Back In The Day..........

[icehockeyboy]

And I'm talking 30 plus years ago, when I was just a kid getting into this game, no one, and I mean NO ONE seemed at all bothered about after market cables, and happily used the ic that came with the kit, and bell wire was "de riigeur"

And indeed, did after market stuff even exist then, I certainly wasn't aware of it!
:)

Don't get me wrong I am a firm wire believer, but wondered when the urge to cable swap started..........? :scratch:

[Ali Tait]

I guess when people found it sounded better.

[worthingpagan]

And I'm talking 30 plus years ago, when I was just a kid getting into this game, no one, and I mean NO ONE seemed at all bothered about after market cables, and happily used the ic that came with the kit, and bell wire was "de riigeur"

And indeed, did after market stuff even exist then, I certainly wasn't aware of it!
:)

Don't get me wrong I am a firm wire believer, but wondered when the urge to cable swap started..........? :scratch:


In those days i recall you even had to pay extra for a mains plug! I think Kimber played a large part in convincing people to upgrade the cables that came free, back in the late 70's

[Stratmangler]

I remember using 100volt line PA cable to rewire a friend's speakers a long time ago. Must have been around '85/'86.
The improvement in sound quality was not a subtle one.

[hifi_dave]

Well, I was selling/giving/providing better quality incons and speaker cables to my customers in the mid 70's onwards. There certainly wasn't the vast range as there is now and most I made myself to suit the customer's needs.

I do recall being taken to one side and getting a severe talking to by my Editor of the time, who thought I was a loony and shouldn't be putting outrageous ideas in the mags...:rolleyes:

After all, a cable is a cable. Right ???

[ursus262]

Well, I was selling/giving/providing better quality incons and speaker cables to my customers in the mid 70's onwards. There certainly wasn't the vast range as there is now and most I made myself to suit the customer's needs.

I do recall being taken to one side and getting a severe talking to by my Editor of the time, who thought I was a loony and shouldn't be putting outrageous ideas in the mags...:rolleyes:

After all, a cable is a cable. Right ???

Right :rolleyes:

[ursus262]

I subscribe to a different doctrine: mains noise, earthing, equipment support and good components, especially at the source end. Very conservative, me :)

[keiths]

And I'm talking 30 plus years ago, when I was just a kid getting into this game, no one, and I mean NO ONE seemed at all bothered about after market cables, and happily used the ic that came with the kit, and bell wire was "de riigeur"

And indeed, did after market stuff even exist then, I certainly wasn't aware of it!
:)

Don't get me wrong I am a firm wire believer, but wondered when the urge to cable swap started..........? :scratch:

When I first started taking an interest in hi-fi around 1976 or so, I remember an article by a French guy (EDIT: Jean Hiraga) in one of the magazines that suggested differences in cables. The first aftermarket cables I can recall were QED 79 strand speaker cable and (I think) "Gold Endz" ?? interconnects.

[sq225917]

The Jean Hiagra article was the start of it all.That signalled the end of the measurement lead hifi sales approach. Linn came up with the tune demo shortly afterwards and then Japan moved in with big knobs and flashing lights and everything was pretty much downhill from then on.

[worthingpagan]

The Jean Hiagra article was the start of it all.That signalled the end of the measurement lead hifi sales approach. Linn came up with the tune demo shortly afterwards and then Japan moved in with big knobs and flashing lights and everything was pretty much downhill from then on.

I dunno about that, i thought some of the jap stuff was pretty mean tbh :ner:

[Effem]

My first aftermarket interconnect was bought around 1978 and made by Audioquest as I recall. I remember being undrwhelmed by it's performance, especially at the price I paid for it.

Next was a Van Den Hul speaker cable circa 1983 which again wasn't cheap and to be honest the sonic 'improvement' didn't bowl me over either.

From that, one could gather that I :-

a) Didn't have a good enough system

b) My hearing was suspect

c) The cables were more marketing hype than substance

My instincts at the time were favouring c) and as time went on the legend of cable products were based more on folklore and wishful thinking than actual performance, not to mention the price tags of these baubles, so I started making my own for considerably less money and greater sonic benefits.

Oddly enough, it wasn't until I started playing around with mains cables that the light suddenly came on that I wasn't putting in a sooper dooper cable, but actually taking the inadequate cheapo cables OUT and putting something less inadequate in. The better the cable spec and build quality, the less inadequate it was, culminating in the realisation that no cable is ever perfect so all our choices rest between those two extremes.

[The Grand Wazoo]

It's very interesting to go back & look at the prices that cables were sold at.
Hi-Fi Answers March 1989 - KJ West One 'The Speed of Sound' advert (....ahem - no ill intent towards anyone who may have been involved)

1 metre pairs of interconnects:

QED Incon - £14.95
QED Incon Screen - £18.95
DNM Solid Core - £25.00
Deltec Slink - £32.00
Monster Interlink 400 - £32.00
Kimber PSB - £36.80
Monster Interlink CD - £46.00
Vecteur - £49.00
Audioquest Livewire Ruby - £45.00
van den Hul D102 Mk.II - £66.00

[The Grand Wazoo]

QED Incon - £14.95
QED Incon Screen - £18.95
DNM Solid Core - £25.00
Deltec Slink - £32.00
Monster Interlink 400 - £32.00
Kimber PSB - £36.80
Monster Interlink CD - £46.00
Vecteur - £49.00
Audioquest Livewire Ruby - £45.00
van den Hul D102 Mk.II - £66.00


Does anyone know the costs of the nearest modern equivalents?

[icehockeyboy]

At the risk of exposing how long ago I got into hifi..........I was talking 73/74 about the apparent lack of after market wires..........:)

[The Grand Wazoo]

From The Grave

[MartinT]

I bought quite a lot of Kimber PSB back then. I don't regret it as it was good for its time and started me down the road of enquiry about cables in general. I also bought a Monster CD interconnect in the mid eighties which was crap.

[Rare Bird]

I'll argue to the death that the late 60's was the best time for Hi-Fi..

specialist this that & other! Ha :rolleyes:

[The Grand Wazoo]

If we're talking about the pre-CD days (as per Craig's post no. 14), the main source was the turntable for most people and I don't think there were that many after-market arm cables. I suspect people were more engrossed in tinkering with mats and headshells than cables.

[Rare Bird]

Ah well been there never ever again will i waste money on farting about..

However i'm not sure if im imagining things but more people are buying Vintage gear are they not ??

[Effem]

However i'm not sure if im imagining things but more people are buying Vintage gear are they not ??

Probably because the brand new gear is so damn expensive :steam:

[walpurgis]

The interest in specialised cables started back around the late seventies. I bought some fancy looking Litz speaker cables, maybe 1979. I think they may have been Monitor Audio branded. I still have them and I tried them again recently after many years being packed away and was surprised how good they still sound.

[MartinT]

I had a pair of those Monitor Audio litz cables. They weren't bad, but you wouldn't want to have to repair or re-terminate them :eek:

[hifi_dave]

And you wouldn't want to use them with any amp because they are highly capacitive.

[walpurgis]

And you wouldn't want to use them with any amp because they are highly capacitive.

Never had any amp issues with them. I'll measure the capacitance and see. I know dynamic conditions tell a slightly different story, but it'll give me some idea.

[Mr Kipling]

Well, it was still The Dark Ages. Any number of speaker manufactrers weren't even bothering with mirror image pairs when all they had to do was turn the baffle round before finishing. I never understood that.

[Rare Bird]

Cos people just listern to music back then ;)