The online magazine Secrets of Home Theater is renowned for taking a geeky enthusiast's view of home theater and audio; they're best known for publicizing the DVD chroma bug, an obscure problem in some DVD players that makes bright colors in certain scenes bleed slightly into the next color. (I like to think my reviews and articles for Secrets have been a bit more accessible). Lately, Jason Serinius has been writing glowing reviews of CD demagnetizers and aftermarket power cables for Secrets, and the email and forum backlash has been palpable. It's one thing to get worked up about minor issues that are clearly visible if only you look for it in certain scenes (enthusiasts like to get worked up about that sort of thing). It's another thing entirely to ascribe audible powers to products that arguably cannot possibly produce those effects in any scientifically measurable way (enthusiasts like to argue about that sort of thing).
In a tremendously courageous move, Jason decided to take on the critics directly: he got two groups of volunteers, and, together with the Bay Area Audiophile Society, created a well organized, reasonably scientific double blind test of the expensive power cord he'd reviewed so positively. Before he gets to the test results,
- Lots of HTML is used in a preamble that references Galileo, Quantum physics, psychoacoustic principles, and perception/reality constructs.
- Lots of HTML is used to describe the (solid) credentials of those who created the test.
- Lots of HTML is used to describe the test environment, how the test was conducted, and how things could have been better.
Bottom line: nobody could tell the difference between generic power cords and Nordost's $2,500 Valhalla cables. Nobody even scored above 50%...
-avi
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