opaqueice;373022 Wrote: > When someone says they can hear the difference between (say) cables, > there are basically two possibilities: > > 1) Swapping the cables altered the sound waves emanating from the > speakers in a way significant enough to be perceptible to the pair of > ears listening to them, or > > 2) The brain of the listener, knowing the cables were swapped, > perceived a difference that it wouldn't have had it not known they were > swapped.
How and why we perceive things has always been of interest to me. Back when we were actively building selling gear, we went to great lengths to find listeners who we felt that we could trust. The first test that I conjured up to weed out the pretenders involved sticking the usual IC into the tape loop of a preamp. (One of ours, of course.) I got rid of anyone who claimed to hear a difference. None of us could, so we thought that was a valid test to weed out the loonies. But, one of the other principles of the outfit pointed out that it could argued that there was an extra IC in the chain, 2 more pairs of RCA jacks, maybe some additional contacts, etc., blah, blah. So, to shut him up and -really- weed out the loonies, I set up a preamp with a switch on the front panel that did absolutely nothing. Nothing other than make a clicking noise, and presenting the allusion of something being changed. I can not recall how many times since that I have pulled that stunt on people. Brings a whole new light to the concept of "No. 2". The "No. 2" referenced above, that is. I could not believe how many folks had to make an uneducated guess as to which one sounded better. (I actually pulled this very stunt on another equally obscure audio designer. He flunked every time! Yet, he did make some good stuff. I don't know how, though.) So, yes, I realise that just because someone says that they hear a difference does not really mean that they do. Pat -- ar-t http://www.analogresearch-technology.net ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ar-t's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=13619 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=56712 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
