Do Coat Hangers Sound As Good Monster Cables?
Can you tell the difference between music that passed through a pricey Monster stereo Cable, and a coat hanger? A reader forwarded us a post from the Audioholics Home Theater Forum and its author says no. He says his brother ran an experiment on him and four other audio aficionados listening to a new CD from a new group blindfolded. Seven different songs were played, each time heard with the speaker hooked up to Monster Cables, and the other time, hooked up to coat hanger wire. Nobody could determine which was the Monster Cable and which was the coat hanger. The kicker? None of the subjects even knew that coat hangers were going to be used. This is, of course, "nothing new," a Google of "monster cables vs coat hangers" shows that some users have been saying this for a while. Still, this is an experiment begging to be recreated under controlled conditions (say, for instance, a double-blind test). Science fair project! Read how it went down, inside...
I'm so sorry, but I do not buy into 90% of the hype brought to us audiophiles by the commercial sector of our hobby and the home entertainment industry at large. My brother, an audio engineering whiz kid has proven to me what is real and what is not. Let me rehearse with you an example of how he does this.This is for a short run of cable. If you're going over 50 ft, then you may benefit from better shielding, but for most home people's home theaters, this is not the case. Remember folks, just because something performs better spec-wise doesn't mean it actually sounds better. Specs are one thing, psychoacoustics are another. Of course, a coat hanger doesn't have a Monster Cable lifetime warranty, so if your coat hanger breaks, you'll have to go out and buy another coat hanger.We gathered up a 5 of our audio buddies. We took my "old" Martin Logan SL-3 (not a bad speaker for accurate noise making) and hooked them up with Monster 1000 speaker cables [ed. Monster Ultra Series THX 1000 Audio Interconnects] (decent cables according to the audio press). We also rigged up 14 gauge, oxygen free Belden stranded copper wire with a simple PVC jacket. Both were 2 meters long. They were connected to an ABX switch box allowing blind fold testing. Volume levels were set at 75 Db at 1000K Hz. A high quality recording of smooth, trio, easy listening jazz was played (Piano, drums, bass). None of us had heard this group or CD before, therefore eliminating biases. The music was played. Of the 5 blind folded, only 2 guessed correctly which was the monster cable. (I was not one of them). This was done 7 times in a row! Keeping us blind folded, my brother switched out the Belden wire (are you ready for this) with simple coat hanger wire! Unknown to me and our 12 audiophile buddies, prior to the ABX blind test, he took apart four coat hangers, reconnected them and twisted them into a pair of speaker cables. Connections were soldered. He stashed them in a closet within the testing room so we were not privy to what he was up to. This made for a pair of 2 meter cables, the exact length of the other wires. The test was conducted. After 5 tests, none could determine which was the Monster 1000 cable or the coat hanger wire. Further, when music was played through the coat hanger wire, we were asked if what we heard sounded good to us. All agreed that what was heard sounded excellent, however, when A-B tests occurred, it was impossible to determine which sounded best the majority of the time and which wire was in use. Needless to say, after the blind folds came off and we saw what my brother did, we learned he was right...most of what manufactures have to say about their products is pure hype. It seems the more they charge, the more hyped it is.
Speakers; When is good enough, enough [Audioholics] (Thanks to Shane!)
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Comments:
No wire hangers...EVER!!!
@fostina1: Not really. A solid soldering iron with a hot tip and a steady hand.
Fun part's the RFI you can get with 'hangers.
One upshot to making your own is you can manage your clutter by cutting to length what you need.
Proves what I have believed for years. Can't wait to see the comments that try to dispute this. Next thing you know they'll be disputing that McDonalds coffee tested better than Starbucks (conumer reports).
I wouldn't use coat hangers for long runs.... but only because of the "skin effect" where, at higher frequencies, currents tend to travel on the outer skin of the conductor... so a coat hanger (or 14/2 Romex, for that matter) may cause signal loss... but only at long distances.
Since standard speaker cable (including Monster, and cheap Shadio Rack cable) are stranded, there are many conductors, each with their own skin effect. So, in effect, stranded cables are more efficient... but again, this is only apparant in longer runs.
This was a neat experiment though!
No mommy not the wire hanger!
for longer runs of cable, if you are truly worried about shielding, just run Coax. Its cheaper than monster cable, although not as thick on the center conductor. But if it can transmit HDTV signals, it ought to be able to handle whatever audio analog goes through it.
Of course, a coat hanger doesn't have a Monster Cable lifetime warranty, so if your coat hanger breaks, you'll have to go out and buy another coat hanger.
Bravo. We're still laughing.
Not surprising - I used to use Monster Cables for my guitar before I started buying good ones. The ONLY discernible advantage to them was that you could take them back into the music shop and get a new one when they shorted out, no paperwork or cash required. But the fact that my current cable preference doesn't seem to have that shorting problem really makes this whole point moot.
Specs and statistics are like bikinis. What they show is very interesting, but what they hide is vital!! I'm going out to get more coat hangers!
I feel sorry for the people with hearing so good that they need to spend the beaucoup bucks on vacuum-sealed cabling and super high-fi speaker setups. I'm fine with my Polks and lamp cord, thanks.
@AD8BC: Do you know anything? There is no skin effect between 20hz-20khz!!! Resistance in long runs is the only thing you need to worry about and that is solved by thicker coat hangers or wires.
Work out the skin effect at 20khz LOL!!!!
[en.wikipedia.org]
But they lack the beautifuuul labels at the end of the wire. Solution: Post-It notes!
Duh, for really short distances copper wire is copper wire.
"so if your coat hanger breaks, you'll have to go out and buy another coat hanger"
Dry cleaning isn't free you know!!!
My dog can tell the difference.
Coming soon, MONSTER CABLE COAT WIRE HANGERS!!!
Now you can pay 1000% markup for the same purpose, to hang your coat!!!
"Gee whiz, my coat certainly looks better when it's hung on one of these monsters"
Not knowing the piece of music, aka, being from a new band. Greatly influences the ability to tell sonic differences.
Bad comparison.
$0.39/foot 14 gauge lamp wire would cost a whopping $3.90 for 10' and would sound "the same" as Monster. Actually, walk to a construction site and ask one of the workers if they can give you some left over house wiring. That would also sound the same. And as an added bonus, it's free!
The only place an expensive cable MIGHT help you is if it's a cable that gets moved a lot, stepped on, etc. A guitar cable fits that category. Stereo speaker cable, not so much. Unless you're moving that setup from party to party...
Having said that, I have a 20 year old, cheap (Peavy) 25-foot main guitar cable that STILL has no shorts in it. If I were to play gigs these days, though, I'd definitely go wireless on my axe.
At least he proved to the people here that Monoprice cables are a complete ripoff.
Why pay for expensive copper when you can use potmetal?
Stranded wire is stranded to make it more flexible. The individual strands are not insulated and touch each other. Except for ease of installation, there will be no discernible audio difference between common stranded and solid wire.
See the above referenced wikipedia article. Toward the end it discusses Litz wire. With that, some small difference might be detected with sensitive instruments (or freakish ears).
You know, if Monster Cable can get people to buy their product, who are we to care?
Really?
I mean what is the outcome? You've got your 4 friends there, they can't tell the difference. So you make them look like idiots, they think you're a jerk. And maybe, just maybe, 1 of those 4 friends will wise up. The other 3 will get defensive and like you a little less.
I can understand being economical when it comes to home wiring and not going with Monster, but come on, coat hangers? Lol...
A good set of non-brand audio cables is about 5 dollars.
@laserjobs: Good point, I was just writing off the cuff here... it has been a while since I last had to actually use that knowledge....
although I could swear that there was an effect at 60 Hz...
@radio1: Thanks so much for your helpful comments on an article you don't care about. Personally I'm not so selfish with my anti-ripoff leanings and learnings.
The results may have been different if it was music the subjects were familiar with so they could look for certain subtleties in the music.
Everyone hears and perceives audio frequencies differently due mainly in part to the physical shape of your ears. Also after hearing things a certain way for long periods of time (like for example in a studio or high end sound systems) your brain tends to trick you into believing that everything sounds the same. I have to wonder if it is possible that these "audiophiles" have just been simply tricked by their brains into believing that a simple coat hanger could possibly transfer sound as well as a speaker cable.
Sounds like a pretty cool experiment though.
This just in: Monster announces new line of Clothing Suspension Frames. The 1000X model is available for only $100, and it's guaranteed should it ever break. Fashion magazines are praising its "more lifelike shape" and "resistance to environmental free radicals."
Monoprice cables are awesome. Monster cables are overpriced. They are not the same brand, not even close. Do not conflate the two!
You are paying for coolness, Monster cables look way cooler then a coat hanger, plus they are easier to attach and stay attached then a coat hanger is.
Those that actually think Monster Cables really do anything more than any other cable ought to read this. It explains such things as Monster Cables and Barack Obama:
When it comes to shopping, researchers at the University of Iowa have found that sometimes ignorance really is bliss. In what they term the Blissful Ignorance Effect, researchers at the university's Tippie College of Business found that people who have only a little information about a product are happier with that product than people who have more information.
"We found that once people commit to buying or consuming something, there's a kind of wishful thinking that happens and they want to like what they've bought," said assistant professor of marketing Dhananjay Nayakankuppam. "The less you know about a product, the easier it is to engage in wishful thinking. But the more information you have, the harder it is to kid yourself. This can be contrasted with what happens before taking any action when people are trying to be accurate and would prefer getting more information to less."
Nayakankuppam conducted the research with Himansha Mishra, a former UI graduate student now teaching at the University of Utah, and Baba Shiv of Stanford University. Their paper, "The Blissful Ignorance Effect," will be published in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of Consumer Research.
The researchers used three experiments to arrive at their conclusion. Two of them were consumer test-style experiments in which subjects were asked for their opinion of chocolate in one and hand lotion in the other. In each experiment, one group of subjects was given lots of information about the product, the other group much less. In each instance, the subjects who had little information were more optimistic about the chocolate or hand lotion than those who had more information.
In the third experiment, subjects were given the opportunity to pick a video to watch. They were told one of the movies had received uniformly good reviews from critics, while the other received mixed reviews. Although more of the subjects selected the movie they were told had received uniformly good reviews, those who selected the movie believing it had mixed reviews were more optimistic about their choice.
Nayakankuppam said that the Blissful Ignorance Effect demonstrates that people have a need to be happy with their choice, and will often engage in whatever distortion is needed to justify the purchase. That means playing up the positive aspects while downplaying the negatives.
Nayakankuppam said prior research has shown that before people make a buying decision, they generally like to take an objective, clear-headed view of the products they're considering. During this phase, so-called accuracy goals play a larger part of a person's thinking because they want to buy the product that best meets their needs at a reasonable cost. His research, however, shows that once a decision has been made, the Blissful Ignorance Effect takes hold and the buyer makes that emotional commitment to a decision.
He said the data suggests a shift in peoples' motivations. While they have a need to be accurate before taking some action, post-action it is the directional need to justify a conclusion that is more important, he said.
"Once we've committed to something, we want to be happy about the decision and that drives our perceptions about it," said Nayakankuppam. "It's your decision, it's a part of you, and that creates an emotional attachment. It's sort of like your kid and you want to like it no matter what."
In that way, he said the less we know about something, the easier it is to create our own conceptions about it. For instance, he said that if we don't know the chocolate we're eating has hundreds of calories, we can convince ourselves that it isn't expanding our waistline.
Although the research used inexpensive items like chocolate and hand lotion in its experiments, Nayakankuppam said the Blissful Ignorance Effect could apply to bigger ticket items, too, such as cars or houses. However, since people tend to do more research before buying expensive items and thus would have more information, the effect would be more limited.
STORY SOURCE: University of Iowa News Service, 300 Plaza Centre One, Iowa City, Iowa 52242-2500.
Lemme get this straight:
I have my expensive speakers (B&O).
I have my custom built amp (built by my uncle, in the 70's, when custom hi-fi was the pc).
I am going to use coat hangers to wire this stuff?
Not for nothing, I think I'll stick with monoprice. No Monster, but monoprice isn't expensive and fits the actual jacks very nicely.
PS- the wire hangers in Mommy Dearest were a lot heavier gauge than the ones you get from the dry cleaner. Hard to find good wire hangers for beating your children anymore. Progress... BAH!
I've gotten similar results by looping my monster cables and stapling them with triangular pieces of paper that say "We <3 our Customers"
... and this way your home theater system can be used to perform abortions, too!
Nobody can tell the difference between cables unless they are just to small a gauge for the distance. Here is why:
Amplifier <1% distortion
Speaker Cables <1% distortion
Speakers >1% distortion
The speakers will always be the where any difference is heard because they create much more distortion than any other component involved in the system. Think about it, the signal losses created in the mechanical system are going to be much greater than any of the electrical system. Maybe Monster can start selling uniform air in a can to fill your room for more accurate sound.
Does the fact that this is referring to an experiment in 2004 matter?
These days wire hangers just do not have the same electrical resistance and will melt under high load whereas Monster cables will still melt your credit card.
But really... 2004!!!!!!
I did a did a similar test when I was setting up a video art project a few years ago. Over a 50' run of the video cabling, the best video signal was over cheap Radio Shack coax cable with those crappy screw-on analog video adapter tips. Monster didn't even come close.
@LTS!:
If it was a study about differences in eggs matter because it was done in 1984? Montser cable is still the same as are hangers.
If the signal is analog then it can make a difference but for digital signals it makes almost no difference at all. Either the 1 and 0 are getting through or they are not.
Great. Now Target will start selling coat hangers for $80 apiece.
short answer: cables and pretty much everything else DO make a definite difference in your stereo system. if you enjoy music then do yourself a favor and read on.
I've been a hobbyist and salesman for stereo equipment before. YOU might like to believe that salesmen are evil and dangerous. that they are your enemy. truly, they are regular guys like you. the ONLY customer that will buy some outrageously priced gear and NOT test it to make sure it's worth it, is the rare guy that's too rich and too busy to care. everyone else will go home to listen with their buddies and IMMEDIATELY RETURN it if it doesn't make an improvement.
I have scores of customers to whom I gave the double - blind pepsi challenge. every time they could hear differences in different equipment.
there are certain things that can hinder the improvement of a system. there are certain brands that aren't worth the copper from which they're made. also, there are smart respectable people in this hobby that I even look up to, that I find doing or saying the dumbest things. so make sure you ALWAYS try things for yourself. make sure you always consult as many sources as possible. make sure you never treat your opinion as the final word no matter how much you think you've cemented it in truth. reason: there are so many variables in the equation / so many links in the chain of any stereo system that it's very difficult to pinpoint any one thing down to test it. that's why many engineers in many industries are paid lots of money to create better audio equipment for various applications.
1. a system is a chain who's weakest link can bring down everything else .
2. certain brands and certain items from certain brands are mostly worthless. monster is a great example for cable. their surge protectors are a good value though, and their warranty is NOT BS. audioquest has some cables that are way out in left field, and they usually sound like crap. but their simple cables with multiple individually insulated conductors are worthwhile. ( 'multiple individually insulated conductors' is a trend in many brands that sound good, yet CAT-5 cable WILL sound like crap. it's engineered for a different purpose.)
3. if a good system isn't set up properly then you're sabotaging your own sound / your own experiment. e.g. A/B switchers MAY NOT be used in an experiment!
4. it does not take a lot of money to make a worthwhile system. but "a lot" is ambiguous. currently a fun stereo would start at about US$2000, and can be built in pieces over time.
5. different people have different preferences. any stereo has trade-offs. different people will choose different trade-offs. to eliminate more trade-offs, more money must be spent!
But now try finding a 50ft+ coat hanger....
ya but you know how hard it is to get those little ends on the coat hanger.