The 10 biggest lies in audio

[Provost Harrison]

It's quite nice to read that stuff, I've come across some of the cobblers they have come out with. I remember when looking for a digital monitor cable and some of the cobblers about its parameters and shielding and conductivity. That is the beauty of digital, you don't have to worry about that crap. A bog standard piece of wire between the two would do the job quite adequately.

[SpencerH]

Its nice to find out that I was right to not care about cables and yeah I'm a great believer in double blind tests for all things 'artsy'.

[Sikander]

I bought a discontinued floor model 5.1 sound system at Radio Shack for $200, a great deal. I started to buy the cables I needed for it there, and then realized that they would cost more than half the price of the sound system! I went across the street to Target and bought them for less than 25% of what Radio Shack wanted.

[SpencerH]

Hmmm, it makes me wonder about the computer cable mythos?

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
Oh sure. People that cream their jeans over a browser are so much better.

Owned.

[-Jrabbit]

This piece is several years old but well worth continued circulation.

I spent 20 years working for a major pro audio manufacturer, with over 100 engineers on staff. Back when I was new there, my job in customer service involved answering letters from end users. (This was the mid-80s, so people actually wrote letters.) The most demanding of these inquiries were generally from audiophiles searching for the perfect combination of turntable-tone arm-phono cartridge. Part of my process involved going to the engineers for technically correct answers.

Listening to them diss the audiophile tweaks was always a huge source of amusement. I could always get a nice rant going by sitting down with them at lunch and using certain catch phrases -- like "oxygen-free copper" or "Bose."

It sad that, 20 years later, the only thing that's changed is the increased ability and willingness of marketers to prey on the ignorance of their customers.

[self biased]

for the most part it's right. i'd quibble about some of the upper end sampling rates and how it affects noises at 20k, but my hearing is so shot these days i'm lucky to percieve anything above 17k

[-Jrabbit]

It's a well known fact that the use of italics damages high frequency hearing response.

[self biased]

as does 150+ db enviroments without protection.

[Nostromo]

nm

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by SpencerH
Hmmm, it makes me wonder about the computer cable mythos?

Shielded is definitely better.

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


Shielded is definitely better.

Is that based on empirical data or opinion though? More to the point, while shielded cable certainly has specific uses, is it really worth the extra money for 'Monster Cables' in order to play some game on a console?

[Kuciwalker]

No.

[Nostromo]

You risk having some reliability problems with dirt cheap cables, though. So I'd say its worth paying a little more for cables, but not 1K$ or 10k$ more But I hear that Monster cables are a bit overpriced: you can have cables the same quality, but for less $.

The simple truth is that resistance,
inductance, and capacitance (R, L, and
C) are the only cable parameters that
affect performance in the range below
radio frequencies. The signal has no
idea whether it is being transmitted
through cheap or expensive RLC. Yes,
you have to pay a little more than rock
bottom for decent plugs, shielding, insulation,
etc., to avoid reliability problems,
and you have to pay attention to
resistance in longer connections. In
basic electrical performance, however,
a nice pair of straightened-out wire
coat hangers with the ends scraped is
not a whit inferior to a $2000 gee-whiz
miracle cable.

[Kuciwalker]

Consoles already come with perfectly fine cables.