Just to clarify, the LC-1 is not a 75 ohm coax and is only recommended for analog audio.
Jeff is correct, the LC1-1 is not 75-ohm. I edited the post above to fix that, my bad. Still, the point of air dielectric is a smaller cable at the same RF impedance and capacitance illustrating how efficient AIR is over anything else. Air is as good as you can get in practicle cable.
You can nitrogen pressurize seamless alumium hard line coaxial design cable (forces the moisture out, a vacuum sucks water in) though, and get to 90% and higher Vp! It isn’t too practicle for us. You think ICONOCLAST cable is stiff?
At RF LC-1 would calculate;
101670/(12.5 Pf/foot*82%) = 99 ohms at RF, and is close to where the ICONOCLAST series I resides in RF impedance. Neither is made for 75-ohm digital. Use 1694A for that.
The LC-1 uses a foamed dielectric verses an air tube dielectrics, thus series I is a smaller cable than LC-1. The mostly air (we have a spacing thread and teflon plastic tube wall don’t forget) near the wire surface and under the shield is less dielectric distortions.
DIGITAL has CRC, Cyclic Redundancy Check, error correction to repair errors, and has no “sound” until after the DA and AD filters. Listen to music or watch your 4K TV set and you have a near perfect sound or picture until strange skips or blanking blocks are all over with uncorrected errors.
Digital can tolerate most errors, find them, and correct them as it is a “known” signal pattern where analog ever a known pattern and has no forward error correction (FEC) or reverse CRC correction like digital. Digital has square waves and analog has ??? waves. We don’t know what comes next inside an analog signal or is even current so all the mistakes keep piling up. We send analog as it is received with no analysis what so ever.
Digital was designed to remove the gross analog errors and replace them with, to most people, smaller AD and DA errors. Digital is a post process tolerant technology. No scratches on the record or added tape hiss.
We can argue which error types are worse but if we encode analog perfectly to digital we are adding the errors in the AD bock. Digital has to encode the analog WITH all it’s errors collected up to the AD point and then we are adding the filters errors. Digital can’t technically be better than the signal it gets, which is analog. All digital can do is not make analog not too much worse than it received it based on the DA filter. After the AD filter we use we use a DA filter and add more errors.
Digital is REALLY tough with analog since it has to add DA and AD errors by design. Digital is a discrete signal step where analog is continuous. Once digital is encoded, it can go all over with zip added errors, though. Analog can’t. Digital has really improved over the years. On paper we have the, “can you hear that argument” but digital is worse than analog on a pure technology basis by design. You can only argue that you can’t hear what distortion digital adds, not that it isn’t adding distortion, digital does do that.
Best,
Galen
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Mike,
No, you have to cheat going from single ended to unbalanced. There is no way around that.
RCA - Shield is the signal return path.
XLR - Outer shield is PIN 1 and isn’t the signal path, a pure shield. PIN 2 plus and 3 minus are the “floating” balanced signal pins. XLR used as an RCA with PIN 1 ground and PIN2 signal hot will have different electrical than intended as the PIN 1 to PIN 2 electrical are not supposed to be ideally used. PIN 2 to PIN 3 won’t have the return path GROUND RCA needs. Balanced has no “ground” and the PIN 2 to PIN 3 is what matters for electrical in XLR. Ground is the ground at PIN 1 and has no signal by design.
Each isn’t the other electrically or we would have one cable.
Best,
Galen
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I should clarify my question.
Agree on cheating going from RCA to XLR.
My question is: in your cables, is there two wires (+ & -) inside a separate shield?
Or is it like LC-1, one wire (+) inside a shield
Which also doubles as the (-)?
Does that make sense?
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I appreciated how stiff the Iconoclast Gen. 2 green XLRs are now. The stiff conduit protects the integrity of the cable well. In the past I changed and moved other cables so often that I was always afraid the cable structures may be weakened. But there is no worry with Iconoclasts.
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Well get there Mike…
-
The ICONOCLAST RCA is a single wire inside a dielectric with a DBL braid shield. Yes, it is like the LC-1 desig nbut an improved air dielectric that is the same VOLUME as the XLR’s chambers.
-
The ICONOCLAST XLR is four triangular chambers, each with ONE “conductor” (a single wire or the 4x 30 AWG style). The wires are cross-wired as a star quad. The shield is a separate PIN 1 connection to true ground (no signal on the wire).
Best,
Galen
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I didn’t make the ICONOCLAST stiff on purpose, that’s a result of the MATERIAL needed to be the best it can be electrical.
If you get a piece of the BAV XLR, and compare it to the 4x1 series I ICONOCLAST XLR there is a MASSIVE difference in flexibility. Yep, that material, changed to foamed Telfon and Teflon jacket from a TPO dielectric and TPE jacket makes ICONOCLAST stiffer for a push in electrical.
The ICONOCLAST design triangle of electrical, flex and durability is optimized to electrical.
Best,
Galen
3 Likes
I can confirm the benefits of Teflon dielectric. I ordered and received a couple of Belden 1695a digital cables to compare against my LC-1s. I was in the process of comparing the two cables while we were having this discussion.
I play Tenor sax in a 20s-30s band that has 3 saxes (2 altos, 1 tenor). When we harmonize and our intonation is just right, the harmonics of the 3 instruments seem to lock together. Its kind of a magical place to play in when it happens.
Listening to baroque orchestra, or brass sections, or saxes playing together on various recordings, I can hear that kind of magic with these Teflon dielectric cables. It doesn’t happen on the LC-1s.
At least for me. YMMV
I wish I knew about the BAVs or Iconoclasts before I ordered the Belden digital cables. I only stumbled upon your cables because of the review at ASR. Now that I know there is a real benefit as far as listener experience with better dielectrics, they will be next on my list.
Thanks, Mike
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Mike,
Each time you reduce the dielectric constant the better a cable can be;
- Solid PE 2.3
- Solid PP 2.25
- Teflon 2.1 for dielectric.
- Foamed 1.45 @ 83% Vp
- Air 1.0 (ideal)
Vp = 1 / SQRT (dielectric constant).
EXAMPLE
1/SQRT (2.3)= 0.659 (65.9%)
Foaming follows the same ultimate pecking order but depends on the foaming ratio and neucleating agent and gas, usually nitrogen, used. The closer to AIR the dielectric is and the closer to the wire the air is the better. Reactance is a LOG function on distance so you leverage the air better the closer it is to the wire.
Best,
Galen
2 Likes
Thanks Galen,
While I can ask, here are some other pet peeves of mine about cables.
-
Why do the actual (RCA for interconnect) connectors sound different? I’ve never been a fan of silver plated construction. My preference is gold plated copper if available.
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Why is there such a big difference in details and frequency response after cleaning connectors with contact cleaner. Something like this for instance. Usually need cleaning about every two weeks. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000BXOGNI
These effects are nearly as big an improvement in the sound of a cable as the actual cable construction and dielectric itself IMHO.
Thanks, Mike
Depends on the air seal. GOLD doesn’t oxidize itself, but it doesn’t SEAL to well to the connector interface since it is a HARDER material than say silver or Rhodium that is softer and fills in the voids between the materials better. Gold to Gold is good.
No one worried about efficiency at the connector will make a gold plated wire as the last eighth-inch that interfaces with the connector is not too cost effective. This is why we TERMINATE a cable into a gold plated connection with a ultra sonic or like weld. Way more efficient. Use the wire best needed for the cable itself, not the connector.
RCA and XLR connectors do have electrical. The shorter the cable the more we hear the connector’s contribution. An RCA or XLR uses a dielectric inside to separate the signal pin to the ground or each other. The better that dielectric material the lower the capacitance it adds. The better the interface metal the longer and better the sound. We measure the ASSEMBLY so we define what you buy as an example.
A Rhodium plated spade doesn’t ever need to be removed and cleaned if you install it right and leave it alone. It is a sealed interface.
Most good RCA and XLR are gold to gold interface (gold pins we use) and gold female inserts are best. This is a continuous connection.
Silver is good if it uses a self cleaning design but this isn’t a long term use connection as it wears the silver layer each use by design to clean the oxide layer.
There is no perfect connector but modern plastics and plating tech close the “gap” really well.
Best,
Galen
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Hi Galen,
Something you said earlier made sense as to how cleaning interconnects could make a difference:
“RCA designs need a good low DCR shield as the way they work adds a resistance between devices, and too high a DCR shield can cause the ground current to increase and make NOISE. The more DCR differential the higher the noise floor on unbalanced lines.”
So DCR could get raised because connections aren’t air tight. Cleaning the RCA contacts lowers the DCR back down. This lowers the noise floor. Fair statement?
Thanks, Mike
Mike,
Yes that is a fair statement that connectors add to noise the same as a high DCR shield. It’s all additive. S/N is based on where the noise floor is under the noise. Raise the noise floor and it adds to the noise. This is why it is called a NOISE floor because you can only get that good! Add all our own added stuff and it gets worse.
Best,
Galen
Hi Galen,
One other concern that comes to mind is on where to put your money when it comes
to interconnects -vs- speaker cables.
Since voltages and currents in interconnects are more delicate then in speaker cables,
it seems you would want to put a larger portion of your budget into interconnects.
How would you fall on this? Do you think speaker cables are just as important as interconnects,
or much less so?
Thanks, Mike
Mike,
This endlessly debated. I go by the complexity of the network.
An amplifier/cable/speaker is a much more messed-up electrical transfer function than the Interconnect, IC, cable with a “infinite” (~47-kOHM) input that stays put. A speaker’s impedance varies considerably and right when the cable’s open-short impedance does too and where we transfer the most power.
You will hear more variation between systems on the speaker cable side since it is so much harder to get an ideal impedance match.
The IC cable has a much less demanding transfer function into a fixed resistive load value. Yes, we can improve the IC cable too but technically the IC cable’s load matching is better and most consistent.
You can try an ICONOCLAST TPC 4x4 XLR or RCA and the TPC series II speaker cable free of charge and decide what, to you, makes the biggest change! Odds are the speaker cable unless you have something like maggie’s that are a mostly resistive load. That will even up the possible changes between the two based on the load impedance consistency.
Best,
Galen
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Hi Galen,
My budget isn’t ready for speaker cables of this ability since I bi-wire. I currently use generic 14 gauge OFC speaker wire on the top and 12 gauge generic extension cord wire on the bottom. About 4 ft. I thought you might get a laugh out of that, but they work ok and I was operating under an assumption that speaker cables do the least damage to the signal as compared to interconnects. My AHB2 amp introduces some complexity with bi-wiring. It has 2 posts that are SpeakOn connectors, and 2 posts that are Screw down connectors.
Interconnects seem more affordable. I’m thinking I’d like to try the BAV or Iconoclast. Unfortunately I need a 1.5 ft RCA to XLR, which probably means a custom no return type of cable.
Thanks, Mike
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Mike,
You’re a BAV customer for sure. Great electrical (look at the R, L C data…near the same) and not too expensive. I’d camp here awhile and look over the TPC speaker cable. We do have SPEAKON style.
I will have an application report on single and parallel calculated and measured speaker cable data. That will be off a bit, it takes awhile to do all the testing.
Talk to Bob about an all BAV RCA to XLR assembly.
Best,
Galen
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Thanks Galen,
On the Bi-wire speaker cable front… This quote from your papers:“ICONOCLAST is a 0.08uH/foot and 45pF/foot 11.5 AWG aggregate design, all very good values for a complex design with 24 wires in each polarity to flatten Vp and thus lower the impedance rise at low frequencies. ICONOCLAST values fundamentally match a 10 AWG “zip” core 1313A (two 10 AWG wires parallel) response pattern.”
If my woofer crosses over around 400Hz, and to be somewhat economical, would there be much penalty to just using 1313A on the bottom in a bi-wire configuration?
Thanks, Mike
Mike,
Technically yes as the 1313A has higher INDUCTANCE (0.15 uH/foot) than the ICONOCLAST @ 0.08 uH/foot for current delivery. The cross-over and Vp match is going to be OK with either but for a current source cable, lower inductance is better.
The second optimization over Inductance is the Impedance match at the most reactive and variable low frequency end. 1313A has a higher open-short impedance right where we’d like it to be ideally LOWER impedance around 100 Hz and below. This means we don’t get as “resistive” a match to the speaker’s lower but still reactive and varying load.
Those two issues, inductance and lower Impedance are improved with ICONOCLAST speaker cable by using more and smaller AWG wires.
Try them and see but that’s the math to the answer.
Best,
Galen
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Hi Galen,
I will try them. My brain is still wrestling with the objective/subjective battle between the ASR NULL test measurements down to -115dbs -versus- what you are saying PLUS what I hear myself in my own system with my current cables.
It reminds me of the old star trek episodes where Kirk puts the alien computer into an infinite loop using some logical contradiction and blows it up.
I graduated with an EE from college, then spent 40 yrs as a S/W Engineer. Now I’m mostly a musician. It’s definitely a left/right brain struggle.
Thanks,
Mike