I can’t say the cable changes WHAT we hear, but HOW we hear it.
If you take two like sinewaves, to keep it simple, and put them in phase the amplitude will double but the sound will remain identical.
The really aggravating thing about analog, is that when we SHIFT the phase, and worse add group delay (we got rid of that in this example using two of the same frequency) we see really strange stuff happen to the superimposed composit signal. Keep shifting the two like sine waves and the signal disappears. Every TINY shift can have BIG impacts on the voltage level in time. Fast rise time functions get worse and worse distortion with phase shift.
With real signals, like music, both the initial phase and the signal speed with frequency (Vp) down the cable change. The good news is there is little time for the signals to “shift” as the speed of the EM wave is still very fast. And it is TIME adjusted.
The classic verbal equation goes like this;
The superposition principle states that when two or more waves overlap in space, the resultant disturbance is equal to the algebraic sum of the individual disturbances at each point in time.
That’s the part, at each point in time, that changes everything we can possibly hear. On paper, the changes to series II cable are SMALL in the true time domain space even if the percentages are larger (10% and more). What we have is an experiment to see just what the ear can hear when we alter the time domain relationship of the fundamental to the harmonics. No cable is so bad that a piano can’t be identified as a piano. How much of the sound of a true piano can we retain? That’s our hobby.
Many will comment that until we address the inaccuracies in speakers, the worst offenders that we have, the rest of the chain isn’t a “problem” going by the numbers and that the added distortions are small compared to a speaker’s.
That’s a true assessment of the WEIGHT of the inaccuracies but not a proper analysis of the effect of the inaccuracies. It depends on the idea that anything but the speaker’s distortions to be inaudible. We know that’s not true as studies have used the same speaker and changed the front end electronics and listeners report a different sound. Maybe not “huge” no, but the electronics do count, still.
We offer a real change in the series I and II IC and speaker cables to trial. With real cable changes, does it matter? I was a curious as you are to the outcome. The math and paper work can’t define the sound. I don’t know what the “general” sound is until I hook them up, same as you. I have no ability to cheat that aspect of the result.
Sure, I know they are better on paper and that the cable does meet the paper’s math requirements. Still, the time domain evaluations show a sliver of space for the differences to be heard. Are our ears that good? It is easy to so, “no you can’t hear that”. Well, use the cable and physically put the task into practice.
We are doing our best to make designs that can also keep the economy of the products such that as wide an audience as possible can evaluate what the fuss is about. With a consistent design ETHOS, ICONOCLAST makes it a little easier to evaluate WHAT exactly was changed and does it do anything (copper or time based changes or both together).
People have asked, and asked, for this kind of “experiment” and I for one was one of them. We now have two different sets of variables to evaluate, copper and time based alterations, for any true change.
We sell the DATA. Everyone sees the exact same reported and measured (you get a test report with every assembly) “difference” at the design stage. Each will apply a different system and a different set of ears so we can’t use adjectives to properly describe those differences to you. And we don’t. Our web site is pretty devoid of descriptive prose on the sound but we demand that the hard calculations and measurements are properly provided.
Best,
Galen
