Audioquest $340 Ethernet cable teardown.

Discussion in 'Audio Hardware' started by daglesj, Jul 24, 2015.

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  1. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    This stuff just gets kind of sad quickly. A lot of people commenting in this thread do or have worked in IT and are quite knowledgable on the subject at hand. Certainly the furthest thing from a couple of people sitting around trying to sound smart on a topic they're not actually well versed in.

    But, despite the fact that a network cable is not nor will ever be an "audio cable", and despite the fact that the network models are designed to make the physical layer mostly irrelevant, look at this, Audioquest makes a network cable, ergo it's an audio cable, and people need to defend audio cables from the bad guys!

    Best of all, these folks feel that there's somehow a moral high ground (there isn't), and they have it (they don't). So there's a special kind of patronizing finger-wagging that goes on display. And finally, of course, the suggestion that people who have invested their careers working with computer networks in mission-critical, high value applications just don't really know much about this kind of thing.

    Again, it would be sad were it not so hilarious! :pineapple:
     
    BuddhaBob, Shel, mongo and 2 others like this.
  2. Scott Wheeler

    Scott Wheeler Forum Resident

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    Maybe I missed these posts. Could you point out where people are "defending audio cables from bad guys" and are "somehow feeling a moral high ground" and are doing some "patronizing finger waving?"
     
    jupiterboy likes this.
  3. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    That would probably be considered rude of me, so I'll just tell you to read the thread again. :wiggle:
     
  4. Scott Wheeler

    Scott Wheeler Forum Resident

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    I already didn't see them the first time.
     
  5. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    Well, I'd say give it one more try and then give up. Fortunately, you're not being graded on anything here, so probably no sense wasting your afternoon on it, right?
     
  6. Scott Wheeler

    Scott Wheeler Forum Resident

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    If you aren't willing to point out what you are talking about then I see no point in wasting anymore time at all much less an afternoon. Looks like a burning straw man to me and I will leave it at that unless you change your mind about pointing out what you are talking about...:cool:
     
  7. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    So Scott, what we have here is a situation where I don't feel especially compelled to explain myself to you. If you didn't understand my post, perhaps you weren't the intended audience. I'd add a "make sense?", but I'm guessing it wouldn't.
     
    sunspot42 likes this.
  8. gloomrider

    gloomrider Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Hollywood, CA, USA
    I'm thinking many forums members find themselves in the unenviable position of having to explain themselves to Mr. Wheeler.

    But having him here sure does improve the overall quality of the forum. :winkgrin:
     
  9. Scott Wheeler

    Scott Wheeler Forum Resident

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    Nah, I understood the post. I just didn't buy it. It's a shame that you have to turn this into personal attacks though. But that usually follows when one has nothing to back up their assertions. if that is all ya got I'm done with it. So feel free to move on if you like. Or feel free to talk about the topic.
     
  10. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    There weren't any personal attacks, Scott. I have quite a lot to back up my assertions to the futility of trying to make ethernet cable "sounds better". Your post uses the language of a person having an argument. I'm not having an argument with you, so what exactly is it you're doing here?
     
    mongo and sunspot42 like this.
  11. jimbutsu

    jimbutsu WATCH YÖUR STEPPE

    Neither will a USB cable!

    I'll show myself out...
     
    Billy Infinity and tmtomh like this.
  12. Scott Wheeler

    Scott Wheeler Forum Resident

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    Apparently wasting my time with someone who doesn't want to support his assertions. I'm done wasting my time with you. If you want to talk about the subject then we can do that. Otherwise I am moving on. If you don't understand that your post #208 was nothing but a personal attack we really have nothing more to talk about at all.
     
  13. tim185

    tim185 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Australia
    You said "perceived difference". That's it right there.
     
    toddrhodes likes this.
  14. toddrhodes

    toddrhodes Forum Resident

    Location:
    South Bend, IN
    Absolutely. It's the only way to talk about such things. I don't have the equipment nor the motivation to test my perceptions. I do have a motivation to not spend $230 on a USB device and cable so if anything, I'd rather it not make an improvement so I can send it back and move on. Sadly, for my wallet, that was not the case :)

    Cheers!
     
  15. darkmass

    darkmass Forum Resident

    Jeeze no, not a total forum troll. (In truth, I don't think you're a troll in the slightest...though I haven't completed populating my spreadsheet yet to see what percentage of agreements you and I have. :))

    Maybe the Pono was to slightly soften what was to follow. (Note, where I typed "word view" in that post, my fingers dropped the "l" in "world view"). You see, "science" is a ladder, and ain't none of us here anywhere close to the top rung. At that, the top rung keeps going up more quickly than we can approach it. And at that science isn't even a ladder except in the most limited and two-dimensional of senses.

    We all got some science. We all pick our battles. I just happen to think some forum "scientists" got some bootstraps to be hauling on. Science isn't amber that freezes our knowledge in place.
     
    ElvisCaprice likes this.
  16. samurai

    samurai Step right up! See the glory, of the royal scam.

    Location:
    MINNESOTA
    1. This thread is tedious.
    2. If someone wants to buy a $340 Ethernet cable I don't care, not my money.
    3. And I don't feel superior to that person because, again, I don't care.
     
    Ham Sandwich likes this.
  17. 56GoldTop

    56GoldTop Forum Resident

    Location:
    Nowhere, Ok
    Dang, that's the best made ethernet cable I've ever seen. It's, for sure, a far cry from grabbing a couple of connectors, a crimper and a few feet of plenum cable off a roll. If you don't know what I'm talking about.................... :shh: I bet their RCA and XLR cables are bitchin'. :agree: Just sayin'. Couldn't care less about their ethernet cable; don't do "network" audio. ;)
     
  18. gloomrider

    gloomrider Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Hollywood, CA, USA
    Well, we all like science, right? How much gear would any of us have if it weren't for electrical engineers? And I'm pretty certain they learned a bunch of science to become competent engineers.

    But I don't think this thread is about science at all. I think it's a discussion about companies making items of dubious value/price ratio and just how far a company has to go before it crosses the line of fraud.

    I'm quite familiar with the ideological view that, "it's doesn't matter how much it costs. If people want to pay obscene amounts of money for items not measurably better than similar items costing less than 10% or even 1%, it's their business. The only people who care about this are envious wannabe audiophiles". And sure enough, that contingent in represented here in this thread quite well.

    But I'm always surprised to find that vendor advocacy is almost always embraced (lovingly at times) here while consumer advocacy is often derided or even actively discouraged. Can't both exist? And why do the people who seem to think of themselves as "real" audiophiles often quickly dismiss discussions about the actual value of items (like Ethernet cables) as envious chatter that doesn't belong in the forum?

    Should people be "allowed" to spend their money on things of dubious value? Who cares? I'm talking about whether companies should be allowed to sell them and what obligations the companies have to disclose information that enables consumers to determine their actual value.

    Or, going back to science, far less expensive Ethernet cables will have as good or better a Bit Error Rate as the Audioquest cable that this thread is about. If Audioquest disclosed that, then we would all agree that the purchasers of that cable would be fools. And then this thread would devolve into a debate on "fool's rights".
     
    Shel, jeffsab, Rolltide and 2 others like this.
  19. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    Oh, internet. Here we have a person who responded to a post I made, demanded I make additional posts I had no interest in making, but finally announces he's "done wasting his time with me". Well good, seeing as how I was never addressing you in the first place and had no interest in whatever it is you're talking about, I'm glad you've decided to close this particular chapter of your e-life.
     
  20. jimbutsu

    jimbutsu WATCH YÖUR STEPPE


    FIRE BAD!
     
  21. jimbutsu

    jimbutsu WATCH YÖUR STEPPE

    Are you talking about me? I thought we had a connection...
     
  22. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    Awww, baby you know I wouldn't do you like that.
     
  23. jimbutsu

    jimbutsu WATCH YÖUR STEPPE

    Huge relief, I was dreading having to explain to my boss why I was crying at my desk (again).
     
    Gaslight likes this.
  24. Rolltide

    Rolltide Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vallejo, CA
    Excellent post from beginning to end, sir. My favorite line was "And why do the people who seem to think of themselves as "real" audiophiles often quickly dismiss discussions about the actual value of items (like Ethernet cables) as envious chatter that doesn't belong in the forum?". This is the question I want to bellow from the top of a mountain. I try to make pains in threads like this to point out that Audiophilia itself is not on trial. Poking fun of Audioquest for sheer nonsense on ethernet cables is NOT an attack on one's interconnects, speaker cable, isolation pods, or even cable elevators. I own Audioquest products and use them every day.

    In terms of science, I don't really understand why we'd even go there, or what it is we're doing there. This isn't an attempt to understand black holes. Humans made ethernet and we know exactly how it works. There aren't mysteries of nature there we've yet to unlock.
     
    Last edited: Aug 4, 2015
  25. Scott Wheeler

    Scott Wheeler Forum Resident

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    Love science. But one can become a designer and manufacturer of audio equipment without being a scientist or even knowing much about science.

    It has become about a lot of things but initially it was about Ars taking a specific Audioquest cable to task.

    I seem to be reading a different thread than you. I see plenty of folks here that are very much about consumer advocacy. OTOH I didn't read any posts accusing those who are on that side of being "wannabe audiophiles." "Can't both exist?" Sure but it does seem that the mere existence of these cables and people who like them really rubs some people the wrong way.

    Let's talk about the can of worms you seem to be opening here. Who gets to determine "value?" I'm all for disclosure. But I think event that has to be reasonable. What has to be disclosed?


    First, do you know that Audioquest actually knew that? Second, ethernet cables aside one has to remember that "good" and "better" are subjective in nature. There are plenty of things in audio that supposedly measure badly but sound good. So if one is talking about government regulation of audio products one has to be careful about all these things.
     
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