Originally Posted by
D Louth
This is a hot one, on some forums the equivolent of pouring petrol on a fire. Not here it would seem.
cabling is one issue that so far we can't get away with out. Even one box set ups need cables to the speakers.
When I first got into audio about 19 years ago, either I was innocent in mind or perhaps open minded but I could hear that cables made a difference to the sound. In my ignorance, I was unaware of the possible reasons for this. Unlike now, but I still have an open mind. Lets face it taking a pile of cables home to try is a lot easier than other bits of kit. However fitting some of the ridiculous creations out there to your kit is another matter. Cables that look like things you would find used for tying up ships to the plain strange. Any one remember Coogan Hall a hollow copper pipe, with an outer screen that didn't touch the cable(pipe except at the plugs). It was a good cable but unless you fitted it very carefully it would crack. I always wondered about the effect on the pipe when you bent it. Did that change the sound. Same goes for any cable does bending and shaping change how it sounds ?
I have tried many cables over the years and up until recently had never been able to subcribe to the one brand cable loom. However having a chat with someone in the cable business a possible answer to this came up. The answer is consistency. Many cable companies who claim to make cables don't( unless fitting plugs can be called making). Many seek out and try cables, select them, label them and claim to make them. Even within a range say model x the interconnect and speaker cable are not the same cable even though that claim is made. Just dip into the RS catalogue/range made(which is huge). I am by the way not saying all cables are picked out of the ones RS make (there are other sources of cables out there). Now I don't have a problem with this. If time and trial is put into listening and selecting fine but the price should bear that out. To ask to much is a bloody cheek. Now if you make it or at the very least make/design and ask someone else to make it then you can claim to make cables. There are very few out there who do this, very few( you would be shocked about who does and doesn't. Legal reasons prevent me from saying. But you know who you are. SHAME ON YOU).
So when I have tried cables in the past I have ended up with make X for linking source, make Z for speaker cable and so on. Only in the last few months have I found an exception to that with Atlas Marvos. Atls make Marvos from the same cable so the range of cables are consistent, through out. This goes for all their cables that I have tried. They design and have their cables made for them. No catalogue use here. So thats one issue that needs to be known, are the cable material used consistent within a range, my experience would suggest no, except in a few cases.
The other issues of length of material, type of material(silver, copper etc), type of plugs, Resistance and capacitance all make a difference to sound and vary with products in your system, as they too have these issues relating to them. This makes group tests a bit of a waste of time, as you will mostly get varying results with the same cables but different kit used and if you use one make of kit and many cables. This is a bit like group tests with speakers. Same room used will affect the results. Some speakers work better in some rooms rather than others.
How a cable will work in your set up, will depend on your kit. You will just have to try it and see how it sounds. Is it wrong to use cables as a tone control. Well that will depend on you and how badly mismatched your kit is.
If you have a well balanced system then cabling should be a bit easier to select. I have only rarely heard cables that can completely destroy the sound of a system and work with only a small range of kit. Most have a basic sound and are not as dramatic. But dramatic ones do exist. So the post one above is not wrong, just I haven't come across this to the same extent.
Most of us will select cables to match a sound preference or we will go with what is hot at the moment( sometimes without trying, very foolish). We all know what the hot 3 are Nordost, Chord and Kimber. I feel that you should consider cables at the very least in a similar way to picking the rest of your system when you are buying a complete new set up. If you are playing with cables as upgrades then you will have to just suck it and see and be prepared to be surprised at what works and what does not. But it is important to remember that many changes are just that and not improvements. The sound improvements cables can make is quite often subtle. Though not always, Ureka moments do exist. One thing you should also bear in mind is have the cables been run in fully. I know this is an issue too but most if not all cables benefit from running in IMHE. Also even if used they may also need a period of settling in (this is different to run in)-I don't understand that one but it can happen. Any suggestions as to why. Current needed to get the material loosened up to allow easier signal flow, perhaps ? Maybe thats BS, just an idea.
Above all have an open mind.
Regards D Louth
Cables
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