$1,000,000 to identify fancy speaker cables

Spyhop · 2 Oct 2007 at 19:13

Here's a good one. The James Randi Educational Foundation invite those who state that fancy speaker cables have anything but a big old placebo effect to prove it. Easy million, right?

Guys? Guys...? Hello...?!

Boink

atpbx · 2 Oct 2007 at 19:22

You see what you've done wrong here is, you've already played your trump card before actually reeling the audio snobs in to begin with.

You should have started innocently with something like "my mate has just spent £500 on cables LOSER"

Then when you get someone coming on and saying "ofcourse you can tell the difference i could quite easily tell you in any test you like which are the expensive cables" THEN you hit them with the "actually i rather would like you to prove it" line.....

No0b

banja · 2 Oct 2007 at 19:26

All that audiophile nonsense. Why would anyone spend a couple of months wages on a cable? If they were that good, they'd actually be more advanced than the kit that even gets used in the recording studios that record the music in the first place. Utterly pointless, and some gullible idiots are getting ripped off. If they're stupid enough to pay that amount for some cables, then deserve it to be fair.

Trifid · 2 Oct 2007 at 19:28

This is what I don't really understand. Surely copper is copper right? An electron gets pushed in one end and bumps all the others in the loop.

But to the point. How can anyone prove it? "This one sounds better" is not proving. It is stating an opinion. Maybe doing spectral analysis on both. Will they also buy the $7250 cable to attach the mic to a computer? Would the differences be proof? etc.

Spyhop · 2 Oct 2007 at 19:30

atpbx said:
You see what you've done wrong here is, you've already played your trump card..

Hah.. If I had that beef with anyone then that would be masterful, but I just found it interesting

But to the point. How can anyone prove it? "This one sounds better" is not proving.

It's not even a matter of sounding better, just different. They would just do a number of blind tests where the person is not aware which of the two cables is being used and must pick the wonder cable out.

Also, I meant to post this in the Hi-Fi forum and made a mistake. Could a kind moderator move it over?

Azagoth · 2 Oct 2007 at 19:35

Isn't all down to the equipment too? A £30 Bush midi system will be just fine with the bog standard generic 'bell' wires. Whereas with a decent Linn system, like there's a bad one, for instance you'd easily be able to tell the difference.

Spyhop · 2 Oct 2007 at 19:43

Azagoth said:
Isn't all down to the equipment too? A £30 Bush midi system will be just fine with the bog standard generic 'bell' wires. Whereas with a decent Linn system, like there's a bad one, for instance you'd easily be able to tell the difference.

Not going to claim your dosh, then?

iBot · 2 Oct 2007 at 19:55

I haven't heard that cable, But I can tell the difference between cheap and expensive cable on my system easily.

Most people have crappy separates so i doubt it would make much difference for them either.

atpbx · 2 Oct 2007 at 20:32

iBot said:
I haven't heard that cable, But I can tell the difference between cheap and expensive cable on my system easily.

Most people have crappy separates so i doubt it would make much difference for them either.

like the article says, prove it and get your million.

Raikiri · 2 Oct 2007 at 20:32

I just made an interconnect for a little amp I have and it does sound different to the stock crappy thing that came with it. Not a huge amount but it's there and well worth the £6 it cost me to make

However I do agree that cables at the higher end are a complete waste of money, there's no way in hell that cable will show an improvement worth $7,000 if at all.

skinnyl · 2 Oct 2007 at 22:04

Expensive 'interconnects' are a total con.

True that basic free wires aren't good, spending no more than a tenner per wire is probably sensible if you have a decent system.

I have a full Quad 99 system and the difference between REALLY cheap connections is noticeable but past spending any more than £30 to connect 3 items together only a machine will tell.

Considering your average 20yr old can't hear past 18kHz, it's a bit ridiculous.