Top Ten Signs an Audio Cable Vendor is Selling You Snake Oil
Watch out if a Cable Vendor or Manufacturer:
- Promotes that their product allegedly eliminates audio related Skin Effect and/or "Strand Jumping" problems.
- Claims revolutionary breakthrough in cable technology by polarizing or biasing the dielectric using a battery.
- Promotes that their products eliminate "Audiogenic", "Diode Rectification" or any type of non linear distortions. See Debunking the Myth of Cable Distortion and Dielectric Biasing
- Physically places (+) and (-) wire leads in separate dielectrics not closely spaced in a common jacket. See: Calculating Cable Inductance of Twin Feeder Cables
- Claims vast improvements in sound by inserting "Cable Elevators" to raise the cables off the floor and minimize electron misfiring or static energy fields.
- Claims that cryogenically freezing cables improves fidelity or measurably changes electrical properties after the cable is restored to room temperature.
- Claims that their cables require a "Break In" period.
- Claims that measurements cannot quantify why their designs are superior and often misapply engineering principles in their reasoning but abandon the associated governing laws and metrics that establish them.
- Claims audible differences exist between stranded and non-stranded wires of same gauge rating, geometry and conductor spacing.
- Claims audible differences between silver and copper cables of equal design geometry and gauge.
Bonus Scams
- Sells speaker cables or interconnects costing more than a plasma TV or a lease on a new Infinity G35 sports coupe.
- Claims wire is directional.
- Slaps RLC boxes on their cables.
- Claims of Speaker Cable Resonance at Audio Frequencies
Here is an example of the dielectric biasing scheme courtesy of Audioquest. The battery does not make a complete electrical connection. Thus it is considered an open circuit.
Updated with Audioquest Response: 10/19/2003
