Speaker Cable v. Lamp Cord

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In article <cnbut501eg8@news4.newsguy.com>, Farrell22 <farrell22@cs.com> wrote:

>>Maybe Sam was right, but just about the low-powered model?
>>
>
>Quite possibly. But the salesman said I *needed* the 545ii for my B&Ws, and
>that it would sound the same as the 535.

So maybe Sam and Stereophile were right. Maybe the salesman was the one
to not trust?




--
Len Moskowitz PDAudio, Binaural Mics, Cables, DPA, M-Audio
Core Sound http://www.stealthmicrophones.com
Teaneck, New Jersey USA http://www.core-sound.com
moskowit@core-sound.com Tel: 201-801-0812, FAX: 201-801-0912
 
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n2ah@hotmail.com (Art Harris) wrote in message news:<cmliqr0o5d@news2.newsguy.com>...
> Michael Dombrowski wrote:
>
> > Is there any difference between (same gauge) speaker cable and lamp
> > cord?
>
> No. But the more important question is: What gauge wire should I use?
>
> That depends largely on the length of your speaker cables. For a given
> gauge, the total resistance of the wire is directly proportional to
> its length. For lengths up to 10 or 15 feet, 14 gauge (AWG) should be
> fine.
>
> Art Harris

This issue seems to come back quite often and it's good to see that
there is a general tendancy to dispel fuzzy logic. Yet "lamp cord" as
I would define it is reletively high guage wire (20 tot 16 guage) with
potentially non-negligable DC resistance characteristics. So I don't
agree that is all the same in comparison to let's say 12 of 10 guage
OFC wire.

Even if we don't believe in microdiodes or "homeopathic" explanations
for mysterious reactances in cable, any measurable lowering of the
total damping factor can lead to perceptable changes in emitted sound
coming the speaker. The larger the shift the more potentially audible
it can be. Also the lower the impedance load of the driver, the more a
given increase in overall DC resistance will change damping
attributes. Obviously it depends on the amp. Tube amps with damping
factors no higher than 30 or so will be particularly susceptable to
this. Over the question of high frequency roll off, cable can make a
difference here but it is not in the frequency response of the cable
itself but in the amount of DC resistance it has. It is the (larger)
decrease in overal damping factor that can cause changes in the
bandwidth of the amplifier because the load changes, not because the
wire is not a neutral conductor. Obviously in most situations it will
be inaudible due to non-significance, but that doesn't mean it doesn't
exist.

I'm curious how others feel about a similar fenomenon with lossy
inductors in the signal path in woofers. It is my personal view that
series DC resistance in the signal path should be strategically
minimized as much as possible. The overall Q factor of the filter
doesn't have to suffer from this if you are in control of the design
process. Once again in the interest of affording the amplifier maximum
EMF control of it's load along with minimized DC loss along the way.
 
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"It is pretty clear, if you want to educate yourself about sound, you have
to
go to a lot of liver performances - unamplified where you can - and listen
to a lot of recordings through a variety of setups over a period of time.
No magazine, regardless of the editorial policy, honest or otherwise, is
going to make up for that basic fact.

Do you personally know the difference between a Mark Levinson CD player's
sound vs. a NAD C541i? How about the resolving power of a CD played in a
Toshiba DVD player vs. an Ayre CX-7. What about a badly mastered Led
Zeppelin CD on a Sony player, and an Arcam?"

Live can only be a benchmark for that exact performance, even then long
term memory of the event will not serve. "Live" is rare in recordings,
most music is created in the studio from bits and pieces which are highly
modified on purpose. As to the sound of gear other then speakers, it has
yet to be clearly demonstrated to exist except as an artifact of the
perception process and is at best something to muddy recall of sound
events. Even if such gear differences did exist, one could only use them
as a benchmark if one also listened to the exact set of gear in the exact
listening space as does the reviewer.
 
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B&D bromo@ix.netcom.com wrote:



>On 11/14/04 10:51 PM, in article cn994o0tc0@news3.newsguy.com, "Bob Marcus"
><nabob33@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>> nousaine@aol.com (Nousaine) wrote in message
>> news:<cn81cr01qtt@news2.newsguy.com>...
>>
>>> While I do think it's true that these books reinforce mythology I also
>wonder
>>> why fair, honest reporting of the truth about sound quality is not of
>equal
>>> importance.
>>
>> Because magazines have to interest readers--but they have to serve
>> advertisers.
>
>Also would be a pretty boring magazine. The best stuff really doesn't
>change much year to year.
>
>It is pretty clear, if you want to educate yourself about sound, you have to
>go to a lot of liver performances - unamplified where you can - and listen
>to a lot of recordings through a variety of setups over a period of time.
>No magazine, regardless of the editorial policy, honest or otherwise, is
>going to make up for that basic fact.
>
>Do you personally know the difference between a Mark Levinson CD player's
>sound vs. a NAD C541i? How about the resolving power of a CD played in a
>Toshiba DVD player vs. an Ayre CX-7. What about a badly mastered Led
>Zeppelin CD on a Sony player, and an Arcam?

I've owned and used dozens of cd playback devices; and I've been a subject in
and also performed a few bias controlled listening tests of same; and so far
I've not found any individual who has demonstrated an ability to reliably
identify cd players with ONE excpetion. In that case one listener was able to
distinguish a prototype Phillips 14-bit CD Player from a later Sony. So do I
'personally know the difference'? Nope and I don't believe anyone else does
either.
 
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moskowit@core-sound.com (Len Moskowitz) wrote in message
news:<cnbiv10oso@news4.newsguy.com>...
> Farrell22 <farrell22@cs.com> wrote:
> >I haven't had utter faith in audio reviewers ever since Sam Tellig
> >raved about one of the original Adcom power amps in the late '80s
>
As far as I am aware, the Stereophile reviewer who recommended the
GFA-555 so highly was actually Antony H. Cordesman, in April 1985
see http://www.stereophile.com/amplificationreviews/678/, which has
follow-up comments from J. Gordon Holt, Guy Lemcoe, and myself.

> Funny... I had an Adcom 535 (still have it, now in my office system)
> and it sounded pretty darned good for the price. When I tried the
> higher power models in the Adcom line at that time, they didn't
> sound quite as good.
>
> Maybe Sam was right, but just about the low-powered model?

Again, as I remember it, the GFA-535 was a Sam Tellig favorite.

John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
 
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On 11/16/04 7:39 PM, in article cne6jv030b9@news1.newsguy.com, "Bob Marcus"
<nabob33@hotmail.com> wrote:

>> Do you personally know the difference between a Mark Levinson CD player's
>> sound vs. a NAD C541i? How about the resolving power of a CD played in a
>> Toshiba DVD player vs. an Ayre CX-7. What about a badly mastered Led
>> Zeppelin CD on a Sony player, and an Arcam?
>
> No, and I doubt anyone at Stereophile really does, either, because
> there's no evidence that they do valid comparisons. (And what does
> "the resolving power of a CD" mean??)

Sorry - meant to say "the resolving power of a CD Player with a CD
played..." - my bad.

Sure - that is exactly my point - I know of all of those things due to my
pursuit of good sound, and I would not have been even introduced to it if I
had been limited to reading it in a book or magazine.

Not sure what you mean by "valid comparison"
 
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On 11/16/04 7:42 PM, in article cne6pr030k2@news1.newsguy.com, "Wessel
Dirksen" <wdirksen@p-we.com> wrote:

> Even if we don't believe in microdiodes or "homeopathic" explanations
> for mysterious reactances in cable, any measurable lowering of the
> total damping factor can lead to perceptable changes in emitted sound
> coming the speaker.

Never minding the affects on output power of an amplifier whose load is
pulled off of a pure resistive load...
 
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>From: moskowit@core-sound.com (Len Moskowitz)

>In article <cnbut501eg8@news4.newsguy.com>, Farrell22 <farrell22@cs.com>
>wrote:
>
>>>Maybe Sam was right, but just about the low-powered model?
>>>
>>
>>Quite possibly. But the salesman said I *needed* the 545ii for my B&Ws, and
>>that it would sound the same as the 535.
>
>So maybe Sam and Stereophile were right. Maybe the salesman was the one
>to not trust?

Well, I heard what I heard, and I wouldn't buy anything by Adcom again (I don't
have any of the equipment any longer). But my point isn't that Sam is generally
untrustworthy, but rather that you need to listen to things in your own
environment in order to know how you like them. I don't trust anybody the way I
trust my own ears, brain, and reactions.
 
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On 17 Nov 2004 00:42:35 GMT, wdirksen@p-we.com (Wessel Dirksen) wrote:

>n2ah@hotmail.com (Art Harris) wrote in message news:<cmliqr0o5d@news2.newsguy.com>...
>> Michael Dombrowski wrote:
>>
>> > Is there any difference between (same gauge) speaker cable and lamp
>> > cord?
>>
>> No. But the more important question is: What gauge wire should I use?
>>
>> That depends largely on the length of your speaker cables. For a given
>> gauge, the total resistance of the wire is directly proportional to
>> its length. For lengths up to 10 or 15 feet, 14 gauge (AWG) should be
>> fine.
>>
>> Art Harris
>
>This issue seems to come back quite often and it's good to see that
>there is a general tendancy to dispel fuzzy logic. Yet "lamp cord" as
>I would define it is reletively high guage wire (20 tot 16 guage) with
>potentially non-negligable DC resistance characteristics. So I don't
>agree that is all the same in comparison to let's say 12 of 10 guage
>OFC wire.

Neither does anyone else, if you took the trouble to notice that the
above comments *specifically* stated 'same gauge'.

>I'm curious how others feel about a similar fenomenon with lossy
>inductors in the signal path in woofers. It is my personal view that
>series DC resistance in the signal path should be strategically
>minimized as much as possible. The overall Q factor of the filter
>doesn't have to suffer from this if you are in control of the design
>process. Once again in the interest of affording the amplifier maximum
>EMF control of it's load along with minimized DC loss along the way.

It is my personal view that speaker designers in the major companies
know what they're doing. If a loddy inductor is used, then that is
factored into the overall voicing of the speaker. None of these
parasitic resistances bear any comparison to the resistance of the
voice coil. Please note also that over the vast majority of its
working range, a loudspeaker is mass/compliance controlled, and
electrical 'damping' is not a factor. Basically, keep the loop
resistance of the wire below a twentieth of the speaker nominal
impedance, and you won't have a problem. Just as an illustration,
that's twenty five feet of 16 AWG for a four ohm load. We audiophile
types do tend to overkill on this matter of speaker wire resistance!

--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering
 
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Stewart Pinkerton <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote in message news:<cngumf0dn6@news2.newsguy.com>...
> On 17 Nov 2004 00:42:35 GMT, wdirksen@p-we.com (Wessel Dirksen) wrote:
> >
> >This issue seems to come back quite often and it's good to see that
> >there is a general tendancy to dispel fuzzy logic. Yet "lamp cord" as
> >I would define it is reletively high guage wire (20 tot 16 guage) with
> >potentially non-negligable DC resistance characteristics. So I don't
> >agree that is all the same in comparison to let's say 12 of 10 guage
> >OFC wire.
>
> Neither does anyone else, if you took the trouble to notice that the
> above comments *specifically* stated 'same gauge'.
>

My input was meant to be general and not a specific reply to the
above. I noticed that virtualy all of the strings seemed to omit the
DC resistance issue which is a factual matter and not a matter of
hype; whether its significant or not.

>I'm curious how others feel about a similar fenomenon with lossy
> >inductors in the signal path in woofers. It is my personal view that
> >series DC resistance in the signal path should be strategically
> >minimized as much as possible. The overall Q factor of the filter
> >doesn't have to suffer from this if you are in control of the design
> >process. Once again in the interest of affording the amplifier maximum
> >EMF control of it's load along with minimized DC loss along the way.
>
> It is my personal view that speaker designers in the major companies
> know what they're doing. If a loddy inductor is used, then that is
> factored into the overall voicing of the speaker.

Agreed, this is a question of good engineering. But the choice of
inductors in a production loudspeaker is ussually not based on optimal
performance, but on minimizing the negative affects of compromise.
This is act of life due to aggressive cost budgets to which all
loudspeaker engineers must adhere in a production setting. (exotica
excepted) Low Rdc inductors are expensive, and as you state below, is
not a bad strategic area to save some money. But that doesn't mean
that lowering series DC resistance to woofers is theoreticaly not
audible or desirable.

None of these
> parasitic resistances bear any comparison to the resistance of the
> voice coil.

If "lampcord" and inductors add 0.5 ohm of DC resistance, but very
often even more than this, than this constitutes almost 10% increase
of a standard driver Rdc of 5.2 to 5.7 ohm. This is audible in most SS
amplifiers, although subtle. It is enough to possibly make more than 1
db SPL changes in a majority of tube amplifiers. This doesn't cover 4
ohm drivers which typically have Rdc values of 3.9 ohm or so making
the phenominon more distinctive.

Please note also that over the vast majority of its
> working range, a loudspeaker is mass/compliance controlled, and
> electrical 'damping' is not a factor.

Agreed to a point. Bass is where this really becomes a common factor
to contend with for all amps. Tweeters /midranges often have resistors
in series. But I personally like my bass tight and find it reason
enough to pay attention to this. Also, with tube amps, the entire
frequency spectrum can be affected. If a SS amp with a damping factor
of 400 gets 0.5ohm between output and voicecoil it will be subtle. A
tube amp with a damping factor of 30 can easily have measurable SPL
variances especially at the low end.

Basically, keep the loop
> resistance of the wire below a twentieth of the speaker nominal
> impedance, and you won't have a problem. Just as an illustration,
> that's twenty five feet of 16 AWG for a four ohm load. We audiophile
> types do tend to overkill on this matter of speaker wire resistance!

True, but those typical cheap inductors add 5 times as much "wire" to
the signal path as your 25 feet of 16AWG. Together, I'm not so sure
its harmless anymore.
 
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B&D <bromo@ix.netcom.com> wrote in message news:<cnehat01ahd@news2.newsguy.com>...
> On 11/16/04 7:39 PM, in article cne6jv030b9@news1.newsguy.com, "Bob Marcus"
> <nabob33@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> >> Do you personally know the difference between a Mark Levinson CD player's
> >> sound vs. a NAD C541i? How about the resolving power of a CD played in a
> >> Toshiba DVD player vs. an Ayre CX-7. What about a badly mastered Led
> >> Zeppelin CD on a Sony player, and an Arcam?
> >
> > No, and I doubt anyone at Stereophile really does, either, because
> > there's no evidence that they do valid comparisons. (And what does
> > "the resolving power of a CD" mean??)
>
> Sorry - meant to say "the resolving power of a CD Player with a CD
> played..." - my bad.

OK, so tell us what you mean by "the resolving power of a CD Player."
It sounds suspiciously like pseudo-technical jargon. Resolution is a
technical term, and every CD player has the same resolution, doesn't
it?
>
> Sure - that is exactly my point - I know of all of those things due to my
> pursuit of good sound, and I would not have been even introduced to it if I
> had been limited to reading it in a book or magazine.
>
> Not sure what you mean by "valid comparison"

If you have to ask, it's safe to assume you didn't do any, either. So
no, you don't know any of those things. You only think you do.

By valid comparison, I mean the usual: side-by-side, blind or double
blind, and level-matched. Anything else, and you're comparing
pricetags, not sound. Or, to be precise, you don't know whether you're
comparing sound or pricetags (or looks, or company reputation, or...)

bob
 
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On 11/18/04 7:47 PM, in article cnjfr3017g@news4.newsguy.com, "Bob Marcus"
<nabob33@hotmail.com> wrote:

>> Sorry - meant to say "the resolving power of a CD Player with a CD
>> played..." - my bad.
>
> OK, so tell us what you mean by "the resolving power of a CD Player."
> It sounds suspiciously like pseudo-technical jargon. Resolution is a
> technical term, and every CD player has the same resolution, doesn't
> it?

Resolving power - the amount of detail and information successfully
recovered by a CD player without distortions such as jitter.

Not pseudo-technical - the format has only 16 bits of data, you are correct,
and the DACs are generally rated to be able to extract more than 16 bits if
presented with them. However, the effective # of bits may not be as high as
16 with a real world player. And of those - through the conversion and
analog stages, the detail that is available is not always presented.

Take the iPod fed with a Apple lossless or AIFF file compared to a NAD C541i
- play a CD such as an early Elvis Costello for an example of a bad
recording. You will be able to hear more detail on the NAD than on the
iPod. Same # of bits in the formats, but the amount of effective detil on
the CDP is higher. Take the becnhmark DAC1 - it will have incrementally
more detail than the NAD.
 
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On 19 Nov 2004 00:44:59 GMT, wdirksen@p-we.com (Wessel Dirksen) wrote:

>Stewart Pinkerton <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote in message news:<cngumf0dn6@news2.newsguy.com>...
>> On 17 Nov 2004 00:42:35 GMT, wdirksen@p-we.com (Wessel Dirksen) wrote:
>> >
>> >This issue seems to come back quite often and it's good to see that
>> >there is a general tendancy to dispel fuzzy logic. Yet "lamp cord" as
>> >I would define it is reletively high guage wire (20 tot 16 guage) with
>> >potentially non-negligable DC resistance characteristics. So I don't
>> >agree that is all the same in comparison to let's say 12 of 10 guage
>> >OFC wire.
>>
>> Neither does anyone else, if you took the trouble to notice that the
>> above comments *specifically* stated 'same gauge'.
>>
>My input was meant to be general and not a specific reply to the
>above. I noticed that virtualy all of the strings seemed to omit the
>DC resistance issue which is a factual matter and not a matter of
>hype; whether its significant or not.

Untrue - almost all cable discussions mention loop resistance at some
point, and any DBT discussion always mentions level-matching, and the
fact that there's no merit in comparing cables with massively
different RLC parameters.

>>I'm curious how others feel about a similar fenomenon with lossy
>> >inductors in the signal path in woofers. It is my personal view that
>> >series DC resistance in the signal path should be strategically
>> >minimized as much as possible. The overall Q factor of the filter
>> >doesn't have to suffer from this if you are in control of the design
>> >process. Once again in the interest of affording the amplifier maximum
>> >EMF control of it's load along with minimized DC loss along the way.
>>
>> It is my personal view that speaker designers in the major companies
>> know what they're doing. If a lossy inductor is used, then that is
>> factored into the overall voicing of the speaker.
>
>Agreed, this is a question of good engineering. But the choice of
>inductors in a production loudspeaker is ussually not based on optimal
>performance, but on minimizing the negative affects of compromise.
>This is act of life due to aggressive cost budgets to which all
>loudspeaker engineers must adhere in a production setting. (exotica
>excepted) Low Rdc inductors are expensive, and as you state below, is
>not a bad strategic area to save some money. But that doesn't mean
>that lowering series DC resistance to woofers is theoreticaly not
>audible or desirable.

Sez who? Have you ever done a listening comparison?

>None of these
>> parasitic resistances bear any comparison to the resistance of the
>> voice coil.
>
>If "lampcord" and inductors add 0.5 ohm of DC resistance, but very
>often even more than this, than this constitutes almost 10% increase
>of a standard driver Rdc of 5.2 to 5.7 ohm. This is audible in most SS
>amplifiers, although subtle. It is enough to possibly make more than 1
>db SPL changes in a majority of tube amplifiers. This doesn't cover 4
>ohm drivers which typically have Rdc values of 3.9 ohm or so making
>the phenominon more distinctive.

Agreed that it may reduce the sensitivity of the speaker by a dB or
so. Just add more power - not an issue for a real amp, i.e. SS.

>Please note also that over the vast majority of its
>> working range, a loudspeaker is mass/compliance controlled, and
>> electrical 'damping' is not a factor.
>
>Agreed to a point. Bass is where this really becomes a common factor
>to contend with for all amps. Tweeters /midranges often have resistors
>in series. But I personally like my bass tight and find it reason
>enough to pay attention to this.

If you like your bass 'tight', then get a system with a Qts of less
than 0.7. Agonising about inductor resistance won't make any
difference.

> Also, with tube amps, the entire
>frequency spectrum can be affected. If a SS amp with a damping factor
>of 400 gets 0.5ohm between output and voicecoil it will be subtle. A
>tube amp with a damping factor of 30 can easily have measurable SPL
>variances especially at the low end.

This is utter nonsense! The effect of parasitic resistance in a series
inductor will if anything be *worse* for an amp with low output
resistance, and the whole point of an inductor is that its impedance
rises with frequency, so it's clearly rubbish to suggest that its
series resistance will have any effect outside the bass range.
Certainly, any FR differences caused by the high output resistance of
say a SET amp will be the same as they would be had the speaker been
otherwise designed, because the speaker will have been 'voiced' for
whatever crossover components are used.

>Basically, keep the loop
>> resistance of the wire below a twentieth of the speaker nominal
>> impedance, and you won't have a problem. Just as an illustration,
>> that's twenty five feet of 16 AWG for a four ohm load. We audiophile
>> types do tend to overkill on this matter of speaker wire resistance!
>
>True, but those typical cheap inductors add 5 times as much "wire" to
>the signal path as your 25 feet of 16AWG. Together, I'm not so sure
>its harmless anymore.

As noted above, I suspect that the speaker designer knows more about
this than either of us. If that kind of thing bothers you, then use
active speakers, where the amps are directly connected to the drivers,
or choose one of the two-way designs which has no crossover components
connected to the bass/mid driver.
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering
 
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On 7 Nov 2004 21:39:52 GMT, in article <cmm4n801bpp@news3.newsguy.com>, Nousaine
stated:
>
>"goFab.com" tplqqq@aol.com wrote:
>
>>On 29 Oct 2004 23:06:49 GMT, in article <cluie902n9i@news1.newsguy.com>,
>>Michael
>>Dombrowski stated:
>>>
>>>Hello All,
>>>Is there any difference between (same gauge) speaker cable and lamp
>>>cord? I cannot see any reason why there would be, especially if bannana
>>>plugs are soldered on to both ends. If there are differences, why? I
>>>can't for the life of me think why speaker cable would be better than
>>>standard wire.
>>>
>>>Mike
>>
>>It's not, but lamp cord is really ugly, and some speaker cable looks really
>>cool!
>>
>>If it makes u feel better and it appeals to your sense of aesthetics, by all
>>means buy some expensive cable. There is not likely to be any audible
>>difference.
>
>In my opinion most zip cord is much superior to most high-end wire in
>aesthetics because it has an easily identifiable polarity construction, it
>usually has enough strands to be quite flexible, it has a small jacket that is
>easier to make less visually apparent and you can buy some real "art", such as
>the kind you hang on the wall or some that is called recorded or live music,
>with the difference in price.
>
>For example I have used clear jacket 14 gauge zip cord with a copper and a
>silver interlaced copper conductors, a nice bendable feel along with Pamona
>dual banana plugs which sounded exactly like a set of Tara Labs RSC 8-foot
>cables that had a MSRP of $990.
>
>The difference in cost covers my current year price for 2 tickets (Row H seats
>11, 13 ) of a 7 concert series of Saturday evening performances of the DSO at
>Orchestra Hall in Detroit with $279 left over for dinner and/or hotel.
>
>IMO the cost difference completely covers the increase in art available to me
>by using zip cord (in this case I bought a hundred feet for $18.)
>
>It is true that I'm mixing prices from the mid-90s when I bought the zip cord
>and tested the high-end cable (which was loaned to me) and the price of my
>current Concert series but I'm thinking the concept is clearly apparent.
>
>BTW I think the zip cord is aesthetically equal, and often superior, to any
>high-end cable I've ever used or seen.

You have a point.

And there's an in-between. If you feel the need to have something purpose-made
for audio, there are excellent companies that have more moderately priced stuff
that has the high end "look and feel" to it. Pure Note and Cobalt come to mind.
 
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"goFab.com" tplqqq@aol.com wrote:

>On 7 Nov 2004 21:39:52 GMT, in article <cmm4n801bpp@news3.newsguy.com>,
>Nousaine
>stated:

....snip to content....
>
>>BTW I think the zip cord is aesthetically equal, and often superior, to any
>>high-end cable I've ever used or seen.
>
>You have a point.
>
>And there's an in-between. If you feel the need to have something
>purpose-made
>for audio, there are excellent companies that have more moderately priced
>stuff
>that has the high end "look and feel" to it. Pure Note and Cobalt come to
>mind.

Sure that's a consideration. But I think that one is primarily aesthetic as
well because no audio "wire" compnay of which I'm aware actually makes wire, as
in drawing copper. So wire that is "purpose" made for audio is simply a
function of branding.

For example when I mentioned the Tara Labs "RSC" (rectangular solid core)
speaker wire it is intended to imply a speciallt made wire that is 'purpose
built' for audio applications, when in fact its just the same flat wire that is
used for winding automobile starters. The only parts that are specifically
'audio' in nature are the translucent jacket that says Tara Labs on it and the
really shoddy connectors (plug petals that had to be re-spread with a flat
blade screwdriver on EVERY reconnection.

But sure, when I person feels better using a branded product then why not!! If
that's the case I'd be careful to select the product carefully. I've seen some
'purpose-built' audio cabling products that the term purpose-built seems to
mean poor quality and hard to use :)
 
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Stewart Pinkerton <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote in message news:<cnljcu01fk3@news1.newsguy.com>...
> On 19 Nov 2004 00:44:59 GMT, wdirksen@p-we.com (Wessel Dirksen) wrote:
>
> >Stewart Pinkerton <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote in message news:<cngumf0dn6@news2.newsguy.com>...
> >> On 17 Nov 2004 00:42:35 GMT, wdirksen@p-we.com (Wessel Dirksen) wrote:
> >> >
> >> >This issue seems to come back quite often and it's good to see that
> >> >there is a general tendancy to dispel fuzzy logic. Yet "lamp cord" as
> >> >I would define it is reletively high guage wire (20 tot 16 guage) with
> >> >potentially non-negligable DC resistance characteristics. So I don't
> >> >agree that is all the same in comparison to let's say 12 of 10 guage
> >> >OFC wire.
> >>
> >> Neither does anyone else, if you took the trouble to notice that the
> >> above comments *specifically* stated 'same gauge'.
> >>
> >My input was meant to be general and not a specific reply to the
> >above. I noticed that virtualy all of the strings seemed to omit the
> >DC resistance issue which is a factual matter and not a matter of
> >hype; whether its significant or not.
>
> Untrue - almost all cable discussions mention loop resistance at some
> point, and any DBT discussion always mentions level-matching, and the
> fact that there's no merit in comparing cables with massively
> different RLC parameters.

Hi Stewart,

The whole DC resistance thing is important to me and that's what's
fueling my input here. So this reply is about DC resistance in general
as it applies to loudspeaker performance, whether from cable or
inductors. So please consider this a departure from the above. As
such, I appreciate the discussion on this.

>
> >>I'm curious how others feel about a similar fenomenon with lossy
> >> >inductors in the signal path in woofers. It is my personal view that
> >> >series DC resistance in the signal path should be strategically
> >> >minimized as much as possible. The overall Q factor of the filter
> >> >doesn't have to suffer from this if you are in control of the design
> >> >process. Once again in the interest of affording the amplifier maximum
> >> >EMF control of it's load along with minimized DC loss along the way.
> >>
> >> It is my personal view that speaker designers in the major companies
> >> know what they're doing. If a lossy inductor is used, then that is
> >> factored into the overall voicing of the speaker.
> >
> >Agreed, this is a question of good engineering. But the choice of
> >inductors in a production loudspeaker is ussually not based on optimal
> >performance, but on minimizing the negative affects of compromise.
> >This is act of life due to aggressive cost budgets to which all
> >loudspeaker engineers must adhere in a production setting. (exotica
> >excepted) Low Rdc inductors are expensive, and as you state below, is
> >not a bad strategic area to save some money. But that doesn't mean
> >that lowering series DC resistance to woofers is theoreticaly not
> >audible or desirable.
>
> Sez who? Have you ever done a listening comparison?

Well, sez me I guess.

As I have brought in before here, I do loudspeaker modification and
design professionally, and for quite some time now and have seen and
modded filters of many loudspeakers. So FWIW, my input is based on
personal experience which I will carefully dare to call expertise not
just conjecture. All along the way I listen and compare all the time
very often with a someone next to me so I'm not listening alone. Even
though it only affects a small part of the overall performance of the
entire design, I have discovered that reduction of this DC resistance
thing is easily the most repeatable noticeable improvement you can
make to a standard production loudspeaker with lossy inductors. So
this is a petpeev issue with me especially since this seems to be
downplayed or held silent by the bulk of this expert group now and the
last time this came up. This is a last stab at throwing this out there
for scrutiny. I am curious to know why there is a tendancy to
underestimate/disbelieve this issue while experience has shown me that
there is almost nothing else more predictable as a focus for
improvement. Heck, maybe I'll learn more about loudspeakers and people
while I'm at it.

This is what I have been doing on a regular basis: I've been almost
exclusively using German Intertechik HQ-80 inductors (large, very
densely compressed ferrite powder inductors) for about 10 years since
they have been on the market. They allow air core quality at normal
power levels for living rooms often less than 10% of original series
resistance. (ex. 1.5mH has 1.6mm diameter copper wire, Rdc=0.07ohm) If
you doing nothing else besides this swapping the series woofer
inductor(s), but make small value adjustments in the rest of the
filter to restore original filter response, the difference in bass
definition is astounding. The sole negative factor that seems to
infrequently pop up with such projects is a less stable image. This is
however greatly dependant on the amplifier and filter topology. Also,
if this occurs, it is usually fixable and change is warranted since
this indicates an overall vulnerable filter design.

>
> >None of these
> >> parasitic resistances bear any comparison to the resistance of the
> >> voice coil.
> >
> >If "lampcord" and inductors add 0.5 ohm of DC resistance, but very
> >often even more than this, than this constitutes almost 10% increase
> >of a standard driver Rdc of 5.2 to 5.7 ohm. This is audible in most SS
> >amplifiers, although subtle. It is enough to possibly make more than 1
> >db SPL changes in a majority of tube amplifiers. This doesn't cover 4
> >ohm drivers which typically have Rdc values of 3.9 ohm or so making
> >the phenominon more distinctive.
>
> Agreed that it may reduce the sensitivity of the speaker by a dB or
> so. Just add more power - not an issue for a real amp, i.e. SS.
>
> >Please note also that over the vast majority of its
> >> working range, a loudspeaker is mass/compliance controlled, and
> >> electrical 'damping' is not a factor.
> >
> >Agreed to a point. Bass is where this really becomes a common factor
> >to contend with for all amps. Tweeters /midranges often have resistors
> >in series. But I personally like my bass tight and find it reason
> >enough to pay attention to this.
>
> If you like your bass 'tight', then get a system with a Qts of less
> than 0.7. Agonising about inductor resistance won't make any
> difference.

Improving speakers is only sometimes agonizing, yet in the end always
fun.

But I'm glad you brought this up for 2 reasons. One change that can
occur with lowering of overall Rdc is lowering of Qe and thus overall
Q of the woofer. Depending on the amount of resistance recovered, this
is usually measurable yet negligible. Yet lowering of overall Q will
in theory improve transient response.

Second, many assume based on the calculated impulse response for the
well known transfer functions that there would have to be an obvious
audible difference in the subjective "tightness" of bass between let's
say a Qtc of 1.0 and 0.71 in sealed cabinet designs. Yet as it turns
out, listeners find the wider –3db bandwidth in higher Qtc speakers
subjectively discernable as "lower bass" but not necessarily "looser
bass". I do realize however that the occaisional subjective impression
of "more bass" can come from a looser impulse response. These kind of
controlled alignment comparisons within a limited range are common in
the R&D process for a production product when deciding on final design
so it happens all the time. Yet it seems such alignment comparisons
never seem to be as pronounced as the subjective "loosening" of the
low bass when adding a 0.5 or higher resistor in series with the
woofer with thereby only a slight increase in overall Qtc.

>
> > Also, with tube amps, the entire
> >frequency spectrum can be affected. If a SS amp with a damping factor
> >of 400 gets 0.5ohm between output and voicecoil it will be subtle. A
> >tube amp with a damping factor of 30 can easily have measurable SPL
> >variances especially at the low end.
>
> This is utter nonsense! The effect of parasitic resistance in a series
> inductor will if anything be *worse* for an amp with low output
> resistance, and the whole point of an inductor is that its impedance
> rises with frequency, so it's clearly rubbish to suggest that its
> series resistance will have any effect outside the bass range.
> Certainly, any FR differences caused by the high output resistance of
> say a SET amp will be the same as they would be had the speaker been
> otherwise designed, because the speaker will have been 'voiced' for
> whatever crossover components are used.

Whoa, I'd watch it with the superlatives but it's obvious you don't
agree. Also, it is primarily the bass range that I'm referring to
here. Just for the sake of definition, the FR of any amplifier is
defined by both it's own design (something I know nothing about) and
the load connected to it. The latter is out of the amplifiers direct
control. If you wanted to get devious, you could probably screw up the
FR of even the most stable and neutral SS amplifier if you know what
you're doing just by giving it a strategically sadistic load. Tube
amps are more sensitive and thus often slightly differ in FR from
speaker to speaker which nearly always have wacky loads. Therefore
there is no guarantee the "voice" of the filter design will be able to
speak neutrally if the input impedance of the speaker is such that the
amp cannot drive it neutrally. This is subtle if not negligable but
nonetheless a fact of life for many tube amps.

>
> >Basically, keep the loop
> >> resistance of the wire below a twentieth of the speaker nominal
> >> impedance, and you won't have a problem. Just as an illustration,
> >> that's twenty five feet of 16 AWG for a four ohm load. We audiophile
> >> types do tend to overkill on this matter of speaker wire resistance!
> >
> >True, but those typical cheap inductors add 5 times as much "wire" to
> >the signal path as your 25 feet of 16AWG. Together, I'm not so sure
> >its harmless anymore.
>
> As noted above, I suspect that the speaker designer knows more about
> this than either of us. If that kind of thing bothers you, then use
> active speakers, where the amps are directly connected to the drivers,
> or choose one of the two-way designs which has no crossover components
> connected to the bass/mid driver.

Now this is interesting if I may. Intelligent consumers are usually
critical and hopeful they make the best buying decisions and may feel
proud of some possessions enough to feel fond of them. Heck all the
cars I have owned have had a name. But few question that
unpleasantries lie waiting such as planned obsolescence, and quality
compromise vs. cost. Of course there is a difference between function
and performance. A gadget may be price-performance designed and
marketed for longevity, performance or usually a planned mix of both
in a certain proportion. But most agree you usually can't get both for
the price of one. So if we can accept that our toaster has economic
design limitations, why is there a general tendancy to accept the idea
that a loudspeaker design has been designed to a holy grail standard.
B&W is a good case in point, they are very good at engineering a solid
performing package together at a good price point, but only relatively
recently have they been truly able to deliver +/- non-compromise
ideology type designs. So outside of these models, you can usually
easily improve the performance of virtually any B&W, not because the
design is inferior, but because you can go after the areas they had to
skimp on. Incidentally, lower DC resistance inductors are being more
and more implemented through the years as technology and production
methods get better and cheaper. Along with it, the average hi-fi
speaker is much better out of the box than 10 years ago at the same
price point.

To illustrate from a trusted source, I'm wondering if Dick Pierce is
listening and can share light if he has ever seen the inside of a
production loudspeaker which he couldn't easily improve. I doubt are
many if any at all.
 
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B&D <bromo@ix.netcom.com> wrote in message news:<cnlj7d01ff0@news1.newsguy.com>...
> On 11/18/04 7:47 PM, in article cnjfr3017g@news4.newsguy.com, "Bob Marcus"
> <nabob33@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> >> Sorry - meant to say "the resolving power of a CD Player with a CD
> >> played..." - my bad.
> >
> > OK, so tell us what you mean by "the resolving power of a CD Player."
> > It sounds suspiciously like pseudo-technical jargon. Resolution is a
> > technical term, and every CD player has the same resolution, doesn't
> > it?
>
> Resolving power - the amount of detail and information successfully
> recovered by a CD player without distortions such as jitter.

Still sounds pseudo-technical...
>
> Not pseudo-technical - the format has only 16 bits of data, you are correct,
> and the DACs are generally rated to be able to extract more than 16 bits if
> presented with them. However, the effective # of bits may not be as high as
> 16 with a real world player. And of those - through the conversion and
> analog stages, the detail that is available is not always presented.

And how do you measure this?
>
> Take the iPod fed with a Apple lossless or AIFF file compared to a NAD C541i
> - play a CD such as an early Elvis Costello for an example of a bad
> recording. You will be able to hear more detail on the NAD than on the
> iPod. Same # of bits in the formats, but the amount of effective detil on
> the CDP is higher. Take the becnhmark DAC1 - it will have incrementally
> more detail than the NAD.

And how do you know this? Please tell me you are basing this on
something more than sighted comparisons.

bob
 
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On 11/25/04 1:01 AM, in article co3seu0ukt@news1.newsguy.com, "Stewart
Pinkerton" <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote:

>> Just for the sake of definition, the FR of any amplifier is
>> defined by both it's own design (something I know nothing about) and
>> the load connected to it. The latter is out of the amplifiers direct
>> control. If you wanted to get devious, you could probably screw up the
>> FR of even the most stable and neutral SS amplifier if you know what
>> you're doing just by giving it a strategically sadistic load.
>
> Not if it's properly designed to be unconcitionally stable, you can't.
> Besides, IME this claimed effect simply doesn't exist. My own amps
> certainly have the same FR into a low impedance or capacitive load as
> they do into a high impedance speaker, and they go flat down to a
> couple of Hz into *any* load. This is basically a nonsense claim.

It is a well known fact that the transient response of most amplifiers will
change depending upon the load - the amount of power available will change
as well. In working with RF generators, we tend to test them into a variety
of loads from 50 Ohms (VSWR 1:1 or thereabouts) to a complete mismatch
(10-inf:1) reactive load and points in between (1.5:1, 2:1. 3:1. 5:1 and so
on). As the VSWR gets towards the higher VSWR's, and the phase changes, you
generally have to back off the power due to some angles giving dissipations
way too high for safe operation and the transient response changes to being
faster or slower (under/over/critically damped response). I cannot see how
Audio amps would be any different. The amount of power available does
change depending upon the resistive load impedance (such as 8 Ohm, vs. 4
Ohm, vs. 2 Ohm), and as the impedance gets reactive, it may change further.
 
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On 25 Nov 2004 16:06:00 GMT, B&D <bromo@ix.netcom.com> wrote:

>On 11/25/04 1:01 AM, in article co3seu0ukt@news1.newsguy.com, "Stewart
>Pinkerton" <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>>> Just for the sake of definition, the FR of any amplifier is
>>> defined by both it's own design (something I know nothing about) and
>>> the load connected to it. The latter is out of the amplifiers direct
>>> control. If you wanted to get devious, you could probably screw up the
>>> FR of even the most stable and neutral SS amplifier if you know what
>>> you're doing just by giving it a strategically sadistic load.
>>
>> Not if it's properly designed to be unconcitionally stable, you can't.
>> Besides, IME this claimed effect simply doesn't exist. My own amps
>> certainly have the same FR into a low impedance or capacitive load as
>> they do into a high impedance speaker, and they go flat down to a
>> couple of Hz into *any* load. This is basically a nonsense claim.
>
>It is a well known fact that the transient response of most amplifiers will
>change depending upon the load - the amount of power available will change
>as well. In working with RF generators, we tend to test them into a variety
>of loads from 50 Ohms (VSWR 1:1 or thereabouts) to a complete mismatch
>(10-inf:1) reactive load and points in between (1.5:1, 2:1. 3:1. 5:1 and so
>on). As the VSWR gets towards the higher VSWR's, and the phase changes, you
>generally have to back off the power due to some angles giving dissipations
>way too high for safe operation and the transient response changes to being
>faster or slower (under/over/critically damped response). I cannot see how
>Audio amps would be any different. The amount of power available does
>change depending upon the resistive load impedance (such as 8 Ohm, vs. 4
>Ohm, vs. 2 Ohm), and as the impedance gets reactive, it may change further.

Sure that available watts (as opposed to VA) changes, but the whole
point of an unconditionally stable amp is that, even into extrenme
loads, it remains stable, and hence its FR remains essentially
unchanged.

--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering
 
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"Stewart Pinkerton" <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote in message
news:co6gfa01kv9@news3.newsguy.com...
> On 25 Nov 2004 16:06:00 GMT, B&D <bromo@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>
>>On 11/25/04 1:01 AM, in article co3seu0ukt@news1.newsguy.com, "Stewart
>>Pinkerton" <patent3@dircon.co.uk> wrote:
>>
>>>> Just for the sake of definition, the FR of any amplifier is
>>>> defined by both it's own design (something I know nothing about) and
>>>> the load connected to it. The latter is out of the amplifiers direct
>>>> control. If you wanted to get devious, you could probably screw up the
>>>> FR of even the most stable and neutral SS amplifier if you know what
>>>> you're doing just by giving it a strategically sadistic load.
>>>
>>> Not if it's properly designed to be unconcitionally stable, you can't.
>>> Besides, IME this claimed effect simply doesn't exist. My own amps
>>> certainly have the same FR into a low impedance or capacitive load as
>>> they do into a high impedance speaker, and they go flat down to a
>>> couple of Hz into *any* load. This is basically a nonsense claim.
>>
>>It is a well known fact that the transient response of most amplifiers
>>will
>>change depending upon the load - the amount of power available will change
>>as well. In working with RF generators, we tend to test them into a
>>variety
>>of loads from 50 Ohms (VSWR 1:1 or thereabouts) to a complete mismatch
>>(10-inf:1) reactive load and points in between (1.5:1, 2:1. 3:1. 5:1 and
>>so
>>on). As the VSWR gets towards the higher VSWR's, and the phase changes,
>>you
>>generally have to back off the power due to some angles giving
>>dissipations
>>way too high for safe operation and the transient response changes to
>>being
>>faster or slower (under/over/critically damped response). I cannot see
>>how
>>Audio amps would be any different. The amount of power available does
>>change depending upon the resistive load impedance (such as 8 Ohm, vs. 4
>>Ohm, vs. 2 Ohm), and as the impedance gets reactive, it may change
>>further.

Thanks, B&D.

>
> Sure that available watts (as opposed to VA) changes, but the whole
> point of an unconditionally stable amp is that, even into extrenme
> loads, it remains stable, and hence its FR remains essentially
> unchanged.
>

Right, now we're finally talking on the same page. You have just loosely
described that as an amp designer you make efforts to minimize a problem
that I have to deal with. If it were a non-issue, I wouldn't be bothering
you with this discussion and you would have had one less strategic design
issue to deal with in your work.

The real question is what can guys that do what you and B&D do, allow guys
that do what I do to make a better reproduction of the AC signal flow in
wire that we're both responsible for accurately reproducing in one form or
another?

Wessel

> --
>
> Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering