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jrg1990 said:

Maybe so but most dacs are mains powered so a cable like that would make no difference.
 

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There is still noise interference from the bus power. Would you want the S/Pdif signal and AC power going to the DAC to both be inside one cable? Of course not. Power and signal should never be mixed. The problem is that USB was designed to power and transmit receive data from a storage device, where this relatively small interference has no impact. Nobody who designed the universal serial bus ever thought it would be used for audiophile grade, real time music streaming.

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uncle erik said:

I am sure the cable believers will come in here and insist that specialty cables from small manufacturers are "better" than what is found at consumer retail.

Of course they are.

Because a small manufacturer has no interest in a profit and each is a paragon of virtue. No matter that they are selling $20 of materials for $500, they are standing up to the Evil Scientific Conspiracy that is bent on destroying the "fun" of audio. These horrific conspirators also insist that ears are a poor measurement tool even though they are a poor measurement tool and have the nerve to suggest that humans are subject to their own psychology instead of being machine-like. Ridiculous!

So you must buy very, very, very expensive cables.

Never mind the garden hoses, wires stuck in the freezer next to the fish sticks, and manufacturers who can't tell which way to wire their power cords.

None of that matters. It's more important to spend a lot of money on cables to "stick it to" the people who think that a $3 cable would make you just as happy. Those folks are jus trying to ruin things and spoil fun. The people you should really trust are those selling Home Depot wire in Techflex at a 7,000% markup. And you should trust those people because they tell you that you should trust them. It makes complete sense.

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Not trying to pick on or bully you. But IMO if you buy something better quality, and your more satisfied with it, it will last longer; at least in my cases. Also IMO (lets not screw up this thread) i do hear a change in the sound sig from the cable. Its like people saying different speaker or headphones, amps,etc; are all the same. They are! But their are minuet differences that change them. And really who doesn't love a cable as thick as garden hoses, or that come in pretty boxes, with solid aluminum splitters,etc?
 

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cifani090 said:

Not trying to pick on or bully you. But IMO if you buy something better quality, and your more satisfied with it, it will last longer; at least in my cases. Also IMO (lets not screw up this thread) i do hear a change in the sound sig from the cable. Its like people saying different speaker or headphones, amps,etc; are all the same. They are! But their are minuet differences that change them. And really who doesn't love a cable as thick as garden hoses, or that come in pretty boxes, with solid aluminum splitters,etc?
 

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I can relate, I myself bought some "elite" cables costing into the few hundred mark.  I of course got these at a discount that brought them closer to $70.  3x 3m HDMI cables.  I noticed no difference at all, but it does have that WOW factor when looking at the back of the AV/ Reciever lol  Quite sad really...

The entire point of the thread is to warn people that there is an enormous mark up in cables.  Cables are accessories, and accessories are sold at stores to outweigh the low % on the bigger ticket items.  When I sold a TV/ Blu-Ray player, home theatre etc.  I would take the customer to the cable section and first ask what size cable would be needed.  I could then find a cable of that size, and it would always be the "cheapest".  I never had a customer complain about buying the "cheapest" cable which was still $30.

There was this odd time an "audiophile" came in and wanted to check out our collection of RCA cables.  It was around $50 for these cables the size of a garden hose.  "Do you have anything better?"  He asked.  I looked at him, "what are you running that would need elite cables?"  We ended up getting in this 40min discussion, or more so, it was him bragging and dissing today's technology.  He promised (literally) to come back with some photo's of his set.  A week later in comes the same person with photo's of this vintage set of elite components.  Not a single digital component.  Still wanting better cables!  We didn't actually have anything "better".  It was going to be a gift for his son.  I tried to tell him that expensive cables don't make the best gift.  Turns out his son was an "audiophile" as well.  Long story short, he left and continued his quest to find the most expensive cables he could find for no other reason then being expensive. 

Also, for anyone wondering why I didn't discount the rip off cables, well I use to untill I got told "That isn't your money to discount, it doesn't matter how much profit you are making. The more the better!"  The funny thing is, I got in trouble for knocking off $5!  I dropped $5 from the price of a cable that made 10x that in profit and I got called up for it.  I was also told off for selling cheap cables.  If it wasn't for my high sale figures I may have truly lost my job. Just remember that before you get angry at the salesperson.

He/ she may be under a serious amount of pressure to sell these rip off cables and needs to pay for his/ her own expenses, such as family, loans etc.  The best thing to do would be to simply refuse, and if you keep getting pushed, like that poor middle-aged man...  Simply leave and go elsewhere.  Better yet!  Get online and save yourself the tense salesfloor and your pocket

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k93george said:

There was this odd time an "audiophile" came in and wanted to check out our collection of RCA cables.  It was around $50 for these cables the size of a garden hose.  "Do you have anything better?"  He asked.  I looked at him, "what are you running that would need elite cables?"  We ended up getting in this 40min discussion, or more so, it was him bragging and dissing today's technology.  He promised (literally) to come back with some photo's of his set.  A week later in comes the same person with photo's of this vintage set of elite components.  Not a single digital component.  Still wanting better cables!  We didn't actually have anything "better".  It was going to be a gift for his son.  I tried to tell him that expensive cables don't make the best gift.  Turns out his son was an "audiophile" as well.  Long story short, he left and continued his quest to find the most expensive cables he could find for no other reason then being expensive. 

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The big time cable brands are usually only sold by high-end dealers. $50 won't even get you in the door at Nordost, Siltech, et al. Some brands like Audioquest and Wireworld do have cables at $50 and below, but it's their absolute bottom of the barrel stuff. At the extreme other end, Siltech, Tara, Stealth, and Jorma all sell cables that list for over $10,000.
 

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davebsc said:

At the extreme other end, Siltech, Tara, Stealth, and Jorma all sell cables that list for over $10,000.
 

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Yea but they are made from the souls of the innocent... totally worth it.
 
 

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davebsc said:

The big time cable brands are usually only sold by high-end dealers. $50 won't even get you in the door at Nordost, Siltech, et al. Some brands like Audioquest and Wireworld do have cables at $50 and below, but it's their absolute bottom of the barrel stuff. At the extreme other end, Siltech, Tara, Stealth, and Jorma all sell cables that list for over $10,000.
 

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I was wondering when this slight distinction would be pointed out.
 
 
I wouldn't buy any cables for my systems from any regular retailer for the reasons stated by the OP ...they sell over priced garbage. For the record I prefer MIT (impedance matched to the gear the cables are connected to), Nordost, AQ, and a bunch of DIY types of my own design. There is no way I could build a MIT cable for less than what they cost retail without having to rip apart the CVT terminators or the impedance network boxes and hope that finding parts for the build don't cost a small fortune (highly unlikely)..that being said a lot of expensive cables are no better than the decent quality cheaper stuff....the hard part is identifying the good stuff from the mediocre. I have also found over the years that MIT has managed to deliver the most consistent performance across all types of gear I've used, vastly outperforming regular but in the context of this threads subject , some really expensive name brands. I found AQ to be rather ordinary (the IC's anyway) while the AQ speaker cables (Slate, Mammoth for example) to be good performers, certainly better than 12 awg stranded copper sold in most box stores in bulk (50 ft for 60 bucks for example). Anyhow such observations are highly subjective ........this argument is likely the oldest and most contentious of all of them in the audiophile community, the controversy started with the first real half decent cables built back in late 70's when pot metal jacks/speaker terminals, paper thin unshielded ICs with horrible RCA connecters (molded plastic) and lamp cord sold in bulk (18 awg for god's sake) was all we had. Viva la cable, connector,speaker post, etc revolution I say
 
Peete.
 

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pricklely peete said:

I was wondering when this slight distinction would be pointed out.
 
 
I wouldn't buy any cables for my systems from any regular retailer for the reasons stated by the OP ...they sell over priced garbage. For the record I prefer MIT (impedance matched to the gear the cables are connected to), Nordost, AQ, and a bunch of DIY types of my own design. There is no way I could build a MIT cable for less than what they cost retail without having to rip apart the CVT terminators or the impedance network boxes and hope that finding parts for the build don't cost a small fortune (highly unlikely)..that being said a lot of expensive cables are no better than the decent quality cheaper stuff....the hard part is identifying the good stuff from the mediocre. I have also found over the years that MIT has managed to deliver the most consistent performance across all types of gear I've used, vastly outperforming regular but in the context of this threads subject , some really expensive name brands. I found AQ to be rather ordinary (the IC's anyway) while the AQ speaker cables (Slate, Mammoth for example) to be good performers, certainly better than 12 awg stranded copper sold in most box stores in bulk (50 ft for 60 bucks for example). Anyhow such observations are highly subjective ........this argument is likely the oldest and most contentious of all of them in the audiophile community, the controversy started with the first real half decent cables built back in late 70's when pot metal jacks/speaker terminals, paper thin unshielded ICs with horrible RCA connecters (molded plastic) and lamp cord sold in bulk (18 awg for god's sake) was all we had. Viva la cable, connector,speaker post, etc revolution I say

 
Peete.
 

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We're opening up a can of worms here Peete
 
The big box chain electronics cables are almost without a doubt Monster Cable. That's their wheelhouse, selling overpriced junk to people who are told they "need" them, and how Noel Lee affords his Ferraris. MITs are not as exotic as they seem. The metals they use are nothing particularly special (mostly silver plated copper), and at least inside the Shotgun and Magnum lines are just zobel networks. It wouldn't cost a fortune at all to make that kind of thing, just a bit of electrical know how. The Oracle boxes I think are a bit more involved, they better be for that kind of cash. MIT has never been known as being any kind of great value, in fact if you're looking for somebody to blame for the current environment of 5 figure cables, well you can lay that blame at MIT's doorstep.
 
That said, Spectral swears by them, and I definitely have respect for Spectral's audio engineering chops. I really don't like Nordost's flatline cables because they are so darn delicate. Also, the Nordost house sound is bass lean and treble tilted, which doesn't appeal to me at all. The stuff that Audioquest sells for a few hundred bucks is decent, but I wouldn't go much further than that with them. Audioquest never changes their wire geometries, ever. They just change names and colors, and they added that silly and useless battery system to make a buck.
 
Brands I like: Audio-Magic, Kimber Select, Kubala Sosna, and Siltech. I've also heard extremely good things about 6Sons Audio, but I have no personal experience with them. In my system I use Kubala Sosna Emotion and Siltech Classic Anniversary.
 

Some audiophiles spit on overpriced cables but somewhat justify their own vastly overpriced source/DAC/amp but they are feeling smartest than companies marketing techniques and other gullible buyers just by not buying overpriced exotic cables, but its the same ! Science also can't prove that a $50 DAC is any better than one million one and even some blind-tests.

No, it's not the same.  Properly designed amps and DACs are designed using universally known principles in electrical engineering, while the chips are a combination of various technical disciplines (computer science, applied mathematics, systems engineering, in addition to electrical engineering, etc.).
 
The benefit from cables are largely circumstantial.

The very same can also be said about cables but all that really matter is ABX blind tests between different components everything else is just placebo, everyone know it.

Yes, because humans are fantastic at objective sensory analysis and interpretation.

I just went in to buy an HDMI cable for the TV downstairs and it was $50 for a 1.5m cable!  Fortunately knowing a few people I was able to learn the staff price and it was $15, cost would be even lower.  I got it for $20 which is still overpriced.

As for spending into the 5 digit region for cables.  WHAT?!  Did you ever come to think that the internals of the device are more limiting.  It reminds me of individuals in Australia who were buying into HDMI cables costing close to $300 for their PS3.  Firstly, we are talking about a digital signal, you will know if there are issues with the cable.  Think DTV.  Other then that, the PS3 does not have internal connections of that quality

As for speaker cables costing as much as a car.  That is insane!  Don't just look at what sort of cable is running from the x/over to the driver but what the voice coil uses for the connection to the driver terminals.  That will be the most limiting, not the cables running on/ above your floor.  That also reminds of something...  The voice coil is all wire and it is made up of some basic stuff.  We are feeding it with exotic cables.  Lets say you manage to replace the wires running from the amp to the speakers with 5 digit stuff, not only would you need to replace the internal wiring in the enclosure but the wires going from the voice coil to the driver terminals or is that were we all draw the line?  Why not replace the voice coil as well!  Don't forget the internals of your amp either...

Lets make a cable; it will be sold in a variety of packages differing by the amount of 0.1mm strands.  You could order 480 solid silver strands split into "cores" of 8, (80 strands to a core) the cores are plated with 24k gold, wrapped in a plastic mesh (grid type thing) for structal integrity while being flexible, that (plastic mesh) is then dipped into a ceramic material to insulate the cable.  The connectors will be removable in case they are damaged and they also are solid silver plated with 24k.

@ Elysian
On the Sound Science forum you can find a few pages in a letter regarding someone who contacted the creators of the USB specification. They didn't think there was any advantage to "better" cables, even considering power being supplied through them.

I buy second-hand Van Den Hul interconnect cables off of Audiogon because VDH don't advertise, so you end up neither paying the company's advertising budget, nor the store markup. They also make their cables from the raw materials themselves and build them to last forever. I did try a pair of Nordost Heimdalls once, but they caused audible tonal distortion. Other than that, I make my own mostly.  The kind of stores the OP is talking about, I wouldn't even go into frankly, as commission salesman just annoy me, frankly.