[net.audio] Comment and Query -- CD vs. Vinyl

peters@cubsvax.UUCP (05/01/84)

[The first 2 1/2 paragraphs are comment;  the remainder query.]

My first experience with "high-end" audio took place last week-end
(April 28), when I visited my cousin Lou in Danbury, CT.  His system
includes Denon turntable, moving-coil cartridge (forget which),
Audio Research preamp and power-amp (tubes), Martin
Logan speakers (electrostatics + woofers), NEC CD-player, Tandberg
open-reel deck, and probably a few things I left out.  He's been building
his system for years, but most of the above are new additions.  Lou has
a huge record and tape collection -- mostly classical, but some folk and jazz --
and is a very serious listener to both live and recorded music, without
being either arrogant or fanatical about it.

We listened to various things for about 3 hours.  He had James Levine/
Itzhak Perlman doing Mozart on both CD and vinyl, so we synced them up
so we could do single-blind A/B comparison.  The CD always sounded clearer
to me, especially the ensemble parts.  I could detect no difference in the
solo violin.  Of course the silence during rests (on other pieces) and
between bands is uncanny with CD.  On A/B-ing, I could always tell which
medium was which after a few moments of listening, but frankly, the system
-- and the music -- sounded great either way.

I detected none of the harshness that others have noted in CD's.  Lou
said that his system *was* harsh until he replaced the connector cables
from the CD-unit to the pre-amp with Monster reference cables.  In fact,
until he tried this, he was considering not keeping the unit, which he had
home on trial at the time.  He has a graphic equalizer in his system
(which he usually bypasses), and he tried to adjust the graphic to simulate
the harshness he got before making the cable-change.  When he felt he had
done so, he had built in about 6 db enhancement at 8K, sloughing down to
3 at I guess 4K and 16K (I don't remember what all the centers were -- but 
8K is right).  This was just a guess -- we didn't do any cable swapping.
By the way, the turntable always had Monster reference cable, so when
he put them on the CD-unit, he was making all his cables the same.
(He has Monster speaker cables out to the Martin Logans.)

Now, here's my query:  I always thought that a coaxial cable was like a
capacitor in parallel with the load, and so should act like a high-pass
filter.  I thought poor cables would exhibit this effect to a greater 
degree, so that poor cables would *diminish* highs, so that in turn 
switching to better cables would *enhance* highs.  As it was, the CD
was no harsher than the vinyl -- I think most would agree about that.
(I. e., I trust my ears.)  So now I want to know:   (1) has anyone had
this experience with CD units & cables?  (2) Is my understanding of
the difference between good and crummy cables correct?  (3) If both
(1) and (2), how do you reconcile them?

{philabs,cmcl2!rocky2}!cubsvax!peters            Dr. Peter S. Shenkin 
Dept of Biol. Sci.;  Columbia Univ.;  New York, N. Y.  10027;  212-280-5517