Audio Envy

[adk highlander]

If cables are changing your sound then they are doing something wrong.

 

[Trell]

If cables are changing your sound then they are doing something wrong.

Like too thin cables for the speaker impedance load and/or cable length. That should be in the Russel article as well, I recall.

 

[sweetness34]

I bet if you looked inside most speakers you’d see they most likely are just using standard 12-16 gauge speaker wire to connect the binding posts, crossovers, and drivers. Nothing fancy. So it doesn’t really make any sense that some super fancy crazy expensive cable from the amp to speaker would make any difference at all.

 

[audiobuff74]

That's true. That's why I bought inexpensive cables. You can believe what you want but my only change was the cables and I noticed a drastic improvement in sound. I even put my old cables back in and noticed it degrade. Based on opinions here I should just use coat hanger wire because wire is just wire

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk

 

[adk highlander]

That's true. That's why I bought inexpensive cables. You can believe what you want but my only change was the cables and I noticed a drastic improvement in sound. I even put my old cables back in and noticed it degrade. Based on opinions here I should just use coat hanger wire because wire is just wire

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Well if that is what you believe, then why are you hear trying to get some feedback that what you hear is "real" and not just your brain saying, "Hey, you just spent $X on those new cables and it better sound better!". This is the reason that all true scientific studies are done in a double blind environment so your bias does not take over. If you are happy with your cables that is great. But you have to understand there is no science behind it.

 

[sweetness34]

That's true. That's why I bought inexpensive cables. You can believe what you want but my only change was the cables and I noticed a drastic improvement in sound. I even put my old cables back in and noticed it degrade. Based on opinions here I should just use coat hanger wire because wire is just wire

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk

You didn't buy inexpensive cables though. A pair of those Audio Envy 10ft cables with banana plugs is almost $500. That's about 10 times more than you should have spent on a pair of premade cables and you gained nothing. Nobody here is saying wire is just wire as there are minimum specs that need to be met but you don't need to spend near what you did to obtain those specs.

 

[Eppie]

Well, there are several reasons so many are reacting negatively to the initial post. This has come up many times before and the community here likes to educate people as to what truly makes a difference so that people are not squandering hard earned money and supporting companies making questionable claims. Not so much questioning the enjoyment of your system, but being critical of what's on the company's web site. I love picking these things apart.

1. Proprietary Conductors, with equal distance and spacing, each transferring the signal with maximum RCL efficiency.
   -The "RCL efficiency" of this wire is the same as that of the monoprice cables. With typical speaker wire lengths, the resistance, capacitance and inductance is so small it takes specialized equipment just to try and measure it. Given the relative voltages and current of hi-fi amplifiers, it has absolutely no bearing on what people hear unless you're trying to use some skimpy 22 gauge wire with a high current amplifier (which would be a fire hazard). If there was a measurable difference, why not conduct the test and post the results?
2. Highly pure OCC copper removes grain boundaries that cause signal distortion.
   -Again, if you can measure distortion, why not conduct the test and post the results? That's because signal distortion due to "grain boundaries" is hypothetical. They are talking about impeding the flow of electrons if the copper is not pure. Yes, one electron in a billion might be affected but no scientist worth his salt would tell you that that will somehow affect an audio signal.
3. Low-D Fiber insulation, measuring at a 1.3 dielectric; decreasing electromagnetic interference while increasing the speed of transfer, VOP.
   -What "speed of transfer" are they even talking about? Electrons flow through copper wire at about 1/100 the speed of light. Wire insulation has no impact on that. The dielectric properties of insulators has an impact on capacitance, but the capacitance of a well insulated wire strand is so tiny it has no effect on audio signals. It's more of a concern in radio equipment but we're talking signals in the megahertz or gigahertz range that do not make up any part of an audio recording.
4. Outer jacket allows the cable to be lighter and more flexible then extruded PVC. It looks great and serves a higher electrical purpose.
   -Lighter and more flexible is good. I'll give them that. The outer jack is mostly for looks and provides physical protection and increased insulation from external sources. The higher electrical purpose would apply if your speaker wires were lying next to high voltage cables (like thousands of volts), but in an audio setup?
5. Optimized signal flow is the cleanest path for electron resistance.
   -Well, that applies to pretty much every copper wire of suitable gauge, but technically if they're talking about electron resistance silver is a better conductor than copper. Surprisingly, copper is actually better than gold, but copper oxidizes.
6. Pure copper connectors are the same conductivity as source wire. Other metal combinations have displayed signal error.
   -That's true but only if you use dissimilar metals that react chemically, like mixing copper and aluminum, which would cause galvanic corrosion and degrade the connection. Thing is, nobody makes cables that way so it's a mute point. I don't understand the pure copper spay connectors. It looks like a piece of copper wire soldered to the end of the cable. That will eventually oxidize and turn green! Why are they not gold plated?
7. "Both arrows facing speaker; produces natural frequency extension. (How we test)
   Both arrows away speaker; produces deeper timber. (Increase warmth)"
   -Yeah, I think everybody is scratching their head on that one. Anyone that believes that claim has no comprehension of how electricity flows through metals. It's the same in both directions.

I find the whole psychology of audio accessories very interesting. Science has shown that people experience the placebo effect when making big purchases for things like speaker wire or power cables. You convince yourself that you can hear a difference even though the most accurate measuring equipment shows that any real difference is insignificant. We know what the sensitivity of the human ear is so it's not all that hard to calculate how significant a difference a piece of equipment must make before it's audible. I love Youtube channels like Audioholics and Audio Science Review that take the time to make the measurements that manufacturers refuse to make and debunk most of these claims. That's no cure for the placebo effect though. There will always be those that convince themselves that they can hear something that the best instruments can not measure.

 

[Pogre]

I'm just going to call all of the cable assertions "cable apologetics" from now on.

 

[ryanosaur]

I bet if you looked inside most speakers you’d see they most likely are just using standard 12-16 gauge speaker wire to connect the binding posts, crossovers, and drivers. Nothing fancy. So it doesn’t really make any sense that some super fancy crazy expensive cable from the amp to speaker would make any difference at all.

Having delved lightly into the internals of speakers, many will say to use 18AWG hook-up wire on the internals. I chose 16AWG for my own projects.
Most such hook-up wire will be stranded, and at least through Parts Express, they sell 16, 18, 22, 24, and even 26AWG Single Conductor hook-up wire. Just perusing several products now, none is even marketed as OFC.
Hook-up wire aside, the leads of the XO Components themselves are much thinner, with the exception of the Inductors, I should say, where the beefiest are Air Cores consisting of 13 or 14 AWG solid core conductor. However, most Inductors used in the XOs will be 18-20AWG depending on their actual purpose and the goal of the designer.
Lastly, lets consider what may be used to wire the VC of your Drivers. One site posits that anything from 28AWG in the most robust applications up to 38AWG in smaller more delicate products can commonly be found.
It's been a while since I saw one metric that indicated how long the total wiring of all internal components added up to in an average Speaker... suffice it to say that it was not a short distance.

 

[Pogre]

That's true. That's why I bought inexpensive cables. You can believe what you want but my only change was the cables and I noticed a drastic improvement in sound. I even put my old cables back in and noticed it degrade. Based on opinions here I should just use coat hanger wire because wire is just wire

I actually read a story about a DBT where they slipped in a coat hanger among various other expensive and average cables, and no one noticed a difference. So yeah you could use a coat hanger but it's not insulated or very flexible so I wouldn't recommend it...

The thing is, everything we hear goes though a filter that is our brain. You can be fooled into thinking you hear differences when there aren't any. Expectation bias and placebo are very real. Doing comparisons like this is very tricky because of it. No one is immune to it so the best way to really accurately compare things like this is to remove as much bias as possible. Double blind tests are pretty good at that. Sighted testing is known to be notoriously inaccurate. Remove the biases and all of a sudden those differences disappear. I have yet to read or hear about anyone with the ability to consistently pick out differences between cables in a DBT. As long as they're copper, competently made and the appropriate gauge for the lengths they should all perform and sound the same.

 

[Eppie]

I'm just going to call all of the cable assertions "cable apologetics" from now on.

And the debate goes on about GR-Research's claims. When I first saw him stick a speaker wire onto an antenna terminal and claim that speaker wires pick up RF interference, I had to laugh. Problem is, his tests have little to do with what he is trying to prove. It's apples and oranges, as many commenters pointed out. No tests with direct comparisons between actual speaker wires connected to an amplifier and speaker yet.

Not that it's a bad product. At $13.75 per foot his 24 strand cable is not crazy expensive and at an effective gauge of 8 I bet they perform well. The 16 strand is only $9.70 per foot and an effective gauge of 10 which is plenty for most applications. I just wish he had not started that RF noise and inductance nonsense.

 

[ryanosaur]

And the debate goes on about GR-Research's claims. When I first saw him stick a speaker wire onto an antenna terminal and claim that speaker wires pick up RF interference, I had to laugh. Problem is, his tests have little to do with what he is trying to prove. It's apples and oranges, as many commenters pointed out. No tests with direct comparisons between actual speaker wires connected to an amplifier and speaker yet.

Not that it's a bad product. At $13.75 per foot his 24 strand cable is not crazy expensive and at an effective gauge of 8 I bet they perform well. The 16 strand is only $9.70 per foot and an effective gauge of 10 which is plenty for most applications. I just wish he had not started that RF noise and inductance nonsense.

Oh, Danny...

 

[NINaudio]

And the debate goes on about GR-Research's claims. When I first saw him stick a speaker wire onto an antenna terminal and claim that speaker wires pick up RF interference, I had to laugh. Problem is, his tests have little to do with what he is trying to prove. It's apples and oranges, as many commenters pointed out. No tests with direct comparisons between actual speaker wires connected to an amplifier and speaker yet.

Not that it's a bad product. At $13.75 per foot his 24 strand cable is not crazy expensive and at an effective gauge of 8 I bet they perform well. The 16 strand is only $9.70 per foot and an effective gauge of 10 which is plenty for most applications. I just wish he had not started that RF noise and inductance nonsense.

$10/ft?! You can find 10 gauge OFC speaker wire for less than $1/ft.

Seriously, if regular, insulated OFC is good enough for high energy physics experiments where they are looking for the tiniest of signals (often times barely 0.1 dB over background noise) it's good enough for any speaker.

 

[ryanosaur]

$10/ft?! You can find 10 gauge OFC speaker wire for less than $1/ft.

Seriously, if regular, insulated OFC is good enough for high energy physics experiments where they are looking for the tiniest of signals (often times barely 0.1 dB over background noise) it's good enough for any speaker.

When it comes to weird Speaker Designer claims, I'm still struck by Tekton Eric's insistence that Mil-Spec wiring which he touts (or at least used to) as one of his upgrades to the internals of his designs makes such a significant difference in SQ. Swore by it in conversation with him.
SMH

 

[Eppie]

$10/ft?! You can find 10 gauge OFC speaker wire for less than $1/ft.

Seriously, if regular, insulated OFC is good enough for high energy physics experiments where they are looking for the tiniest of signals (often times barely 0.1 dB over background noise) it's good enough for any speaker.

No argument there.

 

[cpp]

But...but.... where's the magic?!

You make your own. Say throw them in the frezzer for hour or so, or place smooth stream rocks on them for a hour or so, Sprinkle some secret dust you create and you alone know how its made. You got it LOL

 

[mtrycrafts]

You could get 100 feet of speaker wire that will do the exact same thing as 2 feet of those SP9 cables.

...

Or if you really want them to be prettied up and have connectors already:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B071L37VMR/

Boy, they look great. Reasonable too.

 

[Pogre]

But...but.... where's the magic?!

 

[NINaudio]

View attachment 45375

Wait you can enhance details OR have more controlled bass? If they were really magic they'd do both!

 

[mtrycrafts]

Where to start, where to start.....

"...

Wow. Just wow.

SP-14 * Speaker cable

* Industry Reference

audioenvy.com

Almost ugly cables. Plain Jane for sure.