Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

In the 1970s and 80s, powerful forces in the US secret services clashed over whether or not the Russians had submarines capable of travelling completely silently, without propellers and cavitations, and undetectably by sonar. This was an inspiration for the film “The Hunt for Red October”; the US President was lobbied to fund countermeasures against a submarine threat that never existed in practice. Despite there being no evidence of the design, manufacture or physical mechanism behind a totally silent form of propulsion, those pressuring the President to tackle the threat argued that the very fact they could find no evidence, was all the evidence they needed.

When the Soviet bloc collapsed, we found out after the cold war that it was all complete rubbish. There never was any such sub, it was impossible to engineer one, and the naysayers were completely right – but the true believers convinced gullible Pres. How stupid is that? Although not so stupid if the military contracts were juicy and awarded to the lobbyists own companies of course.

And now the hi fi angle.

Many people will argue there are merits in expensive cables. Others will argue that, all things being equal (all measurable things that is, such as inductance and capacitance and resistance), there is no sonic difference in cables that measure equally, and the expenditure required to get, say, a top Nordost or Cardas cable is money down the drain. They don’t sound any different because they can’t.

Somewhat at odds with the anecdote with which I opened this blog entry, I’m in the former camp. In my view, just because you can’t measure it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. Trust your ears! That’s the evidence that matters most and is so frequently ignored by the naysayers who refuse to admit their own world view may be wrong.

So it is with equipment supports, and digital transports too. As I gain a more thorough understanding of how digital data is extracted and transmitted, I’m starting to believe it might be possible to provide empirical measurements to back up what I believe I can hear.

I have had a selection of cables in my various hi fi systems and they have all mattered, all sounded different, albeit in many cases the difference was a subtle one. Recently, I’ve tried something even more esoteric, with even more unusual results: new power cables. Yes, not even in the signal path, but somehow affecting my system more profoundly than I expected.

Mains electricity travels through miles and miles of copper cable. Why should the last m of cable make such a difference?

I have been to visit my pal IWC and record an interview for a future podcast, and came away with a spare mains cable he had made up. This is some basic, thick, 6mm2 copper cable wedged into an Oyaide IEC plug at one end, and a strange looking and massive Russ Andrews mains plug at the other; the only size of plug he could find capable of taking the 6mm2 cable he had.

Elsewhere in his house, the incomer tail to his distribution board is even bigger. So it is heavy, thick and just wrapped in rubber -as it comes from whatever manufacturer that supplies electricians with >70amp capable cables for cookers or even more demanding equipment. No special coating, dielectric, cable geometry, shielding nor material – just copper, in PVC. But THICK!

Here it is:

Detail of the end pieces:

Compared with my normal PHY mains cable which is solid-core copper, silver plated, and cotton and silk wrapped with IEC and mains plugs either end -no info on cable diameter – which looks much weedier. PHY is a French brand that makes cables and loudspeaker drivers using ‘natural’ materials and the owner, Bernard Salibert, sadly passed away recently. Prices have jumped since I bought mine and I’m not prepared to buy more, even though I like the sound.

Voila la difference:

Side by side:

So I tried the no-name, THICK cable on my Tron Discovery power amp and was rather stunned. I expected a subtle difference, but subtle it wasn’t – immediately more depth, breadth and height to the soundstage, more macro and micro dynamics, and more overall weight to the sound. Exactly like the weight I felt when the cable was held in my hand. Could it be expectation bias? Not with this magnitude of change.

However, all was not rosy. It was also hard and artificial sounding, solid-state electronic and not valve, unsubtle and somewhat unmusical. Of course, this from a spare cable that had been made up, never used, and needed to be run in. So I left it running and have come back to it many times.

It seems to oscillate between poles as it runs in. At one point it carries all those attributes I describe above, both positive and negative in equal measure, and at other times it is capable, but less capable than at its’ peak, yet more musical and less objectionable with it. As it runs it, it seems to swing less and less between these two extremes. I wonder where it will settle? What I want is the musicality of the PHY and the capability of the HEAVY cable. I worry that it will settle at a point where it remains slightly unmusical and doesn’t have quite the deep capability that impressed me from the off. It would be painful to discard it on the basis that it works better, but I enjoy it less; that seems both sensible and stupid in equal measures.

Last night I swapped it out for the PHY and was rewarded by completely what I expected to hear – a musical, natural and pleasing sound that was somehow smaller and less weighty with it. Much smoother and less brash, but something possibly lost with the reduced detail and weight. Having recently invested in some new CDs (inspired by a change from another bit of kit that comes in at around £100-£150, almost all of which is in the connectors) I put the Average White Band on and felt so energised by the boogie I started to dance. PHY still wins, but if *only* I could combine the attributes of both cables.

Next step is to try it on the Tron preamp and DacMagic power supplies. Intuitively I expect the greatest effect to be on the power amp, but stranger things happen at sea.

Speaking of things nautical – despite naysayers telling me there is no known electrical reason why a thick copper mains cable should affect the sound of my system over a thinner solid core silver/copper one, the evidence is that it does, just as the evidence of the non-existence of a silent sub is refuted by those claiming proof through its absence. If that makes sense…?