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Old 03-29-2026, 07:29 PM   #72
ratinox
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DNSB View Post
Reminds me of one time in the 1980s when one audiophile doubter ran a test where a rotary switch was used to select between a high end solid state amplifier, a McIntosh tube amplifier, a Carver magnetic amplifier (actually not a true magnetic amplifier but used unusual power supply designs) and a mid range home quality receiver all hooked up to a high end CD player and pre-amp with the amplifier output feeding a bank of headphones.
The Audio Myths Workshop has what I believe to be the original version. Starts about 3 minutes in. I'll let you watch it and not spoil the punch line.

Quote:
Anyone else seen a CD Stop Light marker pen for a mere $24.99? You ran it around the edge of the CD to reduce reflections and improve the sound. An appeal to the crowd that couldn't tell the difference between digital and analog.
Oh, ghu, yes. That was so stupid, though not as stupid as people who spend a thousand dollars or more on a 1 meter Ethernet cable.

There WAS a marker thing that did actually do something. One of Sony's attempts at copy protecting audio CDs was to add a "security" track to the discs that would in principle prevent them from being played on computers. In practice it caused a lot of mechanical problems especially with Macintosh computers in which these discs would get permanently stuck and require disassembly of the drives to remove the discs.

The "crack" was to draw over the security track with a marker so that it couldn't be read.
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