Who here freezes some if not all of their A/V components? (1 Viewer)

[Alf S]

For curiousity sake I have to find out how many of you true A/V guru's freeze their cd's, receivers, cables, power cords, vibration dampening devices, or various circuits in your TV's etc?

There's a young man online at another popular board who does this religiously an states emphatically that there are AMAZING changes that take place.

The gist of it is for those who haven't seen the posts, is to put for example, your surround receiver in a garbage bag and put it in your home freezer for 2 days, then the fridge for a day or so, then leave at room temperature. After that the A/V world of sound as you know it COMPLETELY changes..the sound is so incredible, this person posts the amazing findings on several boards.

Since the changes are so dramatic, I would think more folks would be ALL over this and be doing the same thing..thing is I don't read much about it. Is it an underground thing or is it a really popular tweak?

Since I'm not willing to mix water (condensation) with electricity I won't be doing this any time soon with my receiver, but wondered who here does this an stand by it's benefits?

Alfer

 

[alan halvorson]

This person is insane. There is no - I repeat this loudly - NO reason to freeze any audio/video component or software.

 

[Tim K]

that's the most rediculous HT tweak I think I have ever heard. Not only is it without any basis in fact, it is also a terrible idea. As soon as you removed the component from the freezer, the cold would cause moisture to condensate all over and throughout the item. You might as well soak it in the bathtub.

 

[Garrett Lundy]

I find it less ridiculous than say..... old-growth hardwood volume knobs or solid brass isolation pyramids.

At least Ice-man isn't trying to get your money.


I'll add this to my growing list of "things to do to a CD to make it sound better" that I plan on doing when I retire: Which currently stands at ;Freezing, colouring the edge with a green marker, labeling the CD with gold pen, furniture polish, windex, peanut butter, writing 'Garrett -> Good' on the case, Turtle Wax, and copying the CD on a black CD-R.

 

[Leo Kerr]

Now as I understand it, though, microwaving a CD will definitely change its sound.

Not good, mind, but change it. If, that is, it's still playable after you cut the power off to it.

As for the condensation of Mr. Freezer, I think that's what the garbage bag is for: don't take it out of the bag until it's been completely defrosted.

Now, according to Julia Child (RIP), the best way to defrost your TV is to put it in the refridgerator, wrapped in ice, so that it comes from the deep freeze (4°F) to 40°F very slowly.

Well, actually, she says thats what to do with fish.

Leo

 

[RobertMc]

amazing....

I was so taken by this thread, I just had to stop laughing long enough to do a 'google' on this topic.

Here's a link to what I came up with...

Audio and Deep Cryogenic Processing

It left me wondering...should I send them my old heap of s*** car to see what Cryogenic Processing can do with it? I am sure that there's an awesome Ferrari under it's metallic skin that is waiting to be unleashed by the "Permanent, beneficial change in molecular structure of materials..."

I'm sold!

By the way Garrett, have you got any more old-growth hardwood volume knobs for my car stereo to compelte the package?

 

[Tim K]

The garbage bag theory is flawed....unless you live in the desert where there is absolutely 0% humidity. You would need to vacuum seal it in an airtight container. Wrapping it in a garbage bag is going to trap air inside with the unit. That air will have moisture in it...and when the unit is chilled, that moisture will condense on every surface inside and out.

While cryo treating metals can change their properties, putting something in a 20degree freezer isn't going to do anything to the structure of the metals or plastics.

To me, this is a horrible idea.

 

[Brian L]

I only do this with CD's that I have demagnetized and then treated with a green marking pen....otherwise, its worthless

Oh and the interconnet from the CD player to the pre-amp needs to be elevated on a small carbon fiber "saw horse" type cable elevator too; the wooden ones just destroy the imaging.

BGL

 

[Chu Gai]

Which is why I recommend against state and federal funding for computers to be used by institutionalized people. In a way though its not that hard to understand why people come up with these wacky things. Look at some of the crap that Discovery and PBS put out with proof of the paranormal, talking to the dead. There's millions that buy into this. Newspapers have their horoscopes. Oprah, Montelle Williams, and Larry King treat John Edwards and Sylvia Browne like they've got the inside edge. Drugstores sell magnetic bandages and insoles. Infomercials abound about how some whacko just knows how to cure Michael J. Fox' illness with Coral Calcium. Jackasses that look to cure people with aids by teaching them how to whistle magical healing tones. Then you've got this rampant political correctness that seeks not to offend anybody and embrace every form of nuttiness since we can always protect it by calling it a belief. Its such a whoring and fleecing of the public at large. And we wonder why the billions spent on education just don't seem to make the kids any smarter?

 

[Leo Kerr]

Chu -



hits one of my pet peeves.

I was in the hands of Public Education during the so-called Computer Revolution (High school class of 1990) when schools were spending thousands on a single computer. They were going to revolutionize education! And cure pimples! And make every one (or at least the hackers) get straight 'A's! And...

'We' spent billions on educational computing, and so far as I can tell, the only thing it did was draw needed resources away from practical science labs, practical and fine arts. (For the cost of two computers, you could get three or four good pieces of shop equipment. For the cost of one computer, you could outfit your whole wood-wind section. Well, maybe not quite that bad...) And for the cost of, say 10 computers, you could fully fund an instructional assistant, or 20 computers and buy another teacher.

Any of those things would have been better than having a computer gathering dust in the corner.

Leo

 

[MarkMel]

Cryogenic Processing for metals has well know effects. Tool steel cryo'd will keep its edge much much longer than non-cryo'd steel. Brake rotors are also cryo'd in racecars to make them last longer.

I don't know what effect it would have on audio, but I know you can't do it in your home freezer. We're talking sub 0 temperatures for these effects on materials. The material is slowly taken down to -320 (over a week sometimes) then slowly brought back up to room temp. Computers control these systems.

A while back I was researching this because I was thinking of buying a cryo shop. Deal fell through.

 

[Leo Kerr]

See!

Julia had the right of it! The defrosting is just as important if not more important then the actual freezing!

Leo

 

[Tim K]

I think by "institutionalized" he meant people in psychiatric wards and people in prison....not educational institutions.

As for your take on "wasted funds", I think the fact that millions of homes have PC's in them, classrooms across the country have PC's in them, and just about everyone under 30 knows how to use one....proves that it was far from a waste. Look at where our economy has gone in the last 15 years...everything is high tech. Sure we still have old fashioned industry, but nowadays everything is technology. Putting those computers in schools has helped produce young people who revolutionized the way we work as a society.

I think your view on computers in the classroom is quite closed-minded. In fact, I think it would be a waste to spend money on shop equipment...what is that preparing kids for??? Do you think there is a greater demand for wood or metal workers than there is for employees with computer skills? Come on.

I'm not saying wood working or metal working isn't important or that we don't need people with those skills. I am just saying that in this day and age we should be preparing kids with skills that they can use to get jobs and advance themselves...today's jobs demand computer skills.

 

[Chu Gai]

I know we're sidetracking a bit and I'm going to sidetrack a bit more. Computers today have become like the electric typewriter of a few decades ago. I've seen a whole lot of people that tap only a bit of the resources available. They're tools as far as I'm concerned and they can be of great benefit. Personally, I think parents need, need, need, to spend more time with their kids and read to them. And not that see spot run stuff, but introduce them to things like Shakespeare at a really early age. Not too long ago, I found a copy of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and re-read it. What amazed me was the richness and complexity of the work. Written by a teenager! Well when I someday have grandkids, I sure plan on doing things a little differently. Maybe I'll have more time.

 

[Leo Kerr]

For the first ten years of computers in public primary schools, it will take a lot to convince me that it was anything but 95% wasted money.

Note that it was not a complete waste, but mostly.

A computer is a useful tool.

But the computer is not solving all the world's ills. It would be useful, for example, for students to know what is available from their local library. What can you find from an enecyclopedia, dictionary, almanac, et cetera.

One of the schools I was in was suffering from "every classroom must have a computer in it" syndrome. Most sat dark. The next most common use was good old 'Print Shop,' grinding ribbons into remarkably crude banners and signs. (But with clip art!)

Later, in college, I was studying cartographic production as the program was converting from photomechanical production to digital production. I had worked in a process darkroom before, as well as a conventional darkroom. Unlike my classmates, I knew what the tools in Photoshop and Illustrator did -- and perhaps more importantly, why.

Now, well outside of suffering through public schools, I do work with them, supporting the music and drama departments of some of my local high schools. High schools that have received millions of dollars of computing equipment over the years, but the septic farm went south, and there ain't nothing that can be done about that except pump it out every day. The auditorium is a fire-trap. The lights themselves are so rusty that they can't be used.

For the cost of ten or fifteen modern computers (PC, monitor, basic accessories like keyboards and mice,) the lighting system can be gutted and replaced. It is, after all, nearly 45 years old. Curiously, the school board won't buy the correct lamps for the fixtures - not because they're expensive, but because they use too much electricity! Never mind that the 'replacement' lamps don't fit the fixture properly, and so if you're lucky, you get 50% efficiency of the optical system.

Sorry, end rant.

Leo

 

[WadeB]

Just joining in the derailed thread.



So the purpose of education should be creating cogs for our econiomic machine? Sounds a bit like the plot of a film I just saw . . . THX1138.

"Let us be thankful we have an occupation to fill. Work hard, increase production, prevent accidents and be happy.
Let us be thankful we have commerce. Buy more. Buy more now. Buy. And be happy."

 

[Philip Hamm]

Wow talk about sidetracked threads...

Leo I agree with your assessments regarding "computers in the classroom". The only classroom that should have a computer in it is the computer lab.

I read a piece once that illustrated the problem by way of an example where Canadian students studied the Tundra ecology by looking it up on their computers.... When the real tundra was an hour bus drive away from the school. Now, what would be a better learning experience? Looking it up on the internet or going there?

 

[Bob McElfresh]

Admin Note: As long as Alf, the original poster, does not mind I dont see why the well-phrased discussion cannot continue.

Alf: did you get the local opinion about freezing your electronics?

 

[Alf S]

Yup...thanks

Now carry on with whatever it was you all were discussing.

 

[Leo Kerr]

...Amazing...

Nothing stuns a discussion like being given permission to do it.