XLR cable funny story

[bdubs767]

Funny story here...


I need an xlr cable of about 5 to 10 ft length for my rta so I didnt want to wait for an order to come in from PE...

So I went to best buy to see if they had them asked the sales rep if they had any xlr cables he proceeded to say "sorry we only carry the brand Monster not XLR"

[Thumper88]

HAHA!

[eyesofra]

[AVICJR]

So I went to best buy to see if they had them asked the sales rep if they had any xlr cables he proceeded to say "sorry we only carry the brand Monster not XLR"

Go to Circuit City they carry the XLR brand but not Monster.

FOR REALS THOUGH: you can probably get that cable from a Radio Shack.

[bdubs767]

Went to radio shack today got into an argument with the guy over wire is wire.....

He was trying to say that the monster based brand would sound better maybe if he said it was more duriable I wouldn't have laughed.

I then went to a music store found one and the guy went on to say the same thing....


Why does everyone think wire makes a difference???????copper is copper is it not? Even if wire did make a difference it would not be audible as it has to be about 2% distortion to be heard

[Audiophiliac]

Wire can make a difference.

[eyesofra]

x2....they do make a difference .....

some of the resulting differences could be explained electrically but some of them are a matter of psychoacoustics.
" Wires" in Hi-Fidelity audio is a huge and sophisticated industry by its own.

changin my RCA's from some cheap shielded, gold plated types to AQ Diamondbacks made a big difference in the sound.
And now havin streetwires ZN9 plugged in , there's some difference to it too.

Its not placebo and u can hear them. In my system the biggest difference was in clarity, vocal and mids were just much clearer and defined with the AQ.
Its something like in those old radio cassettes time, the magnetic head will accumulate dirt over time and once u clean it up with some good quality alcohol , the overall sound will become so clear.
The result from changin the RCA was something like that with the AQ and ZN ....

But in my opinion, in mobile Hi-Fi , many other things such as driver placements makes many times more difference.So if the stereo sounds good and issues such as placmement and all are well resolved , then goin into quality cabling will enhance the system IMHO.


In home Audio though, drivers comes in a box and once ur done placing them properly with adequate space in between and around them, they just start to image superbly with some decent equipment. In this scenarios cabling make a huge difference and smaller changes becomes more apparent as the system grows into a higher -resolution one with further upgrades.

these are just my own findings and opinion being a Home Hi-Fi freak for quite some time... and movin into mobile Hi-Fi now( after the new car....)

attached a pdf on how an overall build of a cable would effect the sound...the metallurgy,geometry,dialetric ,contact.. everythin makes a difference. It's a good read .

The only thing bout this article is the " stranded vs solid core conductor "issue.
This is still being debated with manufacturers such as AQ,Taralabs into " solid " and others for an instance " QED " and many more backing up " stranded " conductors.

But the other aspects of cable build, discussed in this article are agreed by most cable manufacturers and are being applied in their product , as far as i know .


Adios guys ....

[bdubs767]

Forget the sheilding and connectors that can make a difference in noise rejection, but I'm talking the wire the actually copper, unless the physical size of it plays an issue I am 100% willing to say you will never hear a difference.

[eyesofra]

well , the actual copper does differ from one to one. The bare copper that u can purchase from warehouse is nothing in construction compared to audio grade coppers . For the naked eyes its just copper but there's an entire study dedicated on metallurgy.
Well i can go on, but why dont u read thru that pdf , really answers ur question ..

n/b : bdubs , i was exactly like u man, with the same exact question back during uni time....

[Eric D]

Wire only makes a difference when you are comparing a completely junk wire to a reasonable or good one. Junk wire may be internally corroded, or its connectors may be damaged, or make only minimal contact.

In the case of speaker wires, you need to use a large enough wire for the task. 16ga will do about anything a car audio environment with its short distance can throw at it. 12ga will do about anything home audio can throw at it.

As far as comparing different types of copper, or even pure silver wire, that is just nonsense, directed towards those with more money than brains. If you understand the physics associated with electricity, you will find it is completely impossible for a $100 wire, and a $1,000 wire to sound any different. The only way it can sound different is if it were one of those fancy wires like from MIT, which have a box attached to them which actually colors the sound, so you think you got a difference for your $10,000 spent.

Wires are governed by three things, resistance (impedance), capacitance, and inductance. Parallel wires have capacitance, twisted wires have inductance, and all wires have resistance. The distance most wires go reduces capacitance issues to nearly nothing, and if it is not twisted, you have no issue with inductance. So, resistance is the only issue. In the case of an ultra high end home audio with $10,000 amps, and $5,000 speakers, running a pair of car audio 8ga wires for your speakers will perform as well as a $6,000 set of silver cables would, it is just physics.

And for the record, my home speaker wires were $60 a foot, the biggest waste of money I ever spent on anything, but they do look damn cool, so I use that to justify my stupidity in purchasing them.

[rlockwood]

^
good post

[eyesofra]

very true what ur sayin...the aspect ur discussing is electrical part of it and i wont deny those facts ....

One of the most expensive and natural sounding stereo amplifier ever made was the AudioNote's Ongaku class-A vacuum tube amp.

ok the point is , its designed by a person considered to be a genius and now a legend in the audio world - Kondo-san
The entire internal build of the amp is made of silver - the wiring up to the transformer winding.
Now my point is why would an electronics genius use complete silver for all the metal inside of his amp if not for the fact that " silver " sound different.
And he himself admitted that silver sounds better than copper thus the fact that different metal does sound different . The reason is because the structureal build of these metals.

When we talk to an electrical engineer bout copper wire - immediately capacitance , inductance, RFI,EMI and all these elemets of electromagnetism comes into the picture.

But when u talk to an Industrial Engineer bout copper wire - he would talk to u bout purifying copper , electrolytic copper production, 6N purification process up to OCC process to create crystal coppers which has the least amount of impurities and smallest number of grains measured in PPM .
All these is to reduce the impurities and to alter the structure of the metal in order to lower the distortion within it.

These are engineering facts and it has a lot to do with how an electrical audio signal routed through a particualr metal sounds.

There are many more reasons to why metal type play an important role in Hi-Fidelity audio but these are some that i know of guys.....

[Eric D]

Any genius in the audio world is all about making money, that is the bottom line.

If putting silver on a product makes it cost say $5,000 more, but you can charge $10,000 more to someone with little knowledge about how the silver does nothing for him, then that is a profitable decision, and one I would not disagree with making.

Just because something is expensive, does not mean it is good.

There is absolutely no sonic difference between using long grain copper, functionally perfect copper, or using solid copper electrical wire used in home construction. They function the same electrically, and thus the same acoustically.

The biggest problem with audiophiles these days is their inability to admit to their mistakes. If they pay $1,000 for a wire, there is no way they will admit there is no difference in the sound of it.

Self justification is hardly any justification at all…

If you take some common zip cord, and the top of the line for that year AQ wire (say Everest for example), and swap between them in a double blind test, the audiophile will fail that test. He will not be able to choose the better wire, as he cannot hear the difference.

Likewise, if I take a box of “zip cord”, and come up with a grand and elaborate marketing scheme for it, explaining all the nonexistent benefits and included technologies, shove it inside a 1in thick PCV jacket to make it look big, stick some fancy gold connectors on it, and sell it for say $100 a foot, audiophiles will rave at how much better it sounds.

As an exercise for yourself, check out Kimber Kable and their technology. Strangely, they justify and gloat about all the opposites of AudioQuest. One believes in multi strand individual construction, the other believes in grouped twisted construction. If you keep digging you find they are polar opposites on a lot of their views. So, which is it then? If one is right and one is wrong, which one? Both have countless hoards of mindless drones drooling over their products. Has technology won, or has marketing?

[eyesofra]

though i still cant agree with the fact that solid copper used in home wiring is the same as all those purified audiograde copper mentioned above , i wont deny the fact that, end of the day it all comes down to marketing and essentially money.

As an exercise for yourself, check out Kimber Kable and their technology. Strangely, they justify and gloat about all the opposites of AudioQuest. One believes in multi strand individual construction, the other believes in grouped twisted construction. If you keep digging you find they are polar opposites on a lot of their views. So, which is it then? If one is right and one is wrong, which one? Both have countless hoards of mindless drones drooling over their products. Has technology won, or has marketing?

regarding this exercise , i've already pointed out very cleary the issue of " stranded vs solid core " in my second post in this thread.


cheers .....

[Eric D]

You pointed it out, but you did not explain anything, or make a decision on it.

Solid copper home wire will sound the same as $10,000 audiophile wire, that is my point, and I am sticking to it. No one on the face of the Earth can offer any scientific reasoning, or cold hard evidence to prove this point wrong.

If you move a lamp in your room 6in to the left, or turn a speaker 1 degree away from you, or move your head 1 in from its listening position, you will produce a change in the sound several magnitudes larger than that of the copper wire used.

[eyesofra]

hi eric ,
i was basiclly tryin to establish a point that many different aspects comes to play in a cable design thus the reason i attached the pdf.
And i wasnt discussing the effect of " multi-strand or solid core " in particular to actually write anything bout it or to make any decision, if there was one to make in the first place.
I was just pointing out that, it's something that's still being " debated " as i've stated earlier.

and eric i'm certainly not arguing that u should change what u think is the rite concept. We're just laying down some known facts on the table...thats all rite...
and i respect ur point cause i'm sure u have ur reasons to do so.

cheers for now....

[Eric D]

You have not put any known facts on the table though.

I guess that is where I become confused.

[fuzzysnuggleduck]

This may be irrelevant or already said but whatever.

XLR cables are often best purchased at decent music stores. Anyone that sells or rents PAs, Mics, Mixers, etc all will have XLR cables.

You can get them kind of cheap new or expensive. I bought some really long ones a while ago for about $25-$30CAD each

[eyesofra]

i believe i did .
And confusion is just a lost of orientation , in this case probably its just momentary.

adios fer now...........

[Eric D]

In a large portion of car audio discussion, the answers are simply opinions. This is because there is no clear right or wrong, only different ways of doing it, and the opinions associated with the final outcome.

In this case of cable discussion (a discussion covered on countless forums for years now), there is a right and wrong, a correct and incorrect.

It is no different than arguing the world is flat. You could look out the window of your dwelling all day long and claim the world is flat, but until you step back and get a bigger perspective on things, you will never know the truth.

The world is round, and cable quality does not affect the sound of a stereo, so long as the cables are not complete junk to begin with.

[Audiophiliac]

There has always been this debate...especially in high end home audio. Its 50/50....half are with Doc and say copper is copper and wire is wire. The other half believe that there are big and small differences in cable material, construction, connectors, length, etc...and on and on...and they spend lots of time and money trying and buying different cables. Just like the tube vs. SS debate...or the Electrostatic vs. cone speakers, or passive vs. active crossover debates....I believe there are always exceptions to every "rule".

When it comes to cables, there are definitely differences that are audible. Always? Of course not. But for sure, they exist. I think the biggest issue is noise. RF and EMI are nasty buggers that love to infest any audio system if they are allowed. The copper or silver material has little to do with this. The idea that silver is superior to copper has been around for centuries. It may have some merit to it, but overall, not likely a large source of differences. But cable construction/geometry can have much larger effects on the rejection of RF and EMI noise. Conductor diameter, dielectric properties, twists per inch, etc...etc...can change how well a piece of wire rejects noise.

Now I dont claim to be an engineer. But I can and have heard differences between things that others have said was impossible for me to hear.

Research what Zu Audio has come up with for their cables. They created a unique construction geometry that sounds good on paper...and they offer a 60 day money back guarantee on any of their products. What better way to find out if it sounds better, than to try it in your own system?

That is my answer to anything involving the above mentioned debates. IF you dont think tubes can sound better than solid state, try some freakin tubes. If you dont think electrostats can sound as good as cone speakers, get some electrostats and try them. Same with cables. If you think wire is wire, what would it hurt to try a set of uber expensive cables? I dont promise any results one way or the other. But you have to take anything with a grain of salt.

The nitty gritty that I love about audio, is that there are always ways to improve your system. Whether its room treatment, speaker placement, EQ, swapping amps, speakers, wires, power conditioning, etc....there will always be another level to reach for. Can the right cable make that last little difference to your ears? Possibly, yes. But you wont know until you try them all. Have fun!

I would much rather sit back and enjoy some good music....loudly....than worry about the purity of the copper in my wires. But I also wouldnt wire up a hi-fi system in my living room with home depot wire either.

[Eric D]

So, here is the bottom line.

Instead of playing around with cables, and especially expensive cables, just get a pair of 8ga power wires and use them.

They offer larger than needed gauge so they pass all the current you could imagine, and their geometry is perfect (a ground and a positive leading to the speaker).

Any cable beyond this is an utter waste of money and effort. There simply is no better sounding cable.

You guys can go on and on about how other cables sound different. The only thing which may sound different, is other expensive cables may have a geometry which actually introduces noise in the signal, in an effort to make their cable sound different, so you feel like you got something for the money.

A perfect example would be those boxes on MIT speaker cables, or the battery packs on AQ cables. Both are complete wastes of time, and will IF ANYTHING, make your speakers sound worse than what they could.

As far as hearing differences in things others claimed you could not hear, if they were cable related, you would have FAILED a double blind test. That is a fact. There is no way your ears are better than $100,000 or more test equipment, which shows no difference in a cable design.

An electron is an electron. It has to make its way to the speaker and back. There are no magic voodoo dust particles coming into play here. Since the electron will travel just as easily in a zip cord as it will in an ultra expensive AudioQuest cable, there will be no difference in the sound, especially not one in which a human could actually hear.

[Eric D]

One more note, I doubt the two sides are 50/50 on this debate.

The market share on zip cord (and similar name brand zip cord) is probably about 98%, and that is in high end home audio. The people buying into the BS associated with these exotic wire products are a tiny fraction with gobs of cash to burn. Hence the reason these companies charge so much. They need the cash to stay in business, and if milking rich people with BS marketing pays the bills, they go for it.

Of all the people I have met locally or online who are into high end audio, not one of them believed cables will make a difference. About 75% of them just bought the biggest cable they could afford, or bought cables based on the quality of the connectors.

If you truly believe cables make a difference, I have some nice swamp land I will gladly sell you.

[Audiophiliac]

My point is that cables can sound different. Whether one sounds better or worse than another, is up to the individual. Just like any other component in your system.

[Mackenzie]

wire is wire... I am simply going with kicker because they have the most flexible wire...