Digital coax can sound laid back while not losing any prat. Especially with instruments that end up layered like fillers (back ground keyboards and stuff like that). If you go to short like a meter or less it can still have PRAT but it seems to be on edge and less laid back. Like it's in a rush somehow. Never have listened to longer than 1.5 that I recall. Also with complicated time signatures in electric jazz the PRAT gets lost with cheap coax. Seems better in 1.5 meter. It's about PRAT imo.
Agreed. When I was working with coax cables, it was fairly obvious to me that right at 1.5m (6') was the best sounding compromise. It didn't matter if it was standard RCA's, Canare 75ohm-ish RCAs or BNCs... they all sounded better at that length. AES/EBU just sucked, no matter what. So much for standards.
I'm finding the same kind of results with USB cables. Seems like .75m and 1.5m sound better than 1m, but the jury is still out. I have them listening to hear what they hear. I've been trying to tie transmission line theory into all of this, but admittedly digital is not my forte, even though I build some good ones by the old cut'n'try method.
Ideas?