I've agreed to try out the Hybrid cables next week. Dennis is sending them my way and Chris Shepherd is also sending some other guitar and interconnect cables for some other testing I have planned.
I am planning to do this:
Rubber band a pair of CMC6/MK4's (matched) together and close mic a Collings guitar played by Cody Kilby.
I'm going to use one cable from each maker and record the pair in stereo to a stock R4. I'll then flip the cables to the other mic and retest.
That will give you two seperate tests for each cable, one with each mic. That should isolate any difference between the two matched mics. I'm sure the difference in the mics is less than the difference in the cables, but we shall see.
I'm going to test:
Gumbino's hi-ho silvers VS Van Den Hol's Mic Hybrid
Mogami VS Canare
el cheapo VS Van Del Hol's
probably test the mogami vs gumbino's too.
Each cable will go directly from the mic to the stock R4 for recording. no splitters, nothing.
after that, I have several other tests planned such as testing out a few pre's
V3 vs R4
Great River VS Grace V3 versus Neve Portico VS API 3124
etc......
I am in the market to buy some new cable and pre's right now, so this test is mainly for me, but I'm sure others would like to hear the results.
I'll try to test it out on other instruments or a live club setting, but not sure that is possible to do right now. I'll start with the guitar tests and see what happens.
I've spent many hundreds of dollars on cables over the years and I suspect I know what makes a good cable, it's completely transparent. Cheap cables aren't, that's a fact. It doesn't mean you need to spend $500 on a pair of mic cables, but the less the cable gets in the way of your clarity, the better off the recording will be. The better the wire, the better the chances of making a good recording.
About cable burn-in, that's a misnomer. Cables do sound much better after they have "burned in", however very few people understand that as soon as you touch or move them, they lose that quality. It takes a few days of being untouched or perfectly still to achieve that effect, it happens on the sub-atomic level.
For us tapers, that has no value at all. We move our cables around constantly.
It does have major value in a playback system where cables are usually left alone for long periods of time.
Ever move your speaker cables around and notice they don't sound as good for a while? that's it.
look for these results to be posted in a NEW thread late next week or so.
Cheers, Phil