I work with a man called Ken.
He's not really that keen on that particular interpretation of the classic tune.
Wow some people are tetchy tonight 🤭 single?
I'd still love to see a proof, @5plusn8 where did I say I liked fancy cables? Maybe brush up on your own comprehension, or reading skills? @squirrelking I get that you are frustrated but I really don't see what you have proved.
Does speaker cable actually make a difference?
Yes, it does.
My point and I'm sure it's pretty clear, is that this is what happens to any sport/pastime/hobby when middle aged men with disposable income happen upon it.
They spoil it.
See also golf, mountain biking, road biking, cookery and so on...
so, if you like Pina Colada, getting caught in the rain...
surely the science needed here is blind testing. Surely someone has done some?
True, but no-one can be bothered, it's expensive, and it's not in certain parties' interests, is it? 🙂
I'm not saying that £100/m cable is better than £50/m cable. I'm highly sceptical of that. But I noticed a difference with £5/m cable. But the people who make the £5/m cable also make much more expensive cable, so they're not going to debunk that myth are they? Even if it's true that £5/m cable is better than £1/m cable or mains wire.
My point and I’m sure it’s pretty clear, is that this is what happens to any sport/pastime/hobby when middle aged men with disposable income happen upon it.
They get drunk and bomb threads about it? 😂
They spoil it.
See also golf, mountain biking
Why does the presence of rich middle aged people spoil MTBing? I think they fund development for everyone else. On Saturday I saw loads of MTBers out, from middle aged men to young lads, all filthy so clearly having ridden the local gnar. The kids were on decent looking bikes, probably budget models trickled down from the expensive stuff. All were having fun. All keeping the cheeky trails open with wheel traffic too.
Wow some people are tetchy tonight 🤭 single?
I’d still love to see a proof, @5plusn8 where did I say I liked fancy cables? Maybe brush up on your own comprehension, or reading skills?
Fair enough I haven't actually read any of your posts, I only skimmed the thread, but I did read your replies to me and obvs made the wrong assumption...
https://www.soundguys.com/cable-myths-reviving-the-coathanger-test-23553/
We've all been taken to the dry cleaners.
They get drunk
Not allowed; Mrs Crikey needs guidance while making her latest sewing creation!
Why does the presence of rich middle aged people spoil MTBing? I think they fund development for everyone else.
But they spoil it because it changes the emphasis from the activity to the kit required. It happened in the running world when I was 15; all of a sudden you were judged on your trainers instead of your performance. Same goes for mountain biking; what's the 'entry price' to it now?
Then we end up here with people arguing about the kit instead of the music.
slowoldman
....It is highly subjective. Hence why some prefer vinyl over digital or valves over solid state. If you prefer the sound of something that’s the one you think is right, even if it’s highly inaccurate (which it often is).
This is what makes playing around with a home setup so interesting. Its about enjoying the music.
Accurate monitoring setups are tools for the audio industry, they don't sound bad, but they can be a bit boring to listen to.
I'm with you crikey, just pulling your leg.
But they spoil it because it changes the emphasis from the activity to the kit required.
In their minds, maybe. However MTBing has always been strongly kit related, because it's an aspect of cycling that demands particular kit - fat tyres etc.
And hi-fi has always been ONLY about kit. It's not really anything to do with music, which (in case we've forgotten) is about artistry and creativity.
Re the Soundguys article, they seem to take a lot of nice accurate measurements, see differences, and then hand-wave them away with stuff like this:
Only at 10kHz does the deviation cross the threshold of audibility, and even then: that’s a very narrow range of sound that will absolutely get lost in music. You will not be able to tell unless you’re a child prodigy and have been trained to know what to look for.
Can they prove that these deviations 'will get lost in music' ? What music? Whose ears? How many latent child prodigies are out there? How many have trained themselves to listen out?
Lots of questions. It is entirely possible that we're not yet aware of how the complex signals in music interact with our brains.
I've no idea why I can't bear to listen to MP3 music on headphones for long periods, but I can listen to HD audio (on Amazon) all day.
this whole thread just reminded me of a chap I know who recently bought some very high end speakers to go with his high end amp - and for a source he uses youtube which IIRC is a compressed / fiddled with source!
Accurate monitoring setups are tools for the audio industry, they don’t sound bad, but they can be a bit boring to listen to.
As I said, it's subjective. I listen mostly to classical and I have a very good idea what it sounds like live. IMO an accurate system gets closer to reproducing that than a typical artificially warm hi-fi.
Still not close but closer.
Can you explain using physics why mains cable vs bell wire makes the difference you say it does?…and why nothing over 2.5mm² will.have any benefit?
It's to do with the "skin effect".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skin_effect
Lots of strands have lower resistance to AC than a single strand of the same diameter.
Hence bell wire is not nearly as good as proper speaker cable.
(Apologies if this has already been discussed).
IMO an accurate system gets closer to reproducing that than a typical artificially warm hi-fi.
shure, but a "nice sounding" setup can make listening to recordings (which have obvious limitations,and some which are less than perfect) more enjoyable IME
molgrips
I’ve no idea why I can’t bear to listen to MP3 music on headphones for long periods, but I can listen to HD audio (on Amazon) all day.
What's the actually difference you can hear?
Cause i'll be honest, I hear no difference at all, been messing about with a free tidal account and comparing it to youtube music, A/Bing it, and I hear no difference. Same when I make stuff in abelton and export to mp3. I'm not hearing any noticeable difference.
Can you describe the difference you are hearing?
shure, but a “nice sounding” setup can make listening to recordings (which have obvious limitations,and some which are less than perfect) more enjoyable IME
*Nods approvingly*
mp3 artefacts can be heard easily on piano and bowed string instruments i find, there are a lot of codecs some are less obvious than others.
What does an artefact sound like on a 256 aac or 320mp3?
What do you mean? If you are implying that it is not audible to you at the maximum data rates, fair enough.
It manifests mainly as added extra noise oddly related to the input signal and can sound a bit "phasey reverby or echoy" (if those terms exixt!) for want of a better way to describe it.
If you believe that it is the last word in high fidelity, so be it.
Some material loses a lot in conversion to compressed formats to my ears.
Some is such crap to start off with that it does not really matter 😉
I'm asking you to describe it, so I can listen for the specific thing. artefacts is a bit vague. Curious to hear the difference.
Is there a specific example on a specific song so I can A/B it? I've got a 3 month try of tidal, so I am curious.
Lots of variables, I find it most apparent on piano and strings, maybe because they produse tones rich in harmonics etc. try a few of your faves with those instruments, Oscar Peterson- Motions and Emotions or a bit of Tori Amos, are easy listening 😉
What’s the actually difference you can hear?
It sounds more wooly on the standard def stream. But this isn't the weird part. With compresse audio I can't listen to headphones for long periods. Just ends up stressing me out. Like some sort of pressure in my head and ears. Even on planes I could never listen for long.
I can listen to HD audio for hours and hours though.
Cool, cheers, will have a listen out to those tracks.
I agree with what Molgrips said.
I just can't listen to poor quality digital for much over half an hour.
It was the same when CD first came out - the initial releases of classical stuff were unlistenable - so much distortion, tiring and unatural.
Early cd's were manufactured using analogue masters and as such the compression was ramped up leading to poor sound quality.
Out of curiosity, what are your hi res audio listening set ups?
What does an artefact sound like on a 256 aac or 320mp3?
you won’t hear them at those rates. You won’t notice any difference between a downsampled 320kbps mp3 and its fancy ‘hi res’ original.
You can hear the kinds of artefacts described at mp3 rates of 128 Kbps. You will hear them at 96kbps and lower.
if I remember correctly this was a speaker cable thread. Even with bell wire you’ll hear the loss of detail between 320kbps mp3 and 96kbps.
seosamh77
Full MemberI’m asking you to describe it, so I can listen for the specific thing. artefacts is a bit vague. Curious to hear the difference.
One example is pre-echo, if you search for that on Hydrogen Audio you should be able to find a bunch of example tracks. Castanets are a particular problem for MP3. AAC does a lot lot better.
Out of curiosity, what are your hi res audio listening set ups?
See my previous post on this thread, as for the signal path, see below
[img] 
[/img]
Was just trying some oscar peterson there as recommend above. on my xm4s throgh LDAC and through wired on the mac through my scarlett interface. tbh, I canny hear the difference at all, A/Bing between youtube and tidal masters.
Not saying it isn't there, but I've been testing for a week or so now. I think I'm glad I canny hear the difference. 😆 will save me a few quid.
incidently I also don't hear a difference between LDAC and SBC on the bluetooth.
somafunk
Full Member
Why are you converting from 88.2 to 384khz?
Out of curiosity, what are your hi res audio listening set ups?
I simply have XM3s and an Amazon Music HD sub. I always use Bluetooth, but I have LDAC with max bitrate on the phone and AAC on the Mac. I think the phone + LDAC has the edge but theres not a lot in it. Wired to the Mac is best, although I think maybe wired to the phone isn't such an improvement over bluetooth - but I don't want to bother with wires. I really think that of all these things having a high quality BT codec and lossless audio codec is what stops my ears and brain hurting.
Incidentally, there was a problem with my HD sub a while back, and I ended up listening to SD - and I could tell straight away something wasn't right. But for the record, I cannot tell the difference between HD and Ultra HD on this setup.
I also have an Echo Link connected via analogue to my amp, I gave away nearly ally my CDs, and I have archived my CD player. The Echo is crisper, clearer but lacks warmth - it's objectively better dynamically but I preferred the CD player overall. But not so much that I'll be faffing around with CDs.
heh, I thought I was the only person with an echo link - they don't seem very popular. I also have a link amp used to drive a couple of small bronze-1 speakers in the office - there's probably better things out there for the money but I liuke the connected-ness
prettygreenparrot
Full Member
What does an artefact sound like on a 256 aac or 320mp3?you won’t hear them at those rates. You won’t notice any difference between a downsampled 320kbps mp3 and its fancy ‘hi res’ original.
You can hear the kinds of artefacts described at mp3 rates of 128 Kbps. You will hear them at 96kbps and lower.
if I remember correctly this was a speaker cable thread. Even with bell wire you’ll hear the loss of detail between 320kbps mp3 and 96kbps.
Yeah I'd agree here, I did a test last night on some recorded music I'd made. exported the 320 CBR from ableton, downsampled to 256/192/128/64/32. was only really 128 where I can start to notice(even then I might fail in a blind test sometimes I reckon), 64 was surprising capable, but obviously degraded. 32 was just a riot. 😆
What’s the actually difference you can hear?
Cause i’ll be honest, I hear no difference at all, been messing about with a free tidal account and comparing it to youtube music, A/Bing it, and I hear no difference. Same when I make stuff in abelton and export to mp3. I’m not hearing any noticeable difference.
Can you describe the difference you are hearing?
When I was working at BBC R&D I asked one of the audio guys this and he advised me I was better off not knowing, because once you know what to look for you can't stop yourself. I don't know, and I don't want to know.
OP back again, can't believe this thread is still going, but i have learnt a lot from it which is a good thing, one thing i don't have to worry about to much is the upper frequency end of hearing too much having started my working life as an artillery man, thankfully i have a love of dub reggae..
Finished setting system up today having decided to go with proper speaker stands over just having them resting in either corner (offset to corner and about away from the walls).
Started with this:
https://www.discogs.com/The-Aggrovators-Dubbing-At-King-Tubbys-Vol-1/release/8759239 think my vinyl habit may be a new rabbit hole to disappear down.
I ended up just using this cable, but bought at £5 a metre:
https://www.richersounds.com/chord-c-screen.html
Thanks all for advice.
When I was working at BBC R&D I asked one of the audio guys this and he advised me I was better off not knowing, because once you know what to look for you can’t stop yourself. I don’t know, and I don’t want to know.
I can translate that for you: he didn't know. (-:
I know what he means though. Once you notice the orange & teal palette in TV and films you can't unsee it, it's everywhere. Erm, sorry everyone.
Re the Soundguys article, they seem to take a lot of nice accurate measurements, see differences, and then hand-wave them away with stuff like this:
Bit unfair there Mols. They go on to summarise what they mean later in the same paragraph, and the bit you're objecting to is a hyperlink to a fairly lengthy article explaining all about frequency response. It's not hand-waving at all.
Yes - you might not be able to measure the difference, as all the boring engineers have pointed out, but you can feel it... and that's what music's all about isn't it?
I've just got to the end of that article.
It makes me very happy that the targeted advertising it gave me after the end was a link to buy posh coat-hangers.
RegaP3 or marantz CD/RotelPre /Dr Thomas and a pair of Advents
in the box its PTHD 192/Audient iD Quad 240 on some Tannoy System 8's and Dynaudio BM15A's
all probably belongs in the retro hifi thread.....
