Exactly--and as Passinwind pointed out, and I then tested and proved, that fraction-of-a-dB drop can actually be attributed to the audio converter--not the cables.
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Comparing the tone of three different "boutique" cables
- Thread starter bongomania
- Start date
I think it's pretty interesting that copper actually carries the entire signal, i expected some type of roll-off on the extremes, due to copper not being perfect, but man, it is. I guess i'm being philosophical again, but it's pretty crazy that copper transmits a signal so perfectly
This is true, but it's worth clarifying that for a passive bass, R is dominated by the impedance of the signal source, rather than the series resistance of the cable.
Where are the "extremes"? Human hearing can sense only a tiny fraction of all the frequencies there are.
Even so, what is the significance of that? If 20kHz were an A , then the next A up from that would be at 40kHz. What would that make 22kHz?
I used to be able to hear really high stuff, though. The "ultrasonic" theft detection devices in some department stores would drive me out into the street with a splitting headache.
No more, though.
- Apr 24, 2004
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- Designer Fodera Guitars/Michael Pope Design, Inc., Trickfish Amplification
Most definitely. Thousands of ohms of source impedance certainly makes a handful in the cable negligible.
This is where I think the whole point of the enterprise breaks down.
If you think there's no way to measure sound, then there's really nothing empirical to go by.
The implication is that identical sound waves could have different sounds based on the intent. At this point, sound/music is religion, not something of the physical world.
And this is why you'll always have people who believe in the golden cable, who believe that exotic expensive wood sounds better than junk alder, who believe the word "Sprague" makes a tone control sound better.
There's nothing wrong with taking such a view, but it's rather like taking the position that the RSV Bible is the verbatim word of God. If you don't believe in a physical empirical approach, you really should stay out of the science class, just as the atheist should stay out of Bible study.
scotch
It's not rocket science!
- Nov 12, 2006
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Music is art. The technology used to create it is just tools. Tools can be measured. What people create with those tools... not so easy to measure!
As best I can tell 20k Hz and 22k Hz are both between the 7th D# and the 7th E above middle C, but pitch really doesn't exist past the 5th octave.
- Apr 24, 2004
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- Designer Fodera Guitars/Michael Pope Design, Inc., Trickfish Amplification
There's no way to measure sound. Only various parts of it. There IS nothing empirical to go by in an absolute sense. Empirical data is only useful in defining the apples in any given apples to apples comparison. It doesn't say anything about how the apple tastes. Other than, "like an apple." Can you define how an apple tastes? Why do folks want to try to define things with words and numbers? There's more to it and they'll be better musicians if they can accept that. And no, it's not spiritual so don't bother with that comparison. Apples taste like apples. You can measure the acidity compared to something else. But ultimately you won't describe it in any way other than, "it tastes like an apple".
No. Perception...not intent. Just because you can't measure and define something with words and numbers doesn't make it non-quantifiable. If you can repeat it predictably, it's quantifiable. It's of the physical world, most definitely. Just not definable in the terms you want to use.
It's a shame that consumers have to be so careful not to get screwed. I don't believe that's fair...free market or not. You shouldn't be able to say things that aren't true in order to sell a product and it's done ALL the time.
I believe that saying you can determine how a cable sounds by charting and plotting is as naive as thinking that if you learn scales and arpeggios fast enough you can play like Matt Garisson. Or that learning theory will show you how to play like John Patitucci. There's a world of knowledge that can't be written down that you need to know in order to be able to do that. Just like the only way to determine how a cable sounds is to listen to it.
And to your aetheist comment, an aetheist might have a genuine interest in theology as a means of understanding where different perspectives come from. That has nothing to do with religion and certainly gives them a good reason to be in Bible study.
My argument is that cables are electrical conductors, and their performance as electrical conductors can be quantified. You want to argue the taste of apples and the perception of sound, that's fine, but for me to pay any attention to that argument, you'll have to explain to me what that has to do with the performance of one electrical conductor versus another.
Music is art. The technology used to create it is just tools. Tools can be measured. What people create with those tools... not so easy to measure!
Technology and science is also art. It's all about human creativity.
In this case, as with most, you really can measure what people create!
If people want to believe there is a certain "magic" out there, then fair enough. I just don't like people peddling snake oil and I think bongomania is with me on that one. Things like this are to try and HELP our fellow musician
. (I'm a physicist btw, not that you'd get many openly admitting science is an art!)
That is all they are. There is no magic here. They can be and are quantified. So a big +1 !
If you changed these cables around without the player noticing, they wouldn't notice a difference. If they looked and saw a different cable, or were told the cable was being changed, they would 'hear' simply because they expect to. Well, some people do.
It's like the fun you can have with an additional pot on a guitar or bass. Don't hook it up to anything and as you turn it, explain to someone how something is being attenuated. Depending on how gullible the person is, they will often claim to hear a change.
The density of the wood has an impact on the resonance and therefore sustain and whatnot of the strings as they vibrate. I still say the pickups & electronics play a bigger part, but, the wood certainly has an impact.
With well designed cables, the signal loss between the bass and the amplifier is negligible. There will be some losses, but several orders of magnitude below what we can actually hear. The graphs basically show that the cable has no impact on the sound.
But, as everything, what we see, what we smell, touch, hear & feel are all broken down to signals which are stuck together in our own brains to create the way we experience our surrounds, other factors can tell our brains to expect something different if the idea is planted there, which is what boutique cable companies play on.
Is there a real difference? No.
Do some people hear a difference? Yes, because they are told to.
Placebo's are wonderful things. They can work well in some situations and be used to help some people medically. But musically? It's just people ripping you off.
With well designed cables, the signal loss between the bass and the amplifier is negligible. There will be some losses, but several orders of magnitude below what we can actually hear. The graphs basically show that the cable has no impact on the sound.
But, as everything, what we see, what we smell, touch, hear & feel are all broken down to signals which are stuck together in our own brains to create the way we experience our surrounds, other factors can tell our brains to expect something different if the idea is planted there, which is what boutique cable companies play on.
Is there a real difference? No.
Do some people hear a difference? Yes, because they are told to.
Placebo's are wonderful things. They can work well in some situations and be used to help some people medically. But musically? It's just people ripping you off.
Here's the rub: sound and what we hear are two different things. We can completely describe (to the best of our current understanding) the frequencies present together with their amplitudes and phases. Speaking as a physicist, those are the fundamental quantities of sound. The thing is, music is an art. As such a musician is transmitting more than just frequencies and amplitudes and phases when he plays; he is putting his own emotion into his playing, which evokes an emotional response in the listener. IMO that's something which defines any art form: it evokes an emotional response. Science can't quantify that emotional response, but it does have an effect on how we perceive the music. Note that it doesn't change the music as it propagates from instrument to ear or speaker to ear or whatever; it only changes how the music is processed in our brains.
My contribution to the point being argued
My contribution to the point being argued
There are always the expensive options for people to choose from the high end audio world: http://most-expensive.net/audio-cables
Thanks for some great TB reading Bongomania!
Thanks for some great TB reading Bongomania!
Here's the rub: sound and what we hear are two different things. We can completely describe (to the best of our current understanding) the frequencies present together with their amplitudes and phases. Speaking as a physicist, those are the fundamental quantities of sound. The thing is, music is an art. As such a musician is transmitting more than just frequencies and amplitudes and phases when he plays; he is putting his own emotion into his playing, which evokes an emotional response in the listener. IMO that's something which defines any art form: it evokes an emotional response. Science can't quantify that emotional response, but it does have an effect on how we perceive the music. Note that it doesn't change the music as it propagates from instrument to ear or speaker to ear or whatever; it only changes how the music is processed in our brains.
My contribution to the point being argued
Is any of that heart, feeling or emotion lost during it's electrical transmission through a cable from instrument to amplifier.
The problem I have with that assertion is the underlying assumption that a cable "sounds like" anything. If it puts out at one end the same as you put in the other, what does it sound like?
If you look at something through a sheet of glass, what you see can be affected by it. It can color the image, cloud it, distort it, etc. But if doesn't do any of those things, it doesn't "look like" anything; it "looks like" what you are looking at through it. You can perform tests on the glass for coloration, opaqueness, flatness, refractive index, etc. and predict whether or not the image you will see through it will accurately "look like" whatever it is you are looking at. The image itself is irrelevant to those tests.
One might argue that no piece of glass leaves the image that passes through it as unaffected as if it weren't there. That's true enough as far as it goes, but when what I am seeing looks as good to me (or even very nearly so) through a $2 pane of glass from the hardware store as it does through a $1000 piece of Waterford crystal, I'll take the cheaper option any day. I don't need to try the expensive piece to be confident in my choice if there is test data that shows the cheap glass to be good enough for my purposes.
YMMV.
- Apr 24, 2004
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- Designer Fodera Guitars/Michael Pope Design, Inc., Trickfish Amplification
Understood. But I thought the whole point was that the cables apparently DO sound different and that the reason they do is what's in question. If they were truly transparent none of this would be an issue. I personally think for all intents and purposes, given the way I use my bass, a decent cable that won't break is fine. I don't particularly care if it sounds different than another cable because if it's working right it won't make more than a tiny difference in the real world.
scotch
It's not rocket science!
- Nov 12, 2006
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That's just it. The cables themselves don't sound different! They just plain don't. "Apparently" does not = "does". In fact, it's the "apparently" that makes all the difference in the world.
We may play differently when using them, or rev ourselves up so that we believe we hear a difference, but Bongo's test so far demonstrates that the cable in and of itself isn't creating the tonal changes that the manufacturers would have us believe.
I do agree that if a cable works and is durable, use it!
