@johnjen
I will withhold any comments till I check one of these devices out but it sounds like you are noticing a remarkable difference in ALL cables. Therefore with one of those machines in hand, and following careful protocols I could cook a certain amount of cables of most any type and you could tell me blindly which cables were cooked because they sound remarkably better? Lets say a group of 8-10 cables and I would leave some uncooked, and cook the remainder. Obviously then you would be able to say, cables 2, 6, and 9 out of the 10 sound remarkably better. In the sake of fairness I would want you to select a type of cable that is the easiest for you to tell a difference with, I have some short runs of 16 awg speaker wire I could easily use for such an experiment if that is a good choice for you. Heck I could even send you hand built USB cables, interconnects, AES/EBU cables whatever, in groups of five just to make sure I was not sending you a sampling that was more difficult than what you are using yourself. You might have trouble with one type of cable but be spot on with all the rest.
Bill had mentioned headphone cables but I believe if those are hand braided, it is so hard to get every pair braided with the exact same force as I might with standard twisted pair, or bonded twisted pair (even more accurate.)
That sounds like a fun experiment to me and I know
@bcowen to be a most honorable man, I could send him the info before you announce your results in order to be totally fair. I prefer shipping such things inside the US and I would certainly cover all expenses in such an experiment. The cables would be brand new and newly cooked and I know Bill keeps all equipment in remarkable condition so I am sure his cooker is fine. I do not know you and it is not my intent to embarrass you of course, I would just like to set something up more out of curiosity, I have spent the last 14 years in this specific field and I am always willing to learn something new. As a thank you for taking the time to do this, if you are willing, I would be happy to send you a set of cables gratis that I would personally fabricate or just let you keep the test cables.
This could be a fun thing for Jason to try at one of his monthly thunderdome challenges as well if he runs out of ideas. If you happened to see what I sent him for last night's experiment at Schiit, I believe you can tell I would follow through on my end if you are game for a challenge.
When I first purchased my cooker I did test it with 2 sets of power cables I made.
I made a double set of power cables with copper, and gold, and rhodium connectors from the same manufacturer.
I cooked one set and not the other.
The results were significant enough that I kept the cooker.
And over the years I have repeatedly 'proven' to myself that the sonic differences are obvious, and most welcome, in MY system.
These sonic differences are, at least to me, readily apparent, but can be obscured by a system that can mask these sonic changes.
As such being familiar with the system and its sonic signature is a must, not to mention the choices of music for such testing.
For instance one of the most obvious improvements I notice is the extremely low bass response.
Some systems just don't go down to 20Hz nor have sub 20Hz response, nor does all music.
And I really don't care for 'blind' testing as it is a skewed methodological approach to differentiating what is
'Better', not just different.
While it can help with determining differences, qualitative assessment is not it's forté.
Mike Moffet posted his thoughts a ways back on 'blind' testing and I fully concur with his experiences and conclusions.
And since blind testing doesn't lend itself to determining what is
'Better', I use a different approach.
I make assessments over long term listening (days, weeks, months) not minutes, because some of the differences are subtle, while others (like the bass response) are not.
For example, cooking digital cables (USB, SPDIF, AES, Ethernet) is far more subtle than ac power or analog signal cables.
I'd say cook some cables, listen to them for at least a week, if not weeks, with lots of very familiar music, then remove them and pay attention to the qualitative changes with the same music, and then change back to the cooked cables and again listen to the differences.
THAT is where the qualitative aspects will become apparent.
And if your friend will loan you his cooker, this approach is going to tell you more than what 'blind' testing ever can or will.
That is how I test for improvements, in my system, which I have found to be a much better methodological approach to differentiating
'Better'.
Which really is my aim in determining what any tweaks/changes/modifications are all about, is it
'Better' or just different?
And to this end I have kept a written log of such testing over years, where patterns emerge as to the type of modification, and how much time it takes to notice changes, and then determine if these changes are truly
'Better', or not.
And I would love to participate in this little test, except…
I am currently in the middle of other projects (dialing in 2 tube amps, making matched pair tube assessments, evaluating newly made, but different configuration power cables), and as such my entire system is not 'stable' and unchanging enough for such tests.
Which in turn means they would have to take place months in the future, and so these tests would probably not be 'timely' enough, especially since you can test a cooker yourself.
And again since I don't utilize blind testing as a method for assessment as it is far to 'quick and dirty' and lacks resolution and qualitative data for my needs, which means the tests themselves would take weeks as well.
But with access to a cooker yourself you can determine, for yourself, if there is any benefit to cooking cables, and after all, that really is all that matters, to you.
I have already put forth the effort and know what the results are, for me, in my system, and I like what the contribution cooked cables makes.
And this is but one such cable enhancement technique I have explored, using the methodological approach described above.
JJ