The ultimate cables can/can't - only $80,000

[sdolezalek]

When I saw this product (the Music Interface Technologies ACC 268 Articulation Control Console -- one gushing review here: http://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/music-interface-technologies-acc-268-articulation-control-console-and-ma-x-shd-interconnects/), I couldn't help but think it was the perfect product for a discussion here.  As OP,  I'd like to limit this discussion to points of view about why what MIT is doing might legitimately produce "positive" audio quality effects and how that might broaden our overall views on whether cables do or don't make a difference.  

 

So please no comments like: the ultimate snake oil, no device like this could ever make a difference, etc. (I'll ask Chris to remove those if they flood this thread).

 

But I would appreciate comments like: Yes, it can affect sound, but only in the same way as an equalizer because...., or "Yes, it can, but what it is really doing is ... or No, it can't and here is why...

 

In others words, no plain opinions, only views based upon some level of expertise that include an explantion of "why"

 

[Speed Racer]

Why bother posting the topic at all if you are going to restrict the discussion so much?

[sdolezalek]

Because I'm trying to learn something, not conduct an opinion poll

[GUTB]

It appears to be a very high-quality crossover network designed around some proprietary formulas. 

[mansr]

That's an equaliser, not a cable. Nobody has ever doubted that equalisers work.

[mav52]

What an expensive tone or DSP control

From the mfg website "

Discreet articulation control is now possible over

three sections of the bandwidth, allowing the listener

to adjust for challenging room conditions, equipment

changes

[gmgraves]

47 minutes ago, sdolezalek said:

When I saw this product (the Music Interface Technologies ACC 268 Articulation Control Console -- one gushing review here: http://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/music-interface-technologies-acc-268-articulation-control-console-and-ma-x-shd-interconnects/), I couldn't help but think it was the perfect product for a discussion here.  As OP,  I'd like to limit this discussion to points of view about why what MIT is doing might legitimately produce "positive" audio quality effects and how that might broaden our overall views on whether cables do or don't make a difference.  

 

So please no comments like: the ultimate snake oil, no device like this could ever make a difference, etc. (I'll ask Chris to remove those if they flood this thread).

 

But I would appreciate comments like: Yes, it can affect sound, but only in the same way as an equalizer because...., or "Yes, it can, but what it is really doing is ... or No, it can't and here is why...

 

In others words, no plain opinions, only views based upon some level of expertise that include an explantion of "why"

 

I'm suspicious of any cable with a "box" in its length somewhere, and especially suspicious If said box has controls of some kind. IOW, when is a cable no longer a cable? When it's full of variable controls, large capacitors, inductors and resistors, that's when! What such a box is doing is altering the frequency response of the signal passing through the cable. I spent an hour playing with one of these "speaker cables" from MIT at a stereo shop once a couple of years ago. It changes the sound, subtly. But no combination of settings yielded a sound that I thought was better than any other combination, and I remember thinking to myself that an active equalizer of some kind would be far more effective, and certainly far less expensive (and this particular set of MIT cables was "only" ten thousand dollars, IIRC!).

[gmgraves]

43 minutes ago, GUTB said:

It appears to be a very high-quality crossover network designed around some proprietary formulas. 

Since it only has one cable entering the box and the picture shows but one cable leaving it, it can hardly be termed a "crossover" since it crosses over nothing. At the very least, all it can be is a very limited "tone control" which can be more effectively (and cheaply) implemented by an active equalizer between the pre-amp and power amp!

[Ralf11]

1 hour ago, sdolezalek said:

Because I'm trying to learn something, not conduct an opinion poll

 

 

not all opinions are equally valid

 

expertise and technical knowledge matters

 

to learn something study electronics, acoustics, biology and psychology

[Ralf11]

what MIT MIGHT BE doing that might legitimately produce "positive" audio quality effects MIGHT be altering the complex impedance of the cable/box system

 

 

[esldude]

It is a ridiculous way to apply a little EQ.  It is disgusting they have sold more than 50 of these and have a backlog of orders.  You can go find where Bruce tells you how to make your own articulated cables.  Parallel capacitance and inductance.  The effect is to very slightly alter some speakers and how they interact with amps.  Same result could be done in DSP EQ and it would sound the same.  

[mansr]

It's funny how many audiophiles sneer at EQ, yet swoon over it if you call it a cable.

[Speed Racer]

I am a music lover, not an audiophile, and I have no issues with analog equalizers that are built properly.

[mansr]

3 minutes ago, Speed Racer said:

I am a music lover, not an audiophile, and I have no issues with analog equalizers that are built properly.

I wouldn't have thought you would.

[gmgraves]

2 hours ago, Ralf11 said:

what MIT MIGHT BE doing that might legitimately produce "positive" audio quality effects MIGHT be altering the complex impedance of the cable/box system

 

 

Yes, I suspect that's correct. But then the question becomes, "to what end?" You have an amp supplying an audio signal at a sufficient current/voltage to allow the speakers to make sound, and you have a pair of speakers that respond to the amplifier's signal by making sound, and you have a hank of wire that connects the speakers to the amp. A hank of wire doesn't have a complex impedance characteristic (not at audio frequencies, anyway). It has a certain DC resistance that increases with length (and which can change the sound of SOME - but not all, highly reactive speakers) and it has a certain (tiny amount) of inductive and capacitive reactance that also increases with length. But these latter two characteristics are so small that your speaker cable length would have to be more than 50 ft (with 14 gauge wire) in order for these characteristics to attenuate a 20 KHz sine wave by even ONE dB! So, any complex impedance in the cable/box system would have to be self induced by the box itself! IOW, without the box in the cable, there would be no complex impedance for the controls to alter!

[sdolezalek]

2 hours ago, mansr said:

That's an equaliser, not a cable. Nobody has ever doubted that equalisers work.

I suspected that might be the case, but if so, it appears to be an extraordinarily expensive one and my sense is those here willing to use their computers as a front end can do better (at a tiny fraction of the cost) with products like REW, DIRAC, combined with Roon, HQPlayer, JRiver etc. that apply equalization but based upon measurements rather than "fine-tuning to taste."  Am I missing anything else here?

 

Ralf11: Thanks, the altering of complex impedance is an interesting thought, but do you have anything further than an educated guess?

 

By the way, thanks everyone for respecting my wish re "not opinions," so far this has been a far more useful discussion, even if it generates 10% of the hits/responses that including opinions might.

[sdolezalek]

2 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

A hank of wire doesn't have a complex impedance characteristic (not at audio frequencies, anyway). It has a certain DC resistance that increases with length (and which can change the sound of SOME - but not all, highly reactive speakers) and it has a certain (tiny amount) of inductive and capacitive reactance that also increases with length. But these latter two characteristics are so small that your speaker cable length would have to be more than 50 ft (with 14 gauge wire) in order for these characteristics to attenuate a 20 KHz sine wave by even ONE dB! So, any complex impedance in the cable/box system would have to be self induced by the box itself! IOW, without the box in the cable, there would be no complex impedance for the controls to alter!

Thanks George!

[Ralf11]

6 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

 But then the question becomes, "to what end?" 

 

 

the same end as Gordon Gecko...

[Ralf11]

BTW, Kimber will tell you the inductance per foot of cable & people have measured C on cables too...

 

Yes, it is .... ooops that would be an opinion

[gmgraves]

2 hours ago, mav52 said:

What an expensive tone or DSP control

From the mfg website "

Discreet articulation control is now possible over

three sections of the bandwidth, allowing the listener

to adjust for challenging room conditions, equipment

changes

 

What, then, pray tell, does Bruce Brisson (of MIT) THINK that a line-level equalizer is for if not to allow the listener "to adjust for challenging room conditions (and/or) equipment changes"? Certainly there are enough equalizers on the market to do that very thing for a tiny fraction of the cost of this $80,000 "cable solution".

 

How about:

 

http://www.musictri.be/Categories/Behringer/Signal-Processors/Equalizers/DEQ2496/p/P0146

 

 for $300

 

or, perhaps:

 

http://www.musictri.be/Categories/Behringer/Signal-Processors/Equalizers/FBQ6200HD/p/P0B3T

 

for $200

 

There are more, from both Behringer and other manufacturers. Given what MIT says this obscenely expensive "speaker cable" actually does, I don't get it!!

 

 

[gmgraves]

7 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

 

 

the same end as Gordon Gecko...

 Exactly! It's greed coupled with a callous disregard for MIT's customer base. 

[mansr]

16 minutes ago, sdolezalek said:

I suspected that might be the case, but if so, it appears to be an extraordinarily expensive one and my sense is those here willing to use their computers as a front end can do better (at a tiny fraction of the cost) with products like REW, DIRAC, combined with Roon, HQPlayer, JRiver etc. that apply equalization but based upon measurements rather than "fine-tuning to taste."  Am I missing anything else here?

I don't think so.

[gmgraves]

1 hour ago, mansr said:

It's funny how many audiophiles sneer at EQ, yet swoon over it if you call it a cable.

 

Well said!

[gmgraves]

1 hour ago, esldude said:

It is a ridiculous way to apply a little EQ.  It is disgusting they have sold more than 50 of these and have a backlog of orders.  You can go find where Bruce tells you how to make your own articulated cables.  Parallel capacitance and inductance.  The effect is to very slightly alter some speakers and how they interact with amps.  Same result could be done in DSP EQ and it would sound the same.  

 

It might even sound better. The MIT box(es) contain relatively large capacitors and inductors which would certainly "ring" more than the smaller values used in line-level equalizers, or the complete lack of ringing in properly designed DSP-based eq devices. Of course any device added to the audio signal chain will involve a certain loss of SQ, and a DSP-based solution would, of course, add the quality issues associated with A-to-D and D-to-A conversion. The bottom line here would be is the insertion loss is of a magnitude to actually have an actual audible effect on SQ.  

[mansr]

8 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

DSP-based solution would, of course, add the quality issues associated with A-to-D and D-to-A conversion.

Not if applied before the DAC. Analogue sources are noisy enough that an A/D/A trip won't matter.