Back in February, we ran a piece discussing a hyper-expensive "audiophile-grade" Ethernet cable, the Audioquest Diamond. An 8-meter version of the Audioquest Diamond costs about $4,500, and a 12-meter version will run about $10,000; proponents (like Audiostream reviewer Michael Lavorgna) say that the Audioquest Ethernet cables have a meaningful and positive impact on sound when you use them to listen to audio files hosted on a NAS.

The first objection to that claim—and the one most folks immediately made—is that digital data is digital data, and if the Ethernet cable is good enough to carry the bits at all, it’ll do so with perfect fidelity. However, audiophiles focused on these kinds of Ethernet cables contend that the cables’ greater insulation prevents electromagnetic noise from creeping up the cables, through your listening computer’s Ethernet port, and making itself heard as distortions in your sound card’s digital-to-analog converter (or DAC). Better cables, the contention goes, means less EMI and therefore better sound.

After several e-mail and Twitter discussions with a bunch of different audiophiles—including Michael Lavorgna who initiated what turned out to be a very courteous exchange of e-mails—it became pretty obvious that the folks who believed in this kind of thing really believed in it. The best way to dig into it seemed to be to bring in an outside expert.

So, we called the James Randi Educational Foundation. Founded by famous illusionist and skeptic James Randi, the JREF is an organization which aims to "help people defend themselves from paranormal and pseudoscientific claims." It also administers the "Million Dollar Challenge," a decades-old contest that offers a prize of one million dollars to anyone able to conclusively prove the existence of "psychic, supernatural, or paranormal ability under satisfactory observations." The JREF are experts in conducting impartial controlled tests to prove or disprove extraordinary phenomena—like the kinds of phenomena surrounding audiophile equipment.

And that’s how we found ourselves bound for Las Vegas, with a pair of Audioquest cables in our luggage and a bunch of electronics in tow. Ars will be on stage at the JREF’s The Amazing Meeting conference headlining the final day’s "Million Dollar Challenge" event. We’ll be testing a pair of Audioquest Vodka Ethernet cables (the penultimately expensive cables—I just couldn’t get Ken to OK the thousands of dollars for a pair of Diamonds) in a controlled blind listening test with a wide variety of audio samples and a wide variety of listeners. The goal will be to see if a statistically significant number of test subjects can differentiate between a Vodka cable and a cheap Amazon Basics Cat5 Ethernet cable of the same length.

This isn’t the first time the JREF has taken on audiophile-grade cables. In 2007, the foundation offered its Million Dollar Challenge prize to the Pear Cable Company if the company could prove its $7,250 audio cables improved sound quality as advertised. The Pear Cable Company declined the offer. This time, we’re bringing the cables ourselves, so the test will happen regardless of the feelings of the OEM.

Realistically, we also know that this test won’t sway anyone—if for no other reason than that audiophiles tend to discount the results of blind listening tests (especially A/B/X tests like we’re planning on conducting). The reasons for their opposition are many and varied but come down to two main objections: first, that listening tests (especially double-blind or A/B/X) tend to be conducted in ways that are wildly removed from how folks typically listen to music, and so the applicability of their results are irrelevant outside of the lab. Personally, I don’t buy this for a variety of reasons (not the least of which is that we’re attempting a quantitative measurement, not a qualitative one), but it’s the second objection that I put more stock in. As Michael Lavorgna put it in his closing e-mail to me, "If you want to know what you enjoy listening to, there's no better way than to listen over time."

However, for those of you who put your faith in the scientific method when it comes to audiophile testing, this should be pretty exciting. We’ll have a write-up after the event—with video!—to let you all know how it all shakes out. And if any Ars readers happen to be attending The Amazing Meeting, stop by the Million Dollar Challenge on Sunday evening and we can go out for drinks (or at least "skeptical drinks," in the spirit of the conference).