If they're a measurable component, it's because they've been generated somewhere else than in the cable, though, and modulated into the human range of hearing.
The cable by and of itself, won't be doing that.
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My tools have been wet from rain and not that I make that a habit but this experiment was with the drill totally submerged in water and immediately operated.
Try that with your drill and let us know if the drill still works.
Now I am going to have to clean my screen!
My point, once again ... your remark "there simply isn't any signal distortion of a measurable magnitude that could be discerned audibly" is not the entire story of what can be "discerned audibly".
No argument that the content getting to your ear was indeed generated elsewhere, but one of the paths to your ear of the reproduced content is, under discussion ... a cable. :)
What is getting to your ear, including overtones and harmonics, can definitely be degraded by that cable.
Perhaps I misunderstood your context ... or you misunderstood mine?
As noted previously, frequencies "much higher than audio" (which should be more accurately stated as frequencies above the audible range of the average human ear) can indeed color/effect the sound within the audible range of human hearing.
These "partials" (overtones, or harmonics, whatever you wish to call them) are well known examples of this phenomenon of human hearing.
If these higher frequencies are not passed through any link of the audio chain (including the cable), the lack thereof will most definitely degrade what it was _intended to be reproduced_ for your hearing enjoyment.
One of the main reason why music recorded to analog tape and reproduced by vinyl records sounds "better" to most listeners ... mostly noticed by an increase in the qualities of depth, clarity and definition in a side by side comparison ... than digitally recorded/reproduced audio.
These qualities are most definitely not as subjective as they seem to an untrained ear.
What!?? No built-in laser on them there drills??
Yabbut, that Fester-Gaudy Green flashes itself at the project as brightly as any LEDs ever could.
-- Never trouble another for what you can do for yourself. -- Thomas Jefferson
On 2/3/2012 12:07 PM, Swingman wrote: ...
I'm saying that in the audible range there's not going to be enough degradation owing to the wire chosen for audio cable that one is going to be able to measure it, what more hear it audibly. The range at which such effects of attenuation, reflection, etc., etc., is simply only an issue at the MHz and higher frequencies; far, far beyond the audio.
Anything higher than that in the signal path that are modulated into the audio range to form "color" are, of course, audible (that is, in fact a tautology :) ) but even third/fifth/and higher overtones are still way below the point at which those effects are significant owing to gold or "extra-pure Cu" or whatever marketing BS they want to dream up.
Microwave, ultrasonics, highspeed digital, yes. Audio, no.
I'm saying ... do a side by side comparison with fifty feet of electric extension cord, and ten feet of a high quality audio cable, to a good set of speakers and tell me most listeners, and particularly a trained one, will not hear the difference.
My ears are 69 years old, but I'd lay a wager any day that I could still accurately AB the difference, with familiar content in a familiar environment.
Well, to be fair, compare 10-ft of each but I'll bet you can't in a truly blind test w/ the identical inputs and non-faulty connections.
I looked at it in the lab w/ a signal analyzer in years gone by when a coworker who was an audiophile was making the same claims and there simply wasn't any measurable difference in the signal. You can't (and no one else can) hear what isn't there and there isn't material attenuation or reflection at those frequencies which are audible to be significant (unless, of course, somebody doctors the connectors to add attenuators or other such shenanigans.
At that time (mid-70s) I recall there was at least one uncovering of one how the patch cords at an audio outlet had been so modified and it was how they were convincing folks they could hear the difference. In that case, of course, they could. When a straight plug was used, all of a sudden the difference went away for some reason... :)
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They are very real. I used to notice them.
I prefer CDs today due to the absense of clicks, pops, and scratches I used to hear, even on nearly new vinyl records.
Or to older, battered ears, especially after the Acid Rock years. I've given up my audiophile ways for
lj--Ask me about my Tinnitus!
Oh, THIS JUST I: Pass it on to Lew's 1-year anniversary "And The Creek Keeps Ris'n" thread, will ya?
--snip-- On a bitterly cold winter's morning a husband and wife in Minnesota were listening to the radio during breakfast. They heard the announcer say, "We are going to have 8 to 10 inches of snow today. You must park your car on the even-numbered side of the street, so the Snowploughs can get through." So the wife went out and moved her car.
A week later while they are eating breakfast again, the radio announcer said, "We are expecting 10 to 12 inches of snow today. You must park your car on the odd-numbered side of the street, so the snowploughs can get through."
The wife went out and moved her car again.
The next week they are again having breakfast, when the radio announcer says, "We are expecting 12 to 14 inches of snow today. You must park...." Then the electric power went out.
The wife was very upset, and with a worried look on her face she said, "I don't know what to do". "Which side of the street do I need to park on so the snowploughs can get through?"
Then with the love and understanding in his voice that all men who are married to blondes exhibit, the husband replied,
"Why don't you just leave the car in the garage this time."
--snip--
-- Never trouble another for what you can do for yourself. -- Thomas Jefferson
I remember a while ago, an article in the magazine "Wireless world" (now Electronics World), in which Douglas Self, a highly regarded amplifier designer, explained why he used "Woolworths Mains cable" for his speaker leads. Tables of measurements were provided to support his view!
As Barry Fox, in a later edition of the same journal said, "There is no doubt that most people who pay hard-earned cash for mumbo-jumbo witchcraft will rather hear the difference than admit they were taken for a ride"
Me I buy lamp cord for speaker wire, cheaper works just as well as speaker wire unless you have some high end audio measuring equipment. Then "the superior qualities" of Monster cable show up, it is not discernable by human hearing range though despite some audiophiles beliefs. ========================================================== It's not discernable period. Copper is copper.
My tools have been wet from rain and not that I make that a habit but this experiment was with the drill totally submerged in water and immediately operated.
Try that with your drill and let us know if the drill still works. ============================================================ Done it with a Black & Decker. No problem. When my kid raced electric RC off road cars, it was standard practice to drop the motor into a bucket of water and run it submerged for a minute to seat the brushes.
Laughable folly to any acoustic engineer. :)
It is fruitless, if not impossible, to compare the non-linear, physiological properties of human hearing to a instrument signal analyzer ... period, zero, zip, nada ... any comparison simply does not _scientifically_ equate.
Wanna bet?
A very common (due to psychoacoustic properties of the human ear) phenomenon in the studio is a "ghost sound" on a recording; a sound not actually physically recorded, but heard very clearly when two or more tracks are combined to excite partials and overtones ...
... IOW, you are indeed "hearing what isn't there".
:)
Totally besides the point in our discussion.
Again, nothing to do with the discussion at hand.
As another poster said succinctly stated, if you can't hear the difference, it is pointless to even discuss it.
That pretty well sums it up. :)
Friend of mine was an amateur blacksmith. The guy next to him at a craft fair was selling home made pottery and wasn't doing very well. On the final day of the fair he doubled his prices and sold the lot!
People believe that if something is more expensive it has to be better.
Primarly how dc current flows not an alternating one. Other wise the green movement would have you replace your house wiring to be more green.
There you go Monster house wires.
Having watched people in stores do audio comparisons many times before, I'll bet the vast majority of people wouldn't be able to tell a nasty (10% THD) signal from a clean (0.01% THD) signal thru good or bad speakers with either cable.
Good for you. Point: Most people don't -care- to discern even if they could do so.
Listen to the levels and distortions of car audio every time you're on the street. It will tell you a lot. That people allow themselves to be bombarded by Muzak in elevators and beeps from computer games all these years should tell you some more. (Egad!)
-- Never trouble another for what you can do for yourself. -- Thomas Jefferson
Just keep the cross-sectional area up and the resistance down, theat's all there is to it.
There must be a category of monster cable previously mentioned by Arthur that most people never see. I don't think that Best Buys sells anything that would require an extremely high quality cable.
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