[oak3x]

With the topic of upgrading cables being common in many posts, I thought it would be interesting to get an overall consensus of peoples feelings.

Please elaborate on your experience and share which cables (if any) made a difference to your system's sound.

 

[Duggeh]

speaker cables have to deal with the most sensitive signals over the longest distances with the more difficult loads at each end. Usually. I certainly noticed no difference between 50p interconnect and a £40 van der hul when I had one. And I noticed the kind of differences I could easily dismiss as placebo between a stock and recabled HD600. On the other hand, upgrading my speaker cable from 50p Cable to £10 cable was like scraping all of the auditory layers of mud off the sound.

Where the point of dimishing returns lies though, I do not know. Nor have I tried enough experiemnts with cabling in order to determine if there are "flavours" to cables or not. I remain generally a cable sceptic, but one who is quiite willing to be proven wrong in his sceptisism once the chance to test presents itself.

 

[tom hankins]

Its a tie. But I voted component cables. The Zu Mobius headphone cable, and the Audioquest Sky and Cheetah ICs were the most noticable of all cable changes I've made. I have not messed with my speaker cables in about 8 years so I didnt vote for them, although I beleive they will make the most difference when I get around to them.

 

[m00hk00h]

Cables do not "sound". Not for me.
I have two HD580 Jubilee and one came with a Cardas Sennheiser cable.

So I tried it out. Same source, same amp.
At first there was no difference. After a while of listening and then A/B swapping I realised that the Cardas HD580 sounded a bit more bright, you might say "open" oder "airy". But only slightly and audible only in A/B-ing.
To determine if it was really the cable I changed the wiring of the Jubilees.
And gues what: the brighter sounding one still was the brighter sounding one even with stock Sennheiser cable.

The differences in both headphones may be a result of matched driver pairs, may be a long-time-use-burn-in-effect. I mean they are more then 10 years old and I don't know which of these has been used more often.

After that experience I will never ever think about cables again.

m00h

 

[F107plus5]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Duggeh /img/forum/go_quote.gif speaker cables have to deal with the most sensitive signals over the longest distances with the more difficult loads at each end. Usually. I certainly noticed no difference between 50p interconnect and a £40 van der hul when I had one. And I noticed the kind of differences I could easily dismiss as placebo between a stock and recabled HD600. On the other hand, upgrading my speaker cable from 50p Cable to £10 cable was like scraping all of the auditory layers of mud off the sound. Where the point of dimishing returns lies though, I do not know. Nor have I tried enough experiemnts with cabling in order to determine if there are "flavours" to cables or not. I remain generally a cable sceptic, but one who is quiite willing to be proven wrong in his sceptisism once the chance to test presents itself.

Nicely stated!! I agree with everything you said.....at least those items I'm familiar with from personal experience! My favorite comment though is the one about scraping off all the layers of acoustic mud!

It's not quite as important today as it was a few years ago before all the gold plated connectors became popular. But in the "old days" it was a good idea to disconnect and re-connect the connections every now and again to remove the corrosion that may have accumulated over time and which sometimes gave the impression of a better cable installed when the only real improvement was in removing "all the auditory layers of mud..."

 

[AsuAmo76]

I don't know if it's setup dependent or not, but for me interconnects, power cables and headphone cables (in this order) all affect the sound.

 

[gtortorella]

Cables are constructed in many different ways, using many different geometries, materials, and electrical approaches. I have experienced differences among cables. I do not undertsand why there is so much skepticism about cables. Cables, in my view, are like components: good design and good parts yield good results...bad design and poor-quality parts yield unsatisfactory results.

I agree with highlighting the technical or objective merits of a product or design. I wish more folks would do this with regard to turntables--especially in terms of speed stability (wow/flutter), as the mediocre speed stability of many belt-drive turntables is often overlooked. The overwhelming majority of "audiophile" manufacturers do not even list a measured peak wow and flutter. The same holds true for cables: many manufacturers do not list measured capacitance and/or other important performace or design specifications.

 

[SptsNaz]

Personally I don't think any cable will bring you SIGNIFICANT results, and I'm sure 95% of the people here will agree. In my experience it makes the sound more refined and a bit more detailed. I would say the improvement is about 5-10%. Even though the improvement is somewhat marginal for me it was still worth it

 

[DSlayerZX]

I just received my HD650 along with a original and carda cable.

SO I decided to try them out.

I use the original cable to listen to White Avalon a few times. took me a while

then I changed to Cardda and tried it out. I think it made a different, but is not

big, well..... much smaller than jumping from HD595 to HD650

The difference was there... but not big, I have to be very very concentrate to hear that, don't think I will notice it by normal hearing experience.

But anyway, at the end, I decided to stick with the Carda

I am not sure if interconnect make much of a difference, Since I have been using one made by Signal cable since I got my amp.

Maybe is time to give it a test

 

[AsuAmo76]

Quote:

Personally I don't think any cable will bring you SIGNIFICANT results, and I'm sure 95% of the people here will agree.

Let's see how many folks will fall into remaining 5%. I am the first

 

[jwilldermood]

I don't think cables effect sound for the most part and especially don't think the price of the cable has anything to do with it. This page by Robert Russell of McIntosh Labs fame is an interesting read. http://www.roger-russell.com/wire/wire.htm

BTW, I have recabled two of my phones and the only change in sound I detected was an increase in microphonics.

They look cool though and I myself find it hard to connect cheap cables to my expensive equipment. I think expensive cables are bling and if you can afford them add to the overall enjoyment of owning HiFi equipment.

 

[Jussei]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AsuAmo76 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Let's see how many folks will fall into remaining 5%. I am the first

Seconded. Cables certainly make a difference (at least to my ears). Upgrading my speaker cables made the most drastic [positive] difference. I think the thing that makes most people 'cable pessimists' is the fact that the law of diminishing returns is probably greatest in the cable area. Also, more expensive cables don't necessarily yeild better sound, but they will yeild 'different' sound.

 

[Glod]

I am of the opinion that cables make a crusial impact on tuning a system. But my experience also tells me that it is very much depending on synergy. A good cable is not always good: It has to match the rest of the chain of components. If I would have to make one choice, I would focus on the interconnects. I don't have much experience from different speaker cables, but I have tried several headphone cables with the DH650. They certainly do make a difference worth the money IMO, especially in comparison to the cost of good interconnects. Then again, I am still puzzeled by the small difference in the sonic signature between the Equinox and a stock cable connected to a Lehmann Black Cube Linear at a meet once. Perhaps it was due to that the cables were not auditioned with the same HD650. Or, perhaps, it was due to the different output impedances of the MPX3 and the BCL, as somebody suggested. Or, just due to my ears that morning.

 

[PhilS]

I voted for component cables (which I assume means interconnects or digital cables), but only because the poll choices are a little bit confining. For example, the choices only reference improvements in sound. I don't think there is much debate (except from certain difficult types) that aftermarket headphone cables change the sound, but in my case I found that I preferred the stock cable. Hence, the headphone cable did not make the most significant improvement in sound.

Also, there is a lot more variety and number of component cables than there are headphone cables. Thus, I think it would be relatively easier for me to find a component cable that, for whatever reason, makes a more significant change in the sound -- good or bad -- than a headphone cable. For example, I really did not like the sound a certain silver interconnect in my system. But again, the issue was not one of improvement. Generally, though, I would say that all headphone cables change the sound, while the sound changes from many interconnects might be relatively harder to discern.

Also, the choices do not include power cables. And the changes made in my system from changing out the power cables were very close in terms of magnitude to the changing of my interconnects.

As to whether the changes -- good or bad -- are significant, that's always in the eye (or ear, rather) of the listener. One can say 5 to 10% is not signficant. But if you're system sounds really great, and you change a cable and improve it by 10%, it can make a whole world of difference to your listening experience.

Actually, it's pointless to talk about a 5 or 10% improvement anyway. Nobody has ever identified a standard of measurement that would allow each of us to determine what a 5 or 10% improvement sounds like.

Finally, a plea for keeping this discussion friendly, informational, and devoid of the usual attacks on people who believe they hear differences in cables ("it's just like believing in Bigfoot,etc.") Please.

 

[Wid]

I have yet to "hear" any type of cable making a difference. No guessing how I voted.