. You can hear it, what else do you need ? If the distortion is higher, then your experiment can't measure the distortion in the other cable. It's old news, no device in the world can measure the musicality of a cable.
If you don't hear the problems in the cheap cable, you're deaf, that's all.
[/The devil's advocate]

And this is why I like hydrogenaudio so much. Only scientific fact is allowed, no psuedo-science!

It is remarkable that so many people "fall" for buying expensive cables. I mean, if you are buying expensive cables based on looks, then go for it, but its just too bad that those making a decision don't perform a simple DBT to see if the differences are real or not

Re: "...there are things that can't be measured...", I completely agree. What they're hearing indeed can't be measured because it's placebo.

Your points are so true. These are exactly the kinds of things I hear these people saying. My common response would be, "If you really can just HEAR a difference then you should definitely spend $9000 on wires." They deserve to be seperated from that much money for something the rest of us spend much less on.

I'll bet that some of the same people that "hear" the difference between a $250 cable and a $2500 cable are the same people that can amazingly "hear" a difference between FLAC and uncompressed audio.

That's nothing, I've seen cables half as thick as my arm... with an RLC network box in the middle I think

What about this one?

Found at this table.

Reading the comments about this cable is so fun. It confirms that it is impossible to try to convince the believers with logic and science. They will just shut their ears to such arguments.

There is no proof of the existance of god or other supernatural beings. Still the majority beleive in this kind of superstition. We have to realize that it is no use to try to convince people either way. Just let it be - everybody will be happier that way. Whether the religon is about expensive cable or homeopathy or what not...

That's more like it...

Yes... quite clearly, you were an audiophile once!

As 'bunk' as most of it is, audiophilia as a hobby seems like a way to make some friends and listen to some interesting gear (within limits of budget)... maybe the BS just gets too much at some point, I don't know. What pulled you out of it eventually? (just curious)...

In chronological order :

• The fact that every piece of audio equipment is rated the same in audiophile magazines (that is 9/10 for anything).
• The fact that every audiophile shops explains with confidence that his gear is much more superior to the other shop's, that itself pretend the same (illogical, if A>B and B>C, C can't be >A)
• The widely cheap DIY tricks that every audiophile pretends to be much superior to expensive crappy things (and to the neighbour DIY trick also) : cheap capacitors instead of expensive power cables, cheap mats instead of expensive cones, cheap network cable instead of expensive speaker cable...)
• The discovery that my SPDIF output was bit-identical to a software rip.
  The large discussions in forums with many people debunking pseudo audio science and advocating blind testing.
• My failures in ABX blind tests that I was certain to have succeed, during which I learned to focus my attention on anything, and discovered that I could hear good and bad things at will in any source, but not everything at once.
• ABX failures in analog vs digital, stands, CINCH interconnects, speaker cables, power capacitors, soundcard pass-through (KikeG), CD Player pass-through (myself).

The point before the last one is interesting. What do you think of this analogy ? My hearing would be like a torch lamp. I'm in the darkness in front of the audio, and I can lighten brightly some parts of it with my torch, in order to analyze them closely, or defocus my torch, in order to get a dim and blurry sight of the whole picture. Being an audiophile, I would instinctively focus the torch on the most beatiful parts when an expensive piece of gear is used, because I'm searching for its qualities, or towards the ugliest parts of it when listening to cheap standard gear, because I'm searching for its defects. Thus the picture appears better on expensive gear.
Actually, that's exactly what saleman ask us to do : the expensive gear :
"Listen to the quality ! This sound, this voice, at this time ! Did you hear ?".
The cheap gear :
"Listen to the problems ! That sound, that voice, at that time ! Clear enough, isn't it ?"

interesting link

That does seem like a good analogy... when concentrating or focusing attention, the brain acts as a filter and so the focus is narrowed down. Some people claim to be able to concentrate well on 2 or more things at once, but I never could...

I think some of audiophilia is based purely on social agreement as well. Like the case of getting the replacement cable for the HD580/600 -- "everybody does it" and so it's assumed something is wrong with the stock cable. Or just assumed that the replacement cable "sounds better" because of the price, and so people actually feel bad using the stock cable -- as if they could dare to do such a thing, the shame of it...

Also, that thing (pointed out before) where "anything can be improved on no matter what" is the most ridiculous, I think. No such thing as transparency (as we talk about it around here) to most audiophiles, it can always be made better somehow. This goes against logic and common sense. In fact, I see a different (but not dissimilar) set of illogical and nonsense criteria that would prevent me from being an audiophile (in the traditional definition anyway)... much of it based on "fuzzy logic" and not making much sense.

Not to mention, it helps to be rich and have money to waste (which I don't), another audiophile attitude -- $20 here, $50 there, $100 more... who cares if it makes things sounds better? .

If anyone wonders "why then is he posting a lot on certain audiophile boards, going to local audio meets, etc..." well, I have no explanation except to reiterate that I really enjoy talking about audio hardware (the same way some people talk about cars or sports teams) and the sense of community around a common interest... none of this requires any stereotypical 'audiophile' attitudes (only the willingness to avoid being confrontational), but if the B.S. ever becomes too much it will be time to leave.

Thank you for the link.

Although I disagree that the article demonstrate that audiophle speaker cables are snake oil, as the author sugests in the conclusion, it brillantly shows that speaker cable impedance matching is nonsense.

From dictionary.com...


By this definition, would it mean that we're the real audiophiles and the bias FUD-pushers who claim to be "audiophiles" really aren't? I hate that people have destroyed this word by throwing it around so loosely on other forums, in audio equipment stores, etc.

Pio2001, KikeG, and everyone else here who has gone to great lengths to use scientific, unbiased testing methods to provide truly accurate results are the real audiophiles, IMO, as they have shown an ardent interest in high-fidelity sound reproduction.

As for the buyers of the holy $23500 wire, the only thing that comes to mind is something about a fool and their money...

I'd like to state that I have recently misused the word "audiophile" in a pejorative way, in order to speak about "snake oil adepts", not every audiophile is like this.

ScorLibran,

I agree... the term is 'loaded' however (as are many in the English language, for better or worse) and I don't personally know of any others to describe the absurd side of audiophilia. Of course, there are ways to *really* make things sound better, then there's the big pile of pseudo-scientific babble that just wastes time and money. DBT is often one of the best ways to separate the wheat from the chaff, as we know around here.

"Audiophile" is just a label anyway... useful in certain conversational contexts, pretty much useless outside them. I would rather go with the definition and say "I have an ardent interest in hi-fi sound reproduction," rather than the label. After all, that interest could conceivably vanish as of tomorrow... things like that have happened before, with other interests (like shortwave radio listening, for example) . I don't tend to find convenient self-definitions very useful, or indicative of anything true.

This definition is wrong. -phile comes from latin (or possible Greek) and means love. The opposite is -phobe, which means extreme fear. The suffixes are widely used by chemists: vinegar is hydrophile while oil is hydrophobe -- soluble in water.

I am an audiophile myself. I do not consider myself stupid nor can I see myself fitting into the ugly description of the "typical audiophile" in the threads above. I am using quite expensive gold plated banana plugs for all my speakers. I know they do not improve music, but are very convinent and does wonders for my ego. Girlfriend gets golden earrings, I get golden banana plugs. Go ahead and have a problem with my attitude, but it has nothing to do with audio.

Bias.
This is precisely the problem with high-end audio showrooms - this is their primary sales technique. Given that the salesmen typically work on commission, it's hard to blame them. Still, active shielded and 'single-crystal' speaker cable is an atrocious waste of resources with no objective benefit except to those selling it.



In the absolute literal translation from the Latin, of course. It's important to note that the consensus definition of a word in the idiom of a particular language (or subdialect) can vary pretty heavily from the original meaning of the word in the source language/dialect.
So of course, via a literalistic definition, an audiophile is a "lover of (audible) sounds/listening".
Hydrophobic molecules are insoluble (in contrast to hydrophilic molecules), as I'm sure you meant

It's greek.
(ph, th, y -> greek )

Funny thing is that you will never be able to tell that a speaker cable will make the sound actually "better" or "worse" (in terms of correct playback) ... any loudspeaker sounds different (that's why we can buy so many different models) ... that's why methods like ABX (as a tool for measuring sound reproduction correctness) will not apply here - there simply is no understandable reference you can rely on (like wav-mp3).

The only reference imaginable to me would be to listen to (completely acoustic) live music (like a philharmonic orchestra) and assessing a recording of that specific music being played back through a stereo setup afterwards ... is this feasible to serve as an unbiased blind test ? Not at all ...

If a so-called "high end cable" will introduce some variation to the signal, it could be possible that some speaker's distinctiveness (compared to others) could be emphasized in a way that the listener will sense as "positive" (placebo or not) - people could tend to hear some improvement in their "personal way of listening" (again, no practical reference there) ... that's why you will never be able to scientifically convince true "high end believers" ...

people in another audio forum have noted that audiophile sounds much like 'paedophile', with the same kind of connotations...

I don't understand you. Of course you do testing of different cables on the same pair of loudspeaker. Why wouldn't ABX be possible for that?


Ehh. No. We're talking about cables here. Not recording methods.



This is the whole point of this thread. The hypothesis is that high-end cables introduce some type of distortion (which may or may not be perceived as positive by the listener - that doesn't matter) and thus are defective. Cables are supposed to be neutral. If you want to color your sound you should use devices specifically designed for that like equalizers, reverb units etc.

Yes, we are testing different cables on the same set of speakers ... but how do you determine which cable (assuming there really is a difference) actually sounds better ? If differences can be spotted throughout a blind test (and that is what ABX'ing is all about), cable believers will still argue that these differences make the sound better ... you will not be able to argue on an objective basis ...

Other thing would be if no difference could be ABX'ed ... which often happened in the past IIRC ...

The problem is the missing reference ... and blind testing needs a reliable reference (like codec comparison where coded material is compared against a known source)

There are several ways.

- Do physical measurements on them. The one with least distortion should be considered the reference.
- Dissect the cables and try to find components causing distortion.
- Use statistics. If there is a bunch of cheap cables sounding exactly the same and the expensive ones sound different from them and from each other, guess which should be considered the reference.

I doesn't have to be difficult..

It is difficult and very expensive, but not impossible. It has already been done, I read about it in a book about electroacoustics (Traité d'electromagnétisme, Ecole polytechnique de Lausanne).


Before raising this problem, one should ABX two speakers cable, and that's far from done.


Assuming that one day someone will manage it, and that one of the cable is transparent (say A) and not the other (B), here's how to show it :

ABX cable A vs cable A+B in serial : the result should be the same as A vs B (success)
ABX cable B vs cable A+B in serial : it should be impossible.

If the first test succeeds and the second fails, then A is transparent and not B.

Hey guys. First of all, let me say how happy I am to find a site that treats audio gear with a critical and rational attitude, rather than the insane brand worship that I find on many other sites. I have longed to find a site dedicated to the pursuit of good audio reproduction but with frequent and careful blind testing. This is seriously lacking in this hobby.

However, let me respond to some of the things I've read in this thread. I didn't believe in high quality cables myself, and recently I acquired a good cd player and was unable to hear any difference between this 3 grand unit and my 150 dollar dvd player. Nor was I able to hear the difference between dollar store RCAs and 75 dollar RCA's that I had. I was very disappointed to say the least, and decided that cables and cd players were a waste of money.

Then I was lucky enough to hear my cd player versus another and my cables versus another set in a very high resolving system in Toronto. I listened to 350USD Van Den Hul carbon cables versus my 70 dollar ones and the difference was unmistakable. Same with the difference between the two players. I had my girlfriend there and sat her down while I switched the cables and players around and she didn't fail to identify each one.

Alot of you seem to be implying that cables make no difference, or if they do, it doesn't mean that it was any better. But after hearing these in this system, I can't agree. They sounded much smoother and the soundstage was much wider. They were less fatiguing.

I bought a pair of these cables, and in my very modest system I can't hear any difference. Nor can I hear a difference with any of the headamps I've tried on my system. (that's right, I'm from headfi)

But I have tried these cables on another high resolving system and there was a significant difference between them, copper cables, and silver cables.

A bit OT, but anyway:

If audible (or immagined) differences on an audiophile level are discussed, people often talk abou differences of the 'soundstage'. I've read some related stuff - here's how I understand it (migh be wrong):

1. The way sundstage is perceived depends on phase. Example: fb2k simple surround plugin works by inverting one channel (= phaseshift by 180°) AFAIK.
2. Room reflections are an important point of soundstage perception: The bigger the room, the bigger is the delay of echos.
3. Depending on the direction from which sound reachs the ear, pinna reflection causes a frequency-dependant amplification. Example:

This diagram is a frequency analysis of head related impulse responses (HRIR). Green: Azimuth 30°, Elevation 0° (like an 'ideal' stereo setup; speakers + listener build an equilateral triangle). Red: Azimuth 45°, Elevation 0° (<Distance Speaker-Speaker> = 1.41*<Distance Speaker-Listener>)

There might be more points. Additions or corrections are welcome.

So there are some possible reasons for perceived soundstage differences (other than immagination):

ad 1. Different cables as well as different CD players (=different filters, DACs etc.) can change phase in different ways. I think it's possible that on high-end equipment (amp, speakers) these differences are noticable while crappy equipment changes phase information itself enough to mask the differences of CD players or cables.

ad 2. It's highly unlikely IMO that different cables or players cause differences in echos.

ad 3. Different CD players and cables can have different frequency responses which could lead to different soundstage perceptions


This is only theory based on assumptions and might be complete nonsense - double blind tests and measurements would be necessary to find out the truth in practice.

I'm certainly not at the level of fewtch, etc. in terms of hardware knowledge, but I probably share some of his sentiments about the audiophile community. What's interesting is that over the last 7-8 years(I'm sure catalyzed by the internet, for better/worse) a lot of people seem to have adopted this view. Since the mid 1990's, sales of "high-end" equipment have dropped precipetously(i saw 50% somewhere, i'll look for the link). Maybe the facts that the print media on the topic is controlled by 2 publishing houses and seems to be absurdly biased and top-end companies have pricing schemes that seem to in no way reflect production costs are catching up with the industry, hopefully for the better.
Maybe we'll see some shakeups soon, in the meantime, i'll stick with cables that cost less than a passable "mid-fi" system.

Hello, Tomek, thank you for your participating.
However, while you appreciatre rigorous and unbiased information, you yourself give a subjective opinion about what you heard, without providing blind test results.
This is against rule 8 of this forum (click on the "HydrogenAudio Terms of Service" link on top of any page). I'm sure that you'll understand why this rule was set, and whish you enjoy HydrogenAudio as we do.

An update : I said above, long ago, that speaker cables were yet to be ABXed, this is now done : http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....=25#entry148461

Those carbon cables sounded interesting, so I dug up a link:



While thats one of the dumbest things I've read, I'm curious how these things are even usable as interconnects. As I recall carbon fibers are very poor electrical conductors compared to metal, and a quick look at that site suggests the same:



While I know little about audio equipment, the chem and physics student in me thinks that would pretty difficult to push any real current through unless it was a very short cable.