Used capacitors and polarity???

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sat Feb 18, 2006 11:33 am

So electrolytic capacitors have a predetermined polarity. But what about non-electrolytic capacitors that have been in use for many years. Do they obtain a polarity. Say you take a non-electrolytic capacitor out of a 20 year old amp. Will it sound different if you put it in reversed from its original orientation. This may be a really stupid question.

Billy Batz · Post by **Billy Batz** » Sat Feb 18, 2006 11:39 am

General knowledge would say no it doesnt matter. But people at ampage have experimented with this. I read a long thread about it over a year ago. If you take any capacitors in an amp and line them all up in the same direction (in relation to the AC signal) going with or against it it does apparently make a significant difference. According to the guys that tried it anyway. They also found that making it random seemed to sound better then having them uniform in one orientation. Ive never bothered though.

BrownSound1 · Post by **BrownSound1** » Sat Feb 18, 2006 12:18 pm

I tend to think they would sound better or different because that is what the tester WANTED to hear. I'm not calling them liars or anything like that, but I do think that your brain can trick you into thinking something is better than it actually is.

Billy Batz · Post by **Billy Batz** » Sat Feb 18, 2006 12:28 pm

But why would they want to hear one over the other? Its not like they just spend $100 on caps and want to hear a difference. Why wouldnt they want to hear that one specific difrection sounded better then random placement? People have used that psych excuse to discredit sozos, upgrade trannys, resistors differences, just about everything we nitpick about. Im not paying attention to my cap placement regardless but since it was asked, I figured Id mention it and not disregard it.

Eoin · Post by **Eoin** » Sat Feb 18, 2006 12:56 pm

I wouldn't trust an ear's (or brain's) ability to accurately detect or preserve a subtle difference in sound with any duration at all between comparisons. I think saying that it must be what they wanted to hear is a bit of a cop out argument, but at the same time, I'd be wary of any comparison that didn't involve a recording or at least an a/b that is one directly after the other.

Flames1950 · Post by **Flames1950** » Sat Feb 18, 2006 3:47 pm

If it was a dramatic difference, like going from lego box caps to SoZo's, I'd think you could easily tell that it was improved. But even then, sometimes I do know it sounds better but I've already lost the details of the original sound, making the comparison hard to put in words for everyone here to digest!!

Billy Batz · Post by **Billy Batz** » Sat Feb 18, 2006 4:03 pm

Ive thought about building an amp using those screw terminal strips instead of a board for comparisons. It wouldnt eliminate gaps of time alltogether but whipping out a screwdriver and taking 5 minutes to replace all the caps in an amp is a helluva lot better then 30+ minutes to careful unsolder and sodler in caps.