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

[The Computer Audiophile]

18 hours ago, Ralf11 said:

 

 

not all opinions are equally valid

 

expertise and technical knowledge matters

 

to learn something study electronics, acoustics, biology and psychology

That's partly why the OP said he wasn't conducting an opinion poll. He is looking for expertise. 

 

Telling someone to study "electronics, acoustics, biology and psychology" rather than offer some knowledge doesn't help anyone.

[The Computer Audiophile]

16 hours ago, esldude said:

It is disgusting they have sold more than 50 of these and have a backlog of orders.

Most people in the world would probably says all the components in your system (and mine) are disgusting. It's all relative. I'd never buy one of these or use one, but people can spend their money how they see fit. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

15 hours ago, gmgraves said:

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

Providing a product that people want to buy is the opposite of "callous disregard" for one's customer base.

 

Again, I'd never buy this thing, but some people want it. If people didn't want it, MIT wouldn't build it.

[mansr]

I still think it's pretty dishonest of them to build a rather simplistic equaliser, call it a cable, and sell it at an astronomical price.

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 minute ago, mansr said:

I still think it's pretty dishonest of them to build a rather simplistic equaliser, call it a cable, and sell it at an astronomical price.

Fair enough.

[mav52]

24 minutes ago, mansr said:

I still think it's pretty dishonest of them to build a rather simplistic equaliser, call it a cable, and sell it at an astronomical price.

 

Yep it.  Most likely made for those wealthy audiophiles that have more money than sense. ps: Sorry if this offends any ultra wealthy audiophiles on this site that had thoughts on a purchase..

[jabbr]

21 hours ago, sdolezalek said:

 

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

Mathematically it’s a filter. A filter is described by curves that relate input frequency amplitude and phase to output amplitude and phase. It may have nonlinearities as well. An “equalizer” is an example of a filter.

 

This product seems to allow the specification of impedance.

[gmgraves]

1 hour ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Providing a product that people want to buy is the opposite of "callous disregard" for one's customer base.

 

Again, I'd never buy this thing, but some people want it. If people didn't want it, MIT wouldn't build it.

Well, that's not exactly what I'm on about. Do people want to buy it? I suspect so. Like you said, if there were no market, MIT wouldn't build it. It's the obscene price, coupled with what must be an exhorbitant mark-up aimed at rich, but not very knowledgeable or sophisticated buyers, that bothers me. I think I know the kind of people who would buy something like this. The same kind who buy books by weight, and stereo systems by price. "Hello, is this Ed's A/V Contractors? I want a stereo system. No, I don't have any preferences except that it must cost in excess of half-a- million bucks. Can you do that? You can? Thanks." It's called taking advantage of people's ignorance, and I don't really care that the buyers can afford it and are entitled to spend their money as they wish.To me there is no difference between selling worthless but costly audio bling like this to rich but naive buyers and the local garage telling the lady customer, that her car has a bad thrumbulator, and a new one is going to cost her three grand. In both cases, as far as I'm concerned, it's dishonest.

[mansr]

As I've said before, I have no issue with bling being sold as bling. I might even buy it if I like the way it looks.

[gmgraves]

31 minutes ago, mav52 said:

 

Yep it.  Most likely made for those wealthy audiophiles that have more money than sense. ps: Sorry if this offends any ultra wealthy audiophiles on this site that had thoughts on a purchase..

No matter who it's made for, or that the target audience for products like this are people to whom $80K is pocket change, that's no license to cheat them. One might argue that it's less hurtful to rip-off the rich than it is to rip off widows and orphans, but to me, both are dishonest and reprehensible.

[sdolezalek]

A lot of equipment like this gets bought as part of a larger house building project where the new house might cost $20-40 million or more and the owner decides they want a sound room or home theater and specifies to their audio contractor that "I want the very best."  In most industries those buyers pay for a lot of the bleeding-edge innovation that later trickles down and become available to the rest of us at affordable prices.  To the degree that is what is going on, it is a healthy economic process from which we all benefit.

 

But, if customers are convinced to buy systems at bleeding edge costs that don't actually advance the state of the art, then this industry suffers, at least reputationally. 

 

That is why I was trying to understand what these cable boxes do -- are they advancing the art/science of audio, and if so, how?  

[mansr]

Calling something a cable when it blatantly is not can hardly count as innovation regardless of what the thing actually does.

[The Computer Audiophile]

Maybe we should define cable. If this is really a cable with a component in the middle, then so be it. 

[CuteStudio]

Hmm.

I suspect it's an adjustable zobel network so you can equalise the impedance a speaker presents to an amplifier. Assuming someone twists the knobs in the right way and it does flatten it then many amplifiers may sound better with it.

 

The poor mans solution would be to slap a big 4ohm resistor over the speaker terminals to achieve a similar aim, a smart man would do an impedance sweep and design the correct zobel, or simply buy an active speaker or more amps and a digital crossover.

 

http://diyaudioprojects.com/Technical/Speaker-Zobel/

 

Either way I can see why it costs $80k: That's to stop people doing teardowns and works extremely well

[The Computer Audiophile]

2 minutes ago, CuteStudio said:

Either way I can see why it costs $80k: That's to stop people doing teardowns and works extremely well

If I could get ahold of one, I'd have it in @mansr's hands for a teardown and analysis.

[jabbr]

1 hour ago, mansr said:

Calling something a cable when it blatantly is not can hardly count as innovation regardless of what the thing actually does.

In all fairness I don’t see the manuf calling it a cable, rather the TAS reviewer...

[Albrecht]

1 hour ago, gmgraves said:

Well, that's not exactly what I'm on about. Do people want to buy it? I suspect so. Like you said, if there were no market, MIT wouldn't build it. It's the obscene price, coupled with what must be an exhorbitant mark-up aimed at rich, but not very knowledgeable or sophisticated buyers, that bothers me. I think I know the kind of people who would buy something like this. The same kind who buy books by weight, and stereo systems by price. "Hello, is this Ed's A/V Contractors? I want a stereo system. No, I don't have any preferences except that it must cost in excess of half-a- million bucks. Can you do that? You can? Thanks." It's called taking advantage of people's ignorance, and I don't really care that the buyers can afford it and are entitled to spend their money as they wish.To me there is no difference between selling worthless but costly audio bling like this to rich but naive buyers and the local garage telling the lady customer, that her car has a bad thrumbulator, and a new one is going to cost her three grand. In both cases, as far as I'm concerned, it's dishonest.

A knowledgeable buyer who is someone who does investigative comparative analysis.

Electrical Engineering knowledge often hampers knowledge, - because the EE makes judgments outside of the scope of the device without conducting investigative tests. Commenting on anything based on price is just another form of speculation, - where little to no knowledge is gleaned. Your unqualified opinion and bias has little value to the potential purchaser of the device. The only way to know is to compare two similarly priced devices in a system that is appropriate and commensurate to the device being tested.

No one will EVER buy a $10K cable if they have $800 speakers.

If you haven't done any comparative testing, - you have no knowledge of the efficacy of the product: period.

[sdolezalek]

53 minutes ago, CuteStudio said:

Hmm.

I suspect it's an adjustable zobel network so you can equalise the impedance a speaker presents to an amplifier. Assuming someone twists the knobs in the right way and it does flatten it then many amplifiers may sound better with it.

 

The poor mans solution would be to slap a big 4ohm resistor over the speaker terminals to achieve a similar aim, a smart man would do an impedance sweep and design the correct zobel, or simply buy an active speaker or more amps and a digital crossover.

 

http://diyaudioprojects.com/Technical/Speaker-Zobel/

 

Either way I can see why it costs $80k: That's to stop people doing teardowns and works extremely well

 Thank you.  Useful input.  As someone with large Magnepan speakers that are notorious for having fairly complex impedance curves, I was wondering whether a network like this might present an amplifier with an easier load to drive.  Question is, what sonic benefits are derived from "easier to drive loads"?

[mansr]

12 minutes ago, sdolezalek said:

Question is, what sonic benefits are derived from "easier to drive loads"?

With a good amp, probably none. $80k will get you a good amp.

[GUTB]

11 minutes ago, Albrecht said:

A knowledgeable buyer who is someone who does investigative comparative analysis.

Electrical Engineering knowledge often hampers knowledge, - because the EE makes judgments outside of the scope of the device without conducting investigative tests. Commenting on anything based on price is just another form of speculation, - where little to no knowledge is gleaned. Your unqualified opinion and bias has little value to the potential purchaser of the device. The only way to know is to compare two similarly priced devices in a system that is appropriate and commensurate to the device being tested.

No one will EVER buy a $10K cable if they have $800 speakers.

If you haven't done any comparative testing, - you have no knowledge of the efficacy of the product: period.

 

Thank for the timely truth drop on the thread.

 

None of us here are Bruce Brisson, who's been conducting research and experimentation into these topics since the 70s. Electrical Engineers have very little knowledge of advanced audio -- their knowledge is basic, and that leads to basic opinions on advanced technologies. I'm also just as ignorant, so I have to rely on my ears to notice any benefits, and until I can listen to this product in a meaningful way I can't say yea or nay, and nor can I really judge the efficacy of the technology.

 

Another example would be Bybee purifiers. "Quantum" speak is throughout the marketing, but it was revealed in a 6moons interview with Bybee that he, himself, doesn't know why conducting currents through certain rare-earth metal oxide resistors lowers 1/f noise -- it just does. The Bybee products aren't scams, and several reputable amp, speaker, and cable manufacturers continue to offer them as options in their products. Literally every single review I've ever come across of Bybee DIY products report improvement.

[CuteStudio]

8 minutes ago, Albrecht said:

Electrical Engineering knowledge often hampers knowledge, - because the EE makes judgments outside of the scope of the device without conducting investigative tests.

 

 

Given that most things in audio is made by electronic engineers I'm not sure I understand your statement. Are you saying we'd know more if we knew less? Or perhaps the suggestion is that we are too closed minded to accept to new, unproven laws of physics introduced to the world in an advert for overpriced tat? I'll admit to the latter

 

I don't have to test a wire to know what it does, a device in the middle of a speaker cable has limited options, none of which can affect 'articulation' which as far as I can see is a marketing buzzword that is essentially meaningless.

Reading the manufacturers verbiage indicates that they've either discovered new hitherto unknown branches of physics, arrived from a different planet or just prey on the gullible in the same manner that shampoo marketing departments. People who have previously dissected their products have discovered nothing of any value or use.

 

I did think however that given the huge lump of aluminium that this device could be a variable resistor across the terminals, which would flatten any impedance peaks in much the same way as a $2 resistor might.

 

Clearly it's not a serious device, the devices that can improve sound are built into amplifiers and speakers: the cable is merely an electrical connection to allow the electricity to flow.

 

Lack of engineering knowledge is what these firms prey upon, if one examines even simple amplifier design of class A, AB or D, the position and extent of the feedback loops and choice of input, VAS, driver and output devices there's FAR more scope for different sound, yet in many blind tests some even mistake class D chip amps for tube amps and class A set tube amps for class B transistor.

 

So much like the cryogenically treated beeswax fuses that don't make any difference these cables won't either. Yes, people really sell them and today's dumbed down consumer have little defence:

https://kitsunehifi.com/product/audio-magic-beeswax-shd-fuse-250v-5x20mm-2a-slow-blow-fuse-for-spring-dac/

 

 

[mansr]

2 minutes ago, GUTB said:

None of us here are Bruce Brisson, who's been conducting research

The only research he has conducted is into how best to fleece rich audiophools.

 

2 minutes ago, GUTB said:

and experimentation into these topics since the 70s. Electrical Engineers have very little knowledge of advanced audio -- their knowledge is basic, and that leads to basic opinions on advanced technologies.

Audio is pretty basic technology. The fact that all the scam artists you so adore are able to produce anything that works at all is testament to that.

 

2 minutes ago, GUTB said:

I'm also just as ignorant,

You are worse than ignorant. You are wilfully ignorant, and on top of that you are condescending. Now go away instead of derailing this thread more than you already have.

 

2 minutes ago, GUTB said:

Literally every single review I've ever come across of Bybee DIY products report improvement.

Literally every single review of anything reports improvements.

[The Computer Audiophile]

Let's keep it on topic guys. 

[GUTB]

7 minutes ago, mansr said:

The only research he has conducted is into how best to fleece rich audiophools.

 

Audio is pretty basic technology. The fact that all the scam artists you so adore are able to produce anything that works at all is testament to that.

 

You are worse than ignorant. You are wilfully ignorant, and on top of that you are condescending. Now go away instead of derailing this thread more than you already have.

 

Literally every single review of anything reports improvements.

 

Deleted my biting response in light of TCA's reply.

[psjug]

5 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Most people in the world would probably says all the components in your system (and mine) are disgusting. It's all relative. I'd never buy one of these or use one, but people can spend their money how they see fit. 

Yep.  People spend crazy amounts of money for all kinds of stuff: http://www.theinertia.com/surf/worlds-most-expensive-surfboard-sells-for-1-5-million/

(sorry if off topic!)