[jcon]

On Dec 6, 4:22*am, Mal Thomas wrote:
On 6/12/08 7:29 AM, in article
, "jcon"



wrote:
On Dec 3, 4:09*am, Mal Thomas wrote:
Greetings,

I noted a brief quip in a recent Hi-Fi Choice mag that a metal digital cable
(coax) sounds better than an optical cable.

That's interesting. *I once had a salesman in a high end
audio store once try to convince me that an optical
digital connection was better than a copper
digital connection (I'm not making this up) "because
the light gives the music a softer sound".
I was going to argue with him, but it would
have been like beating up a cripple.

Obviously, to first order any two *digital* connections
are going to sound absolutely identical (kinda sorta
a key feature of digital). At a higher order, there's some
chance that *a copper connection will introduce
spurious analog noise into the system, so an
optical link will always sound as good or better.

I've found that there is large class of audiophiles
that can be convinced to suspend the laws of
physics if it allows them to rationalize spending
more. *Probably true of golfers as well, but I know
less about golf.

-jc

Jcon,
Thanks for the reply. *I have been digging around some more and unless I am
missing something fundamental here, logic would suggest that as it is only
data that is transmitted along the link (optical or copper) and assuming all
the bits that entered the cable were passed through intact to the other end,
there should be no change in the sound due to the cable itself.


That's correct. The only way something could change the sound
would be to introduce digital errors, or to allow spurious analog
noise. The former is extremely unlikely while the latter shouldn't
happen if things are properly shielded and grounded and would
never happen with fiber optical.

Whenever you're shopping for audio equipment, it's a good
idea to re-read "The Emperor's New Cloths" first.

-jc




So any decent cable (meaning properly constructed), either copper or
optical, should be capable of doing that. *As someone else said the only
thing that may effect the signal (sound?) is RFI along a copper cable if it
was inadequately shielded.

Looks like I'll save my money and stick to my optical cable and spend the $$
on the analogues.

Cheers
Mal
Oz