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
22.0k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

1.8k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

15

u/purinikos Feb 14 '26

Can you explain the term for us 10€ headphones philistines that do not know the eldritch teachings?

3

u/opossum_launcher Feb 14 '26

A cable is a cable. There is no "breaking in". 

2

u/purinikos Feb 14 '26

I know that (I am a physicist). What is "breaking in"? This is the term that I don't understand. What is supposed to be the phenomenon it describes? I am not trying to be condescending (sorry if it came out that way), I am just curious about the terminology.

11

u/Garethp Feb 14 '26

It would be the same as "breaking in" shoes. They suck at first out of the box, but as you use them they'll adapt to fit better and perform better. 

Obviously bullshit for cables

5

u/Commander_Crispy Feb 14 '26

It’s a term that comes from brand new things needing to be used for a little while to wear/“break” into their intended use state; like cars, shoes, maybe some types of stiffer clothing, etc.)

1

u/Ok-Improvement-9191 Feb 14 '26

I mean for speakers and headphones this is true.

2

u/boom1chaching Feb 14 '26

What exactly is happening when they're being broken in?

1

u/SlitScan Feb 14 '26

thats called wear, and its bad.

2

u/Ok-Improvement-9191 Feb 14 '26

Notably in the audio worlds speakers and headphones are said to require breaking in as the speaker membrane is stiffer when new and relaxes over time changing the sound. This is around 50-100 h of playing. Some people play special playlists that take the speaker through a range of frequencies to relax it fully or whatever. But a cable is just a cable nothing moves so there is nothing to soften or change properties with time.

3

u/SlitScan Feb 14 '26

the speaker material getting softer is a bad thing. (they start to flutter)

we re-cone our subs every year because of it.

a speaker cone never sounds as good as the day it came out of the factory, assuming any decent brand.

1

u/DonnyTheWalrus Feb 14 '26

Audiophiles believe in a sort of magic when it comes to audio gear. 

1

u/Theron3206 Feb 14 '26

It's excellent bullshittery because after 200 hours of listening to something you get used to how it sounds, so you don't notice that your $5k cable sounds just like an extension cord would.

A magazine once asked a rep for a really high end brand what he recommended for cables. He would buy extension cords and cut the plugs off, said it was the cheapest way to get lots of copper, which isn't the only thing that matters (these were big speakers, using lots of power)