Cryo EL84s

[turretslug]

I expect that a lot of the fretting over minutiae could be explained by psychologists under the heading of "perfectionism". My father used to sit on aviation accident enquiries where details of the precise alloying of bolts and adherence to heat-treatment regimes really could affect whether people lived or died. Hi-fi is a very different matter and maintaining perspective is important in any field of life, to do otherwise is to risk the exponentiating water-slide of madness. I have read in hi-fi magazines how all sorts of things can affect sound quality as well as cryo-treatment of valves, including the precise colours of cables, sorry interconnects. I'm prepared to accept that different dyes may marginally affect things like dielectric constant and loss- but can it make any significant difference in a competently-designed system?

It's wise to keep in mind phrases such as "vanishingly small", "negligible" and "insignificant" where audio homeopathy is concerned- and just enjoy the rest of life, it's trickling away from all of us

[Radio Wrangler]

Um, I don't think that's 1.6 E-19 electrons to make up a Coulomb, I think that's the other way round, but what's a factor of 10^38 between friends?

David

[Ted Kendall]

Originally Posted by turretslug

...but can it make any significant difference in a competently-designed system?

Precisely. If the kit is properly designed and built and the contacts are clean, nearly all the differences vanish like smoke and those that remain are not of the variety which defies Ohm's law.

[paulsherwin]

Back on topic please.

[Lucien Nunes]

You might not have spotted the 1/x:

your measly 1/(1.6 exp-19)

But on a totally different note, given that the drift velocity is many orders of magnitude less than the thermal velocity, and that the ohmic resistance of the metal parts of the valve is a few orders of magnitude less than the impedance of the relevant circuit, why would you not want to subject all metallic conductors in the circuit to the same treatment? If it works for valves, surely it will work for output transformers?

Let's hope that doesn't catch on, I can see insulation failures ahead.

[Radio Wrangler]

Oops, sorry, Lucien.

And there's all that wire in the speaker voice coils! Ripe for cryo-treatment.

David

[Hartley118]

Continuing the cryogenic theme, there may be a good market for superconducting speaker cables - boron nitride or similar - with circulated liquid helium. It's all feasible - at a price! Probably need to install the helium fridge in the next room to avoid the background noise.

Perhaps one could then launch some upmarket speakers with a difficult impedance curve which depended on superconducting cables to maintain a flat response. I can see the business plan coming together before my very eyes!

Martin

[Brian R Pateman]

Despite repeated requests this thread has drifted inexorably towards audiophool silliness.

Closed.