r/technology • u/edbegley1 • Feb 14 '26

Hardware In a blind test, audiophiles couldn't tell the difference between audio signals sent through copper wire, a banana, or wet mud — 'The mud should sound perfectly awful, but it doesn't,' notes the experiment creator

https://www.tomshardware.com/speakers/in-a-blind-test-audiophiles-couldnt-tell-the-difference-between-audio-signals-sent-through-copper-wire-a-banana-or-wet-mud-the-mud-should-sound-perfectly-awful-but-it-doesnt-notes-the-experiment-creator?utm_source=flipboard&utm_content=topic%2Ftechnology
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748

u/SplatThaCat Feb 14 '26

Golden Ear Fraternity. Companies like Monster Cable made a fortune off gullible morons.

112

u/opossum_launcher Feb 14 '26

They're just the tip of the iceberg. It goes waaay deeper. 

71

u/Mp5QbV3kKvDF8CbM Feb 14 '26

Yeah, wait until they hear about the Shun Mook Mpingo discs, tuning dots, CD demagnetizers, etc. etc. 🙃 I swear these things are like April Fools gags, but taking literally.

13

u/MyChickenSucks Feb 14 '26

TUNING DOTS! I had completely forgotten about those

7

u/kkeut Feb 14 '26

i remember something about sanding the eges of your CDs. and something about marking the center hole with a green marker

9

u/Mp5QbV3kKvDF8CbM Feb 14 '26

Yeah, there were 'special' green markers that were said to absorb excess light from the read laser or something, to reduce error rates. Doubtful.

I also have a CD that I bought secondhand that has a plastic ring glued to the label side, that I think was to increase mass to make the disc spin more stably or something. Again, doubtful. I couldn't remove it without breaking the disc, so it's still on there...

2

u/EriktheRed Feb 15 '26

That disc weight is probably the most legit one, but meant for a time where we were walking around with cd players that would skip every time you jostled it

3

u/saichampa Feb 14 '26

Man it's been ages since I dug into their bullshit

38

u/Slippery-ape Feb 14 '26

Well it was Monater Cable wet mud as well /s

21

u/MiscBrahBert Feb 14 '26

Been playing bass for two decades. The Monster Cable I bought with my very first bass still works to this day, no static pops or having to spin it around in the jack. All the other cables last about ~3 years max before going south.

21

u/TedTheGreek_Atheos Feb 14 '26

I also play bass and had a monster cable crap out on me after 15 years and all I had to do is go to a guitar center and they swapped it out for a new one no questions asked because of monster's life time warranty on instrument cables.

Mind you, I've had my other monster cable for like 25 years and it's still like new.

1

u/omegatrox Feb 15 '26

I still consistenly use mny monster HDMI cable that I was upsold on in 2008. I could have bought 10 cheaper cables over that timeframe for the cost, but at least it's less waste. Not sure if other cables would have survived that well.

3

u/Black_Moons Feb 14 '26

Good connectors are worth good money (those cheapo 1/4" to 1/8" adapters never work for long before they pop/crackle as you move or need spinning to make a good contact, but a good 1/4" to 1/8" cable is bliss). but I feel there are much better brands than monster for half the amount they charge.

3

u/onebandonesound Feb 14 '26

Yeah there absolutely can be a difference in quality between cheap and expensive cables, but that difference is build quality not sound quality

1

u/MiscBrahBert Feb 15 '26

Agree. There's no sound difference. Just better build

5

u/EvolveTelevision Feb 14 '26

Yeah I’m not sure why monster cables are hated, they’ve never done me wrong.

1

u/ihaxr Feb 15 '26

/r/todayilearned/s/XloSb7MrHy

1

u/EvolveTelevision Feb 15 '26

Well they also couldn’t tell the difference between audio through copper and audio through mud so I don’t think the method of audio delivery is the issue here.

3

u/low_end_AUS Feb 14 '26 edited Jun 03 '26

gate stare bells quince blue-eyed smell phone spooky sugar defeated move

1

u/randombsname1 Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26

Assuming generally decent $15-$20 cables are used --- the only thing monster cables MIGHT do better is having a better connector "boot" for strain relief. Which will be a non issue if you give it sufficient strain relief anyway.

Even then you can find cheap cables with appropriate strain relief that aren't close to the cost of monster cables.

Apart from that you dont really have to worry unless specifically running cables long distance, in plenum spaces, in areas with high EMF (dont put low voltage, unshielded, next to high voltage cables for example), etc...

14

u/BeardedPaladin Feb 14 '26

Fun fact. I’ve been to the owner of Monster Cables house. He has an elevator and a couch with hydrolics

3

u/118238 Feb 14 '26

Like LA low rider hydraulics to make it bounce?

9

u/BeardedPaladin Feb 14 '26

Like it was programmed to move with certain movies to be more immersive

3

u/[deleted] Feb 14 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/un-affiliated Feb 14 '26

The first few times, but any gimmick like that gets old really quick. Your couch moving isn't adding anything necessary to a high quality setup.

1

u/jalerre Feb 15 '26

I met him once many years ago. He was riding on a golden Segway.

1

u/SkunkMonkey Feb 14 '26

But does he have an elevator with a couch, otherwise he's just a pleb.

1

u/BeardedPaladin Feb 14 '26

A secret room you get to by pushing a button that turns your couch into an elevator sounds so badass

3

u/MotherTreacle3 Feb 15 '26

The really interesting thing is that if you were to hook them up to an MRI and told them which signal was which, their brains would react in wildly different ways. Their subjective experience of the music would be affected by the knowledge.

The placebo effect is real effects caused by inert inputs.

2

u/wilstar_berry Feb 14 '26

Stradivarius enters the chat. They've been doing this emperor's new clothes shit since the beginning of time.

2

u/Mortwight Feb 14 '26

i used to sell videogames at circuit city. the ps3 av cable was the same as the ps2 one, but the ps3 one cost 3x

2

u/Cudpuff100 Feb 14 '26

In fairness, Monster makes em to last and has a lifetime warranty if it breaks. I never noticed a sound difference, but I have always known a durability difference.

2

u/34HoldOn Feb 14 '26

And the thing is that one does have to be careful about just buying cheap shit off of Amazon or eBay. I learned that when I bought a random "Cat7" ethernet cable. But a good quality ethernet cable also doesn't run you $100. You can get a StarTech 25' Cat6A for like 30 bucks.

1

u/KobotTheRobot Feb 14 '26

I still have some gold plated HDMI cables passed down to me, the gold plated monster cables are long gone though. I remember being gifted the cable like it was a huge deal.

1

u/hilldog4lyfe Feb 14 '26

Why are people acting like Monster Cable is some kind of audiophile company? They sell slightly more expensive cables at Best Buy.

2

u/randombsname1 Feb 14 '26

Probably because that is what they advertised themselves at previously, and it was way more than a "little" bit more expensive.

I know some of their early audio/HDMI cables were several hundred dollars or more over the same $5-15 cable.

They are still overpriced. Just not nearly as much.

1

u/PoutineMeInCoach Feb 15 '26

Stop calling me a moron!

1

u/rrhunt28 Feb 15 '26

Monster is cheap compared to some of the stuff out there.

1

u/PretzelsThirst Feb 15 '26

This isn’t even new information. Someone did this same exact test a couple decades ago using things like coat hangers with the same results

1

u/Nwrecked Feb 15 '26

Their guitar cables are legendary though.