ZU Wax Speaker Cable (a Kimber basher?)
 

But why would you *need* to cheat

Money, status - the usual reasons people cheat.

If done properly it should give a good marketing edge for flogging my
Chinese cables (which are also distributed by several other cable
companies). As far as I know none of my competitors have ever offered
any proof of the superiority of these cables. Since it is rubbish that
would be transferred into the audible range by ensuring that my cables
are the ones that have the reduced response in the sub/ultra range it
should be unanimous which cable sounds better.

if Kimber cable (or substitute your favourite snake-oil peddlar) is 'night and day' better than ordinary twinflex?

Nah these cables are rubbish compared to mine and I would be able to
prove it (if you let me choose the amplifier, speakers and source).

ZU Wax Speaker Cable (a Kimber basher?)
 

In article , SteveB
sbrads@nildramDOTcoDOTuk wrote:
Come off it, I can't see there being any problem with me being able to
hear differences, but you would just say there's no difference.


The test Stewart is inviting you to pick up cash for passing does not rely
on anyone's opinions. The test is a form of blind ABX where you have a
three way switch between cable 'A', cable 'B', and cable 'X'. Setting 'X'
will use either 'A' or 'B', but you will have no prior info on which during
each test. If you then listen and can show - with statistical significance
- that you can reliably identify when 'X' is 'A' from when 'X' is 'B' then
you get the cash.

Thus what anyone else can hear, or not, and their opinions, don't affect
how often you may write down 'A' or 'B' when deciding which 'X' may be at
that time. If it is a double-blind test, no-one in the room will know by
any prior knowledge...


Perhaps people's hearing is different in ways we can't describe, it
would be unprovable, which is why there's no way of resolving debates
about the existence or not of 'cable sound'.

The above is a way to test your claim that you can hear "night and day"
differences. If they are obvious to you I'd assume you'd welcome the chance
to rip some easy money out of Stewart's wallet. :-)

BTW If you fail to back up your claim, you pay nothing. All you get is the
opportunity to realise you may have been mistaken in your previous beliefs.
:-)

This gives you an advantage as you have nothing (in terms of cash) to
'lose', but you might get lucky and guess well even if your beliefs are
unfounded. If you *can* hear "night and day"[1] differences then it is easy
cash. :-)


As an electronics engineer mainly working on switch mode power supplies
running between frequencies of 10kHz and 2 MHz, I can see scope
waveforms or spectrum analysis change dramatically with cable lengths
of 2 inches or copper track changes of a few mm, so 4 metres of audio
cable has a lot of potential with all that nasty music stuff flying
around but music's 'jumbled mess' just doesn't lend itself to easy
analytical observation, that's what our ears are for.

As an electronics engineer and physicist, as well as a music lover and
audio enthusiast, I don't think the above has much to do with what Stewart
is inviting you to do. :-)

Slainte,

Jim

[1] Is there some reason why Cole Porter songs seem to make differences in
audio equipment easier for people to detect? ;-

--
Electronics http://www.st-and.ac.uk/~www_pa/Scot...o/electron.htm
Audio Misc http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/AudioMisc/index.html
Armstrong Audio http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/Audio/armstrong.html
Barbirolli Soc. http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/JBSoc/JBSoc.html

ZU Wax Speaker Cable (a Kimber basher?)
 

Wally wrote:
Rob wrote:


That's what a double blind test is for. It doesn't matter what he
says - it's purely down to whether you can consistently tell the
difference.


Eggzackly!


Again and as usual in this context - read 'in ways we *can't*
describe'.


This isn't about some airy-fairy review of the qualities of the cables -
nobody is being asked to describe the differences. The person taking the
challenge just has to *identify* them as 'A' or 'B'.



OK. Do you accept:

1. Some people can differentiate between cables;
2. DBT doesn't reliably support that finding;
3. DBT, for this purpose, is a flawed method?

Rob

ZU Wax Speaker Cable (a Kimber basher?)
 

On Tue, 31 May 2005 08:31:39 +0000 (UTC), Rob
wrote:

OK. Do you accept:

1. Some people can differentiate between cables;

No

2. DBT doesn't reliably support that finding;

Yes

3. DBT, for this purpose, is a flawed method?

No


Rob

d

Pearce Consulting
http://www.pearce.uk.com

ZU Wax Speaker Cable (a Kimber basher?)
 

Don Pearce wrote:
On Tue, 31 May 2005 08:31:39 +0000 (UTC), Rob
wrote:


OK. Do you accept:

1. Some people can differentiate between cables;


No

The evidence, I'm afraid, is against you:

http://www.reviewcentre.com/products45.html
http://www.audionote.co.uk/reviews/anspaanspe.htm
http://www.audience-av.com/cable%20reviews.htm

(etc - try Google)


2. DBT doesn't reliably support that finding;


Yes


Probably agreed (from Arnie's test reports).


3. DBT, for this purpose, is a flawed method?


No


This is always going to be difficult for you to explain given your
answer to (1).

Rob

ZU Wax Speaker Cable (a Kimber basher?)
 

On Tue, 31 May 2005 09:11:11 +0000 (UTC), Rob
wrote:

Don Pearce wrote:
On Tue, 31 May 2005 08:31:39 +0000 (UTC), Rob
wrote:


OK. Do you accept:

1. Some people can differentiate between cables;


No

The evidence, I'm afraid, is against you:

http://www.reviewcentre.com/products45.html
http://www.audionote.co.uk/reviews/anspaanspe.htm
http://www.audience-av.com/cable%20reviews.htm

(etc - try Google)

OK - in these terms, everybody can distinguish between cables, by
looking at them. Nobody has yet (to my knowledge) distinguished
between cables on the basis of sound.



2. DBT doesn't reliably support that finding;


Yes


Probably agreed (from Arnie's test reports).


3. DBT, for this purpose, is a flawed method?


No


This is always going to be difficult for you to explain given your
answer to (1).

Rob

DBT reveals that there is no audible difference between cables that
meet a minimum condition of basic competence for an application.
Therefore DBT is NOT a flawed method.

Unless you consider it a flaw to fail to reveal a difference that
doesn't exist.

d

Pearce Consulting
http://www.pearce.uk.com

ZU Wax Speaker Cable (a Kimber basher?)
 

The evidence, I'm afraid, is against you:

http://www.reviewcentre.com/products45.html
http://www.audionote.co.uk/reviews/anspaanspe.htm
http://www.audience-av.com/cable%20reviews.htm

There are a lot of assertions but no evidence that I can find. Can you
please indicate a verifiable experiment in the links given that I may
have missed?

ZU Wax Speaker Cable (a Kimber basher?)
 

On 2005-05-31, Don Pearce wrote:
On Tue, 31 May 2005 08:31:39 +0000 (UTC), Rob
wrote:

OK. Do you accept:

1. Some people can differentiate between cables;

No

To add some published evidence, in Fred Davis' JAES
paper on cable, loudspeaker and amplifier interactions (see
http://bruce.coppola.name/audio/cableInteractions.pdf) the normal
RLC parameters of the cables (no snake oil here) seem to produce quite
significant variations in the frequency responses of the amp-cable-speaker
system above 5 kHz. See for example figure 14, where there is a 0.5 dB
variation at 20 kHz, 0.4 dB at 15 kHz and about 0.2 dB at 10 kHz.

However, looking at JAES figures on audibility threshold (see for
example http://www.pcavtech.com/soundcards/t...LevelMatch.gif)
the differences above are probably not even audible to to someone whose
hearing is still "young" and extends to 20 kHz. For most "mature" ears
I am sure the reported differences due to the cable are not audible.

However as Trevor Wilson has pointed out on this newsgroup a few
loudspeakers do have extreme impedance curves. The above paper deals
with two loudspeakers whose minimum |Z| is 4.8 Ohms and 5.8 Ohms, so
maybe the "No" above (which I agree with under almost all circumstances
from the published research) could become a "Yes" under a few specialist
conditions where, for example, the loudspeaker |Z| falls, say, to 1 Ohm.

Note that someone doing Stewart Pinkerton's tests with the same set of
kit and cables as Fred Davis would apparently fail the 0.1 dB threshold
test.

--
John Phillips

ZU Wax Speaker Cable (a Kimber basher?)
 

On 31 May 2005 09:48:25 GMT, John Phillips
wrote:

On 2005-05-31, Don Pearce wrote:
On Tue, 31 May 2005 08:31:39 +0000 (UTC), Rob
wrote:

OK. Do you accept:

1. Some people can differentiate between cables;

No

To add some published evidence, in Fred Davis' JAES
paper on cable, loudspeaker and amplifier interactions (see
http://bruce.coppola.name/audio/cableInteractions.pdf) the normal
RLC parameters of the cables (no snake oil here) seem to produce quite
significant variations in the frequency responses of the amp-cable-speaker
system above 5 kHz. See for example figure 14, where there is a 0.5 dB
variation at 20 kHz, 0.4 dB at 15 kHz and about 0.2 dB at 10 kHz.

However, looking at JAES figures on audibility threshold (see for
example http://www.pcavtech.com/soundcards/t...LevelMatch.gif)
the differences above are probably not even audible to to someone whose
hearing is still "young" and extends to 20 kHz. For most "mature" ears
I am sure the reported differences due to the cable are not audible.

However as Trevor Wilson has pointed out on this newsgroup a few
loudspeakers do have extreme impedance curves. The above paper deals
with two loudspeakers whose minimum |Z| is 4.8 Ohms and 5.8 Ohms, so
maybe the "No" above (which I agree with under almost all circumstances
from the published research) could become a "Yes" under a few specialist
conditions where, for example, the loudspeaker |Z| falls, say, to 1 Ohm.

Note that someone doing Stewart Pinkerton's tests with the same set of
kit and cables as Fred Davis would apparently fail the 0.1 dB threshold
test.

Do bear in mind the Fred Davis's maths is deeply flawed in this
article.

d

Pearce Consulting
http://www.pearce.uk.com

ZU Wax Speaker Cable (a Kimber basher?)
 

On 2005-05-31, Don Pearce wrote:
On 31 May 2005 09:48:25 GMT, John Phillips
wrote:

On 2005-05-31, Don Pearce wrote:
On Tue, 31 May 2005 08:31:39 +0000 (UTC), Rob
wrote:

OK. Do you accept:

1. Some people can differentiate between cables;

No

To add some published evidence, in Fred Davis' JAES
paper on cable, loudspeaker and amplifier interactions (see
http://bruce.coppola.name/audio/cableInteractions.pdf) ...

Do bear in mind the Fred Davis's maths is deeply flawed in this
article.

I have not been through the maths. Could you give me an example?

--
John Phillips