Crazy crazy crazy

Let's start this thread for showing/describing/talking about the most crazy thing we have seen in the audiophile world....

This is not to discuss if those things works or not (we already had the discussion about the Marigot dots.... lol).

I'll start with this audio grade breaker box https://www.thecableco.com/product.php?id=6225

The inspiration for the Acoustic ART system came to our lead designer Ted Denney four years ago while sailing the South Pacific. During his sabbatical, Ted visited Buddhist Temples and observed how Tibetan Prayer bowls altered temple acoustics. These singing bowls affected a sudden shift in acoustics whenever they were activated, and when additional bowls of varying tone were also activated, the acoustics continued to change. Ted reasoned that a system of resonating bowls could be developed to discreetly treat room acoustics without the need for large unsightly tuning devices.

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http://www.synergisticresearch.com/?p=195

Anything from Machina Dynamica .....clever little clock....the (obscene) phone call tweak,,,,etc...

One of my favorites was the green pen for edge-treating CDs. Probably a re-branded Sharpie.

Beleive it or not...the Vibratron really works well....as a marital aid.

Tube60 said:

One of my favorites was the green pen for edge-treating CDs. Probably a re-branded Sharpie.

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Made a difference IMS.

*sigh*
The whole power cord thing. If someone can prove to me how a grand worth of wire can improve upon the friction connections at either end then I'll be less skeptical. But really, it's right up there with the wavey hatrack thingy.

For me it is exotic power cords. I try to keep an open mind, but for this I just can't - no matter how hard I try.

The power has travelled through kilometres and kilometres of electricity network, through countless substations and transformers, through your meter, breakers, fuses and house's wiring. What is tacking a metre of exotic cable on the end going to do? Heck - if you really don't believe me, open up whatever component to which you are connecting this exotic cable and have a look at what is on the other side - chances are it's generic stuff just like a generic cable would contain! If you connected your speakers with coat hanger wire, would you think half an inch of Nordost Valhalla on the end would make a difference?

Granted - if you've got power conditioning I might see a valid reason.

Beakman said:

*sigh*
The whole power cord thing. If someone can prove to me how a grand worth of wire can improve upon the friction connections at either end then I'll be less skeptical. But really, it's right up there with the wavey hatrack thingy.

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Hi Beak,

Your skepticism is certainly well founded. In the spirit of full disclosure, I do believe, based on my personal experience, that they do make an audible / positive difference.

Try this.

Replace the power cord that plugs into your source. IMHO, this component is typically the one that will be impacted the most. If you are going to hear what other folks believe is true, this should tell you.

Get a "stock" item from Audio Advisors or Music Direct. Both of these companies offer a wide selection and a 30 day money back.

Not much to lose and may or may not validate your position.

GG

Beakman said:

*sigh*
The whole power cord thing. If someone can prove to me how a grand worth of wire can improve upon the friction connections at either end then I'll be less skeptical. But really, it's right up there with the wavey hatrack thingy.

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I believe you are speaking of the Shakti Hallographs.

This is perhaps one of the most astounding bits of hoodwinkery ever perpetrated in the Audio world. Nearly $1000 for some artfully carved and painted wood sculptures? I've heard them, moved in and out of a "reference" system, and sure they made a difference--ANYTHING that you put behind your speakers will effect the sound. But was it $999 worth of difference? Only if you light your cigars with Benjamins, I suppose...

Yeah, whatever. I just wish I could perpetrate this sort of scam and not wind up in prison...

Gordon Gray said:

Replace the power cord that plugs into your source. IMHO, this component is typically the one that will be impacted the most. If you are going to hear what other folks believe is true, this should tell you.

Get a "stock" item from Audio Advisors or Music Direct. Both of these companies offer a wide selection and a 30 day money back.

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Or get your hands on some good wire, some decent hospital-grade plugs, and MAKE your own. Same result for 1/20th the cost. There are dozens of websites outlining how to make your own "upgraded" power cords, and it's about as technically involved as hooking up a pair of bi-wired speakers.

Power cords DO make a difference, and if you are using high-quality power conditioning (like an isolation transformer-based unit, or an AC regenerator) the improvements can be shocking. But the price charged for some of these power cords is simply psychotic.

IMO, anyone who can't operate a wire stripper and make a good solder joint has no business being in this hobby. An "audiophile" who doesn't own (and know how to operate) a soldering iron cannot be trusted...

For me, the best scams in the Audio world are any little wood/felt/composite discs, panels, or pucks that you stick to the walls of your room, or the sided of your components. I'm not saying these devices don't work (some of them actually effect surprising improvements!). What I'm saying is that the prices charged for these doodads and trinkets is criminal, bordering on sociopathic.

The only difference between the occult community and the audiophile community is fashion. Occultism (at least publicly-practiced occultism) went out of vogue as a status symbol in the moneyed class in the 1700's. Folks like John Dee, Isaac Newton, and Roger Bacon would be branded as cranks today, but in their day, their weird, wacky, and mojo-laden worldviews were considered extremely au-courant. Today, it's perfectly acceptable to believe that wavy wood sculptures, tiny vials full of "specially treated" gemstones, and dialectric paper canactually make great improvements in one's audio system. And it's considered amoung the "moneyed class" to be somehow admirable to own and implement these 21-st century Magickal talismans in one's audio systems.

Let's just call these ultra-out-there tweeks what they are--belief in magic and occultic powers. Only now, instead of angels, demons, and spygeric compounds, the ultra-rich are throwing their money at things like "hallographic imaging", resonance-controlling paint, tachyonic/cryogenic/quantum-tunnelling-treated cables, and other such articles of mystical and magickal juju.

The purveyors of stuff are no different from the majority of practitioners of Alchemy in the Renaissance--they are shysters with trendy buzzwords as their main product, charging avariscious fees for what amounts to a lot of smoke and mirrors...

But then again, as long as there are people with more money than sense, these companies will remain in business. I guess some of my disgust with these products is sour grapes--I only wish I could get in on this astoundingly delusional gravy train...

Hmmmm... Perhaps it's time for a career change... :ROFL:

Do not take this the wrong way, but the inability of some "audiophiles" to just sit back and ENJOY THE MUSIC! Any system, anywhere, anytime, anyhow, put on your favorite album by your favorite artist and tap your toes, drum on your chair, bang your head, throw stuff...I dont care....just enjoy the music for itself and not bother with all the other crap.

A side benefit of being able to do this is you can literally save thousands of dollars on audio equipment.

But, there is nothing wrong with enjoying the music on an uber elite Martin Logan system!

Dreamer said:

Yeah, whatever. I just wish I could perpetrate this sort of scam and not wind up in prison...

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Go to work on Wall Street!

Risabet,

The problem isn't that I lack the intelligence, creativity, knowledge, or patter to pull something like this off. The problem isn't in what I lack--it's what I have an over-abundance of, and that is a respect for other people. Well, I suppose included in that IS a complete lack of ability to treat others in an unethical manner in business dealings.

Which is why I will most likely always remain "middle class". I just can't stomach the idea of a business model that is fundamentally based on picking people's pockets, whether it's in the financial sector, sales, or whatever.

I guess I do lack one ability that prevents me from doing this--I do not have the ability to look someone in the eye and lie through my teeth and maintain a sincere expression.

However, all this said, there IS a certain "Robin Hood" attraction to the prospect of selling mystical trinkets, techno-talismans and esoteric gris-gris to gullible, deep-pocketed audiophools, ESPECIALLY the tin-eared ones who have accumulated their ill-gotten riches through graft, corruption, and unethical dealings. I suppose one could somehow justify selling these sorts of folk a bag of rocks or a scrapwood sculpture for hundreds (or thousands) of dollars if I shared the proceeds with some close friends and my family, and sort of "spread the wealth" around my local community to those in need...

We don't need socialist government programs to redistribute the wealth in this country--we just need more audiophile tweek manufacturers to sprout up in the garages and workshops of the dying middle class.

Hmmmm. Maybe it IS time for a career change... :think: :think: :think:

All I need is a good "front man". Or maybe a female sales rep would work better. I'd just have to make sure she never had lunch with any investment consultants in Santa Ana, CA...

http://cbs2.com/local/Oksana.Grishuk.James.2.731365.html

Dreamer said:

However, all this said, there IS a certain "Robin Hood" attraction to the prospect of selling mystical trinkets, techno-talismans and esoteric gris-gris to gullible, deep-pocketed audiophools,

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Reminds me, there is a painting in the National Gallery here, consisting simply of three vertical stripes covering the full canvas; it is called "Voice of Fire". The powers that be at the Gallery saw fit to pay $2.1 MILLION for it. The "art-speak" involved in their justification of the purchase was beyond my powers of comprehension.

You just have to love the vibb-eaters.

http://www.entreq.com/default.asp?PageId=1924

Sounds like the British art-huckster Damien Hirst, who, in June 2008 suceeded in selling a $100,000 diamond-encrusted platinum skill to an investment group that HE belongs to. He said after the sale, he intends on pocketing the money and re-selling the skull to another bidder in the future. Now THAT is a beautiful scam...

http://www.luxist.com/photos/the-world-of-damien-hirst/872133/


He also sold at Sotheby's, in September of 2008, a formaldehyde-preserved calf with 18k golden hooves and horns to an undisclosed bidder for $18 million. That same day, he also succeeded in bilking another "collector" to the tune of $17.2 million, a shark in formaldehyde. Total take for Hirst in his 2-day, 1-man collection auction at Sotheby's? A cool $200.8 million. Not a bad take for a couple of days at the auction block, eh?

http://www.luxist.com/2008/09/15/hirsts-golden-calf-sells-for-record-breaking-18-million/

The art world has become so infiltrated with self-indulgent pseudo-intellectuals and well-funded sociopathic deviants that there is almost nothing of true artistic merit, beauty, or genuine humanity being created by "big league" artists anymore. It seems that "works of art" now primarily consist of jars of bodily effluvia with various religious articles suspended in them, epoxy-encased, thinly-sliced corpses of humans, suspended on wires, and various large animals swimming in gigantic formaldehyde-filled aquariums, made up to look like the very gods of iniquity and depravity that these people apparently serve.

The debased aesthetics and moral turpitude of the people who are creating this "art" are mid-boggling in their depths.

The explanations of these works by pseudo-intellectual wankers calling themselves "art critics" or "art academics" often rival the insane rantings of Charles Manson in their twisted, convoluting, self-contradictory circuity.

And the demented, Molock-worshiping super-rich sociopaths who buy this art will hopefully, one day, be memorialized for their participation in these inhuman displays of avarice and life-devaluing nihilism, as flayed, epoxy-encased briskets themselves, preferably sooner than later...

Any artist who dares makes art that is not somehow repulsive, offensive, or outright death-cult idolary is at the least derided as "quaint" or "whimsical", but more often is lambasted as "retrogressive" or viciously flayed in print as being "out of touch with the modern aesthetic".

It is a sad state of affairs, not just for the art world, but for the ENTIRE world, when art of beauty is called disgusting and unmarketable, and the disgusting and debased is hailed as desireable. Perhaps, however, art is imitating life--or at least the low-lifes who can afford to buy it...

Bravo!!! You said it so much better than I could.

I think dismissing anything out of hand without experiencing it for ones self or understanding it's origin and rationale is, in keeping with the title of this thread, crazy, crazy, crazy...

I'm not a big fan of Hirst's work, but I am intrigued by what I've read about his motivation. I'll reserve judgement and commentary until I actually see some of it with my own eyes.

I think there IS a lot of tom foolery in high end audio. I also think there are a lot of very good products that may add to my enjoyment of music. I investigate those products that intrigue me or that I feel may offer an improvement in one area or another. If I'm intrigued enough I will bring them into my system for audition. Once I verify for myself that they either work as advertised and work synergistically with the rest of my system, I will make a decision to either support them by virtue of investment or dismiss them in the context of my system - but even then I understand that my experience is not the sum total of all experience, and therefore what does not fire my rocket may very well indeed be the bee's knee's in the context of another's system/room/experience.

With all due respect Dreamer (and I mean that sincerely and in the spirit of honest discourse), I'm a little suprised by the dismissive tone of your post above, especially in light of many of your other posts. I'm particularly referencing your rather brilliant insight on the topic of Reggae music most recently. There was some true insite and enlightenment.

Experience and enlightenment can open many doors.

After all, nobody is putting a gun to any of our heads and saying "You MUST buy this or that or die".