 Wow that was a quick reply, no I am not that much of a rascal, forget the video, I was there at the show and saw it for real, and saw the drum of cable that you guys do not see on the video, rather than 'dodging around faster than a Gladiators Contestant' I was there, I talked in depth to Mr. Townsend and no, we did not agree on many points, however we did agree on the principles, what we could not agree on were the perceived effects. Much as I would like to discuss transmission line theory I will wait to be invited, it is the same in speakers as in cables. (Oh no I've used that word again)... John...
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 The video was clearly seperate from the shows. The video was done with the bloke himself in some studio somewhere ~ NOT some hifi 'show' Im not disputing what either of you say in terms of the spool and maybe him talking about Naim amps. I wasnt there and so cant comment BUT ~ that has no effect to this video that I can see im afraid
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No, It was the 'bloke himself' that I met, yes Mr Townsend, that is the bloke I talked to and discussed with, that is the bloke who discussed Naim's 'sensitivity' problems. I am rather surprised that as a self confessed Hi Fi guru you were not actually at one of the countries leading shows, I wonder will you be at Bristol???
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 Hi John, Can't forget the Video as it is the item Rik put here for discussion.... ....Haven't seen the 100m reel so can't comment on hearsay. Besides....you never really answered my question : Based on the suuplied video evidence that certain standard cables create anomalies as seen on the scope....if you designed an amplifier which exhibited such anomalies during the course of amplifying a 2KHz squarewave as default would you release it to market ???? Yes or no ? Kind regards..............Bill.
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OK Bill, I also thank Rik for making us aware of the video, BUT you did not see the 100m drum as it was out of shot, that's all, but it was crucial to his demonstration. Please don't get me wrong, I fully understood what he was demonstrating and that was. If the load impedance matches the cable then there will be no 'distortion', we all understand that. BUT to compare 100m of standard cable to a short length of his own is unreal. Second point, the anomalies seen on the scope, although looking bad are almost certainly undetectable by ear. Final point, no I would not release an amplifier to the market with a response like that for two reasons. One it would not look good on paper specs, and two it simply would not be possible. The waveform he demonstrated was clearly a 'reflection' involving time delay and that simply could not be replicated in an amplifier design. Now Mr Townsend came across as an intelligent man, his main business is producing superbly engineered turntables and he went back to basics to design a speaker cable with a characteristic impedance of 8 Ohms, and he did that. One other point I would like to stress is with regard to the word 'distortion' as it tends to be confusing, there are two completely different forms of 'distortion' and they often get mixed in discussion. 1] What I call 'real distortion', harmonic distortion, the stuff that gets measured and reported in amp specs, and once created can never be removed. 2] Frequency response abnormalities that we often hear but are actually easily correctable, now ringing and overshoot are not harmonic distortion they are response anomalies. In conclusion to this most interesting discussion I can only state that what he clearly showed on a scope would IMO not be audible to anyone but a bat, and an extremely sensitive one at that... John...
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...This is purely an example, I know the frequencies given are high....
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Hi John, Bear in mind that in transmission line theory, reflection involves impedance matching and you are already on record as saying that DC resistance is the only important factor in a L/S cable. You can't have your cake and eat it..... Cheers.......................Bill.
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Now this is getting frustrating, I do understand op-amps and capacitive loading, I have been in the business of getting 100MHz video down cheap ribbon cable for twenty years, sorry Bill I am not 'having a go' but simply stating that I do know and understand the problems, I do understand electronics and that is not a 'little on the outside' but a real understanding of the fundamental principles. Forty years ago I did a project for Chelsea College to measure the length of cables by their reflection and designed a pulse generator to do just that, hence my understanding of characteristic impedance. I have designed audio and video drivers to send signals down many hundreds of metres of cable so I do understand the problems. Remember I have designed a valve amp that would rival some of the best out there, sorry if I go 'into one' but when anyone questions my knowledge of electronics it is like a red rag to a bull.. John...
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Hi John, Not questioning your knowledge mate.....just pointing out you were a little "basic" in your original summary of what a loudspeaker cable does (i.e. it's just a lump of DC resistance!) For someone with your highly skilled background this is obviously surprising to us..... All the best...................................Bill.
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Yes Bill, basic as it may seem to be, but 99.99% of the time a speaker cable is only DC resistance unless one has an amp so badly designed that it becomes unstable when loaded with a little capacitance, in which case I would question the amp rather than the cable, really do the sums, and you will find that the effects of inductance and capacitance are really pretty insignificant... John...
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Hi all, I saw someone on here saying he sprinkled sugar onto his mains cable and it distorted the sound, I had a thought if I smeared Hanuka Honey on a mains lead what effect would it have? Best wishes Patrick
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Hi all, I saw someone on here saying he sprinkled sugar onto his mains cable and it distorted the sound, I had a thought if I smeared Hanuka Honey on a mains lead what effect would it have? Best wishes Patrick
You know what id do if I was admin? Id just ban your IP address 
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 Patrick, The effect of Hanuka Honey on your mains cables would be a considerable increase in sticky fingers. Anyway Maple syrup is far more effective and cheaper too !
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Please guys stop auguring, the sugar test is very real and very scientific, if you can't hear a teaspoon of sugar then basically you can't hear anything, a semitone change is just so obvious to any musically minded person that to not hear it means that you are not musically minded. Now if Hi Fi is not appresiation of music then just what is it... John...
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Hi John, "Yes Bill, basic as it may seem to be, but 99.99% of the time a speaker cable is only DC resistance unless one has an amp so badly designed that it becomes unstable when loaded with a little capacitance, in which case I would question the amp rather than the cable, really do the sums, and you will find that the effects of inductance and capacitance are really pretty insignificant... John..."Hmmmm....I didn't see any sign of Mr Townshend's Cambridge amp becoming unstable during those experiments.....but the other properties of the cable (other than resistance) were clear for everyone to see ?The over-simplistic view is obviously not warranted....Kind regards......................Bill.
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 I say chaps - don't get too bogged down in the transmission line thing; we are not dealing with true TX line stuff here because - the source Z (i.e. amplifier) is not 8Ω
- the load Z only approximates to 8Ω but in the real world the current and voltage phase will be all over the place, especially so in the notoriously capacitive world of the electrostatic speaker.
I'm really not too sure what Mr Townsend is trying to achieve (other than some sales). He is adding some inductance to his highly capacitive cable which, if successful, will give a better square wave demonstration. I think I'd prefer to stick with speaker cable that has a low LCR and leave it at that. It really is a shame that the video is not accompanied by the back story told by Mr T at the Park Inn. In brief, he devised this as a technique to stop Naim amps. of a certain vintage from blowing up when presented with "easy load" speakers. Mr T hints at this on one of his own pages but, wisely in my view, doen't name naims. It is also interesting to note that, while he was most enthusiastic about his square wave demonstration, not a word was said about all the cryogenic stuff that the web page expounds at length, which I believe to be purest BS. The modern audio enthusiast has been manipulated into believing that cables are a potential force for good, or bad, dependent upon making the "right" choice. The simple dictum that any cable should be as short (and therefore the least invasive) as possible seems to have been forgotten in favour of the idea of buying cables "designed" to "improve" the sound.
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" I say chaps - don't get too bogged down in the transmission line thing; we are not dealing with true TX line stuff here because - the source Z (i.e. amplifier) is not 8Ω
- the load Z only approximates to 8Ω but in the real world the current and voltage phase will be all over the place, especially so in the notoriously capacitive world of the electrostatic speaker.
I'm really not too sure what Mr Townsend is trying to achieve (other than some sales)." I do actually agree with that Pluto. I posted just because I found it interesting to be honest. It was more to do with the fact he was showing distortion through various cables rather than the fact hes trying to sell 'his own'. Id much rather somone posted something similar whos completely 'neutral' in origin and used a much better 'measuring instrument'. I'll certainly be keeping a lookout though.......
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Hi Rik, and to all believers in real science, here is a spectrum analysis of a fairly cheap, very thin and what I would call 'no nonsense' BNC lead. The peak on the left is the analysers own 0Hz reference, note the plot is 'ruler' flat to 110KHz and each vertical division is only 2dB, now how much better can it get? Here is the setup and the 'unmentionable' thin blue thing in the foreground is what I was measuring. Recently I posted something about distortion only taking two forms, one harmonic distortion, in that the item creates harmonics that were never there to begin with, the second is response anomilies and that is what a spectrum anyliser shows up so graphically. The item in question simply cannot produce harmonic distortion and from the plot one can see that it produces no response anomalies, if you want I will do a plot to 100MHz but it will still be 'ruler flat'. Now If Mr. Townsends demonstration were done on a spectrum analiser then we would see some minor ripples in the response between 30 and 100 KHz, but lets face it the sqarewave subtraction display looks all the more convincing. I look forward to more discussion on the matter.... John...
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You may notice a vertical 'bar line' in the picture as against the more normal horizontal bar line that we often get photographing a TV picture, any ideas... John...
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