A year after yours! Just wondering if you understood John Hankinson’s comment or read it properly, but I don’t think you did. What he was saying was that his father tested two different AMPLIFIERS – they were all driving the same model of loudspeaker. People couldn’t tell the difference between the sound produced by the speakers whether they were driven by the expensive or the cheaper amplifiers – they were the same speakers both times!

Anyway back to the subject, I do have these cables and I can hear a difference and it was worth the risk. In short you owe it to yourself to at least give it a go. One thing Russ Andrews does offer is a money back guarantee if you don’t think it makes a difference.
Quite appart from RFI, the cables are actually rated at 13 amps, and will carry more. The bog standard freebie cables are mosty 5amps if your lucky. Now before anyone says music doesnt require more than 5amps, it takes a lot of power to really grip a speaker cone of any size, it may just be for a microsecond but I bet you could hear that. Anything less and all the transients are being averaged out. Most people can tell the difference between a tinny radio sound and a live concert. On the subject of RFI, how good is your earth connection, if there’s a slight resistance there, maybe 1 ohm, all your mains cables will be picking up RFI quite nicely, your amp will be poluted by it, and it will get into the feedback circuits to your amp, ok its rfi and you can’t hear it, but your speakers and crossover circuits are being corrupted by it and that could impact what you hear. Ok a lot of vague terminology above.

If you dont listen to music much have you thought that it may be because its had the life, rythm, timing etc removed from it by RFI, and it distorts which is the thing that makes you grimace and turn it down. Spend some real money on hifi and maybe even try the cable, you might find suddenly you start to enjoy music from your hifi again and I hope you do.

‘Have really enjoyed skimming through this and following up some links but didn’t spot any mention of Backmasking which gives a very very powerful demonstration of the power of suggestion over what we hear. Good way to prove that the Voodoo people are right, blind listening doesnt work!!! You need to know what you will hear then it works.
jeffmilner.com/backmasking.htm
Is a good start and you can make your own experiments in minutes without expensive leads etc just by playing tracks backwards to people with and without the words showing. Stairway to Heaven backwards is the classic! I saw Simon Singh do this at Hay Festival. Played it backwards, asked if anyone could hear anything, no, anyone hear the word Satan? Couple of hands in big audience went up. Then played it again with words on the screen, wow! Just try it.
Most web threads argue whether it was Led Zep or the Devil himself that did this, given the limited technology at the time . One lecturer at Leeds (from memory) tried it on his students but with different words.
I have tried it on an opera singer and ‘tone deaf ‘ people with 100% result, no stats analysis needed with this experiment.
My suggestion is that Hi-Fi shops should have a sign saying ‘this sounds great’ visible when demonstrating expensive kettle leads and oxygen free sexed cables, or they could do as now and just tell people….
Problem I have is I want to buy a new amp and speakers, how do I avoid self and salesperson deception.

This doesn’t prove kettle leads are bullocks but it is pretty conclusive evidence of the need for blind testing for those who still believe they can be objective.

BTW there is a difference between subjectivity, such as liking ABBA and suggestion, hearing a kettle sing Waterloo.

So in response to last poster, go do, check out Stairway to Heaven!

I didn’t expect to hear any difference, and my wife was listening with glee waiting to dismiss it as junk for people with more money than sense.

But it really made a difference. My wife agrees. We have no idea how much these cost, but she said it would be worth up to a hundred pounds (which is actually more than I thought).

The frustrating thing is that I can’t explain it. We tried different CDs, playing a section of a track and then quickly swapping the leads and playing the same track.

And my wife (who has actually commented that expensive hi-fi is wasted on her) couldn’t get over just how marked the difference was.

Neither can I.

We can’t explain it, but we genuinely can hear it even though we expected little or no difference.

It isn’t “bad science” and you are doing your readers a genuine disservice by trying to claim it is.

He and his mates used to run the village’s wine-shop – where they sold only their wine – and they’d have a right good laugh, reading the wine columns with their ridiculous, while waiting for customers.

As for those Aussies who started buying up their vinyards and planting vines that _He’d_ never have bothered with, with their stupid ideas about “cleanliness” (as if!) and “stainless steel” – well, he and his mates knew that no-one could really tell the difference so it was obvious they didn’t know what they were doing, wasn’t it?

I’m so pleased he taught me all he knew – and all _I_ know – about the subject; it’s allowed me to see straight through all the stupid guff that’s talked about wine, even today. The plain and simple truth is that is DOESN’T MATTER what grape you use, what you ferment it in, and whether you age it or not. The result will be either red or white, and will be about 12.% alcohol. Anyone who tells you there is any more to it is, quite simply, talking rubbish.

N

What a bunch of ignorant, closed minded, people!

Let me explain:-

I am a crusty old fart who just happens to enjoy music; we go to as many live gigs and concerts as we can. Our love of music lead us to build a fairly good main sound system plus we also have a ghetto blaster in the dining room, various portable radios and two guitar amplification systems.

As a kid, I also built radios and amplifiers, so learned a lot of theory much of which I have kept up to date.

So. Mains leads, eh? I’ll return to them but what has amazed me is the way in which virtually all contributors have rubbished people who buy hi-fi. Now, I agree that there is a lunatic fringe and frankly, I wonder if some of them may be bonkers – but I haven’t heard their systems, so I shan’t say that they are until I do, unlike you people here.

Then, there are the so-called “experts”, one especially, a John Hankinson. Very funny, JH, albeit unwittingly. Damned rude, too. He rails against all things hi-fi or audio, even insulting me by assuming that I am also into crackpot pseudo science such as crystals etc. What is galling is that he has demonstrated a quite unacceptable lack of understanding of audio and (some of) the accompanying physics. If you don’t understand a topic, don’t criticise it. I won’t go into detail but JH illuminated his fundamental lack of understanding when talking about LP v. CD and the stuff that happens to enable proper LP replay.

His suggestion that because some relation worked in or around the electronics business, he therefore has the ultimate knowledge about what he believes to be true is as laughable as the studio people who say that they get along with this or that ancient , or cheap, equipment because they can’t tell the difference. Well, pay attention – some people can! Obviously, you aren’t aware of studios that HAVE adopted audiophile standards and the stunning results they have achieved but then you wouldn’t want to because it would threaten, if not destroy, your belief system.

To basics.

In the 70s, a turntable and later, amplifier, manufacturer came along who postulated the idea, which sensible people already knew (but the then hi-fi establishment refused to admit) that different, properly designed, amplifiers, for instance, sounded different. Heresy! Today, it is accepted by all bar an outmoded “objectivist only” minority that preamps, power amps, interconnects, pickups, CD players et al, can and do, sound different.

Yet, right up to his death, Peter Walker of QUAD (whose 44/404 amp sounded absolutely dreadful, for rational, circuit design, reasons) steadfastly refused to believe that this was true. His dictum was “if I can’t measure it, it does not exist”. Pure baloney that the scientists among us scoffed at. A scientist, presented with phenomena that he cannot (presently) measure, will do his darndest to find ways to measure the effects. The upshot of this ostrich like belief is that QUAD products failed to keep pace with sonic development, sales fell and the company is now foreign owned. Shades of the British motor industry.

Sonic improvement is precisely what happened. Designers improved measuring (and listening) capabilities and sure enough many hitherto unknown, or unsuspected, distortion artefacts were recognised and understood. Amplifier design is a complicated science with not a little art and the market today, at the higher end, is served well.

Far from the audiophile being ostrich-like, it is everyone who has posted here rubbishing a subject they patently don’t understand who are the ignorant, inward looking, flat earth, crystal and homeopathy wannabees.

Wake up, listen and understand.

Just to make you even more upset, I have conducted blind tests ABX style, if not double blind. Four integrated amps were used, 3 from the same stable (of which two were the SAME model) and another. I was able to identify each within 30 seconds of an LP track with 100% accuracy, over a number of weekends – this because my friends (who achieved roughly 50 – 75% accuracy) couldn’t believe it. A few could hear absolutely no difference at all and that is fine, too: I didn’t criticise them for having cloth ears..

I took my present amp to a dealer about 5 years ago, thinking I might upgrade it. No way. The 1980 amp blew away the new (and very expensive) pair that we listened to on all counts; yes, stereo staging, bass depth, mid clarity and clean but extended treble (all the hi-fi descriptors you guys hate) but mainly a sense of accuracy and “being there”. During this demo., the manager was in the shop not the demo room but came rushing into the room when my amp was first played saying, “What on earth is that? It’s superb!”. All amps, of course, sound the same…

Now you’ll really get wound up. Every few months I clean all of the system’s connections: interconnects, speaker cable ends and wait for it….. the mains plug pins and fuse!!! The difference in sound is remarkable. Once, whilst my wife was out (and not having told her) I did the “spring clean” and on her return was playing a CD. She put her head round the door & said, “You’ve cleaned the cables, haven’t you?”. But cables make no difference….

Cable directionality. Bullshit you all say and so did I and quite honestly I can’t hear any difference. What is intriguing though (and this will anoy you even more) is that not only have designers now understood this phenomenom but it can be measured and explained in not too difficult terms. So, a scientific explanation but I still can’t hear it! The difference is this – if one of you said that you could hear it, I would accept that at face value not belittle you.

By your dogma all cables sound the same, amps sound the same and solid state must always sound the same . Well, how do you explain a new CD player that on installation sounded excruciatingly bad, to the point that my wife came into the room and said she reckoned we’d been had. I was so appalled I called the dealer next day. He assured me that it was normal and explained what in his experience I was hearing – spot on! All those nasty hi-fi words like “hard”, “glassy” and “muddy” – they were perfect descriptors of the sound. I was assured that after a few hundred hours burn-in, the sound would improve and this proved so, in spades. Of course this cannot happen and you lot will now rampage on this thread telling me what a fool I am.

So, if you do not understand the terminology of others DON’T rubbish it, try to understand it, you may just learn something to your benefit.

Furthermore, please understand that I (and others) can hear these differences very clearly. If you can’t, or will not, it isn’t a problem unless you rubbish those who can hear such things.

What has really annoyed me about these two threads is the Luddite approach to anything that you don’t understand, from the self confessed ignorami to those masquerading as having expert knowledge (but whose writing confirms their ignorance) you have done rational debate a huge disservice but obviously rationality isn’t within your ambit.

And now to the $64,000 question: do I think expensive mains cables work? I haven’t a clue because I don’t possess one. The joke is that, apart from just possibly inner city locations, I am very, very, sceptical about them. In fact, I seriously doubt their efficacy and am concerned about those who sell such things as Valhalla being charlatans as most of you think. However, where I differ from those “who know they’re right” is that, until I have heard these cables for myself, I shall remain sceptical but I shall NOT say that they do not or cannot work. There are perfectly rational scientific reasons why, in some conditions, they may work along with mains conditioners and regenerators (but I won’t go there!).

Finally, my biggest disappointment was to be insulted by the pseud JH for being a music lover and hi-fi buyer which makes me, according to him, a follower of the hoaxers, charlatans and idiots who peddle crystal therapies and the like. I came to this site because I was searching for the lowdown on the utterly dangerous Harry Oldfield and here, got lumped in with him!!! I’d demand an apology but I know it won’t be forthcoming from such biased and unpleasant people.

I now expect to be removed from this board for having the temerity to suggest that you adopt reasoned debate, sound judgement, a modicum of knowledge and that you do not rubbish or insult others when, clearly, you haven’t a clue what you are talking about.

Grow up!

If you could affect other people’s power by beaming radio waves at a transmission line, high school boys would do it as a prank and other people would use it as a weapon. Doesn’t happen.

At one time I was designing a house and became quite interested in this. Basically, you have to design the room to fit the sound source, the room ideally has no windows or very small windows symmetrically distributed, exterior ambient noise is not admitted, the room is panelled in wood that, like Goldilock’s porridge, is not too hard and not too soft, and finally, after all is completed, the finest ears must fine-tune the room with the odd bit of carpet to soak up unwanted echoes and reverbations.

It’s an interesting subject, but one in which the power lead plays no part.

Or maybe that’s the mushrooms.

Dave

MAIN POINT: respected hifi manufacturer scores speakers 100 to electronics 10 to cables 0.1 (!!) – and includes article on kettle leads. Worth reading, as quite thorough (experiments include tea from Fortnums and Tetley):

http://www.avihifi.co.uk/Important/Important.html

On that 100 to .1 scale, what do layout and furnishings score?

Shielded speaker cables should only matter if your speaker cable is running next to other noisy cables or if you are in an electrically very noisy enviroment. Generally the amount of energy picked up on a cable is very low, far less than your amp is putting out and so not noticable.
The areas where shielding is important are the outputs from the playback devices to the amplifier, any noise picked up at that point will also be amplified. Also unlike the mains input there are limits to the filtering that can be used on those inputs without having a negative impact on the sound quality. Fortunatly those cables are always shielded even on cheap systems.

If, say, a bit of hi-fi kit had a minor effect, that was below the threshold of human perception, then no matter how big the study, you wouldn’t ever see it.

But…little baby steps make big strides, if you add them up.

Yes, a certain capacitor here, an up-rated DAC there…you could swap them individually and not notice the difference, perhaps, but if they were all swapped for rubbish, it would fall within the threshold, and get picked up by a human ABX test.

And it is also true that a spectral analyser doesn’t “hear” any more than a computer “thinks”. How can you look at a frequency plot and decide what is better? What is better? It’s a personal preference, isn’t it? The idea that you want the stereo to make the same noise as the artists comitted to vinyl/CD is on a hiding to nothing, unless you listened to it on the same equipment they did. Oh, and borrowed their ears and brain…

So, erm, what to do? Small improvements matter, because enough small improvements lead to an audible one. But you can’t ABX the small improvements. Damn. Best spend your money on something else then.

Oh, and my vote- I’d have to see this cable to pass judgement on it, but what they said doesn’t sound convincing. Ethernet cables have a specific twist rate to the different pairs of wires, but then that’s to reduce cross-talk, not to attenuate RF, so it doesn’t apply. I agree you *could* make a mains lead that would make a difference, but I think it would show the difference more prominently on *cheap* equipment, where they had skimped on the filtering.

PS, yes yes, I know I don’t know what I’m talking about, but I wanted to join in anyway.

1. good speakers (i like Lynn myself)
2. shielded speaker cable (no good getting rid of RFi at power stage if speaker cable picks it up!)
3. Good amp
4. Keep power cable away from speaker cable.
5. don;’t spend $480 odd on a wooden volume knob!

http://www.machinadynamica.com/machina64.htm

How could I not have seen the light till now…?