This may be a stupid question but do non-Schoeps collettes have the potential to affect the sound? Up until this point all prior listening comps done in the past used some form of Schoeps collette that I can think of.
Those do look really cool and I'm sure the Gefell folks are doing backflips that this is moving forward.
Well, really anything and everything has the potential to affect the sound of the system being considered. Whether a particular person or whether humans in general can hear the difference is another matter, though I'm sure there are audiophiles out there that say they can. Personally, I have a really hard time believing that a block of wood carved with some magical properties by Audioquest or whoever and placed under your speaker cables running over the floor can make a difference, yet these are actual marketed products.
Anyway, back to the point -- different wire/cable used with different dielectrics, different capacitance, etc can potentially affect the sound. And different components in the collette (notably, choice of the FET used) can affect the sound, and mfg/design/layout of the electronics inside the collette can affect the sound.
I'd be hopeful that this impact would be pretty negligible. Yet Brian/Itgoestoeleven who also has been working on an AKG active system for many months now seems to have been doing a lot of testing of various active cable designs (the electronics side, not the mechanical side) trying to get a design he is happy with. I can't speak for him, but I assume this means he feels there are in fact differences in different designs/layouts/parts choices that he is trying to work through.
So all said, yes probably more tests and listening comps are in order once these new active systems start making their way into the taping community. Always fun to have more comps, keeps us on our toes.
