My point is, and there really is no argument, that total cost of ownership is a better indicator of the price side of the equation than just initial cost.
The ear just isn't as sensitive as some people would like you to belive it is.Sure it is! But can we discuss speakers without getting into a cable debate?
You almost listed the three major factors in cable sound differences: Inductance, Capacitance, and Resistance. All affect sound and are very audible.
"I've had lectures with Bruce Swedien, who, with 8 Grammy nominations for best recorded album, and a win for Thriller (Michael Jackson), I would say he knows a thing or 2 about sound. He won't work with anything but Westlake Audio monitors."
Bruce Swedien is a good engineer but is far from making the cleanest sounding recordings. Believe me, Westlake monitors are colored in sonics. I've tried to use them before to no luck. They probably work great for him since they are somewhat flat in response and are suited to today's compressed pop sound...by the way, monitors are by definition a subset of loudspeakers. Nearfield monitors like the Westlake and other pro speakers are also loudspeakers.
One more thing Kevin, the best home speakers also are engineered to just reproduce the signal. All high end speakers are in fact built this way from the $200 price per pair range to the $125,000 Wilson WAMMs. Those with less accuracy often include the brands like Bose you hear the most about that have been tailored to have a certain "sound" or are just poorly manufactured.
Some nearfield monitors are designed for the optimum listening distance to be short like 3-6 feet like one finds at a mixing board, but even there some audio speakers like the small Revels make great nearfields due to their neutrality. John Atkinson of Stereophile uses these on his excellent audiophile recordings.
Chu, Robert R, John Royster and I have debated this ad nauseum. Why don't we all agree to hold that discussion for another time?Dammit Lee! I'm trying to stay out of this one. And you go and drag me into it.
Back on topic. I'll draw upon cars like we always do. "what are some of the most overpriced but popular cars?" There you go. Can of worms opened. I can appreciate some of the higher priced (in my opinion overpriced) cars and I love them. Are they overpriced? - YES. Do I love them? YES!
So based on the sum of the parts all speakers other than DIY are overpriced.
Especially low res AR speakers.
PS - Brett. I still have some AR9s in the storage room - circa 1982. mmmm 3" soft dome mid-range.
(maybe in
both of those tests are extremes for the problems that high-end speaker wire tries to reduce. the first test is magnetic flux which occurs everywhere there is electronics.. the second test is mutual inductance.I'm no engineer but here are some observations from real world applications of budget and expensive cable in recording studios and live events.
1. I, R, & C all impact the sonics.
2. Cables can suffer from both EMI and RFI.
3. In spite of the fact that they deal with the "last four feet" of AC from the wall, better power cords make a difference even in blind tests I have conducted. Quieter noise floor, etc.
4. Different stranding designs and theory seem to have an impact based on my long-term tests in my own listening room where I know the system sound well. I heard a difference on Maggie 1.6s moving from 8 foot zip cord speaker wire ($10) to Monster ($100) to Audio Research ($300) to Cardas Golden Reference ($1,000), my current cable.
5. I am no engineer but there have been tests on cable properties by people with electrical engineering background.
6. There are times when one pays a big premium for cable and the results are not great. In my experience this has to do with the ability of cables to have "bright" or "warm" sounds that may or may not accentuate or ameliorate a current "bright" or "warm" sound in the system.
7. Cable properties can improve soundstaging and imaging. I am not sure why this is honestly but I can hear this on equipment I am most familiar with.
Recommendation
One test of cable differences resides on the Chesky Test Sampler 2. You can listen to cables with different jitter characteristics and hear the sonic change yourself. The low jitter cable used still had fairly high jitter by today's standards since it was done long ago. Get a copy of the disc and form an opinion for yourself on cables. of course, get someone to randomly shuffle the cuts for you to keep the results blind.
I would argue that is more value-added than endless debate.
And as for the Zuki... Yeah it's a bike......
