Perspectives on cables

Hi,

Thanks Arj for the post !! Seems interesting will read completely and see if I can gain some knowledge !!

Btw have you seen my DIY cables ?? Am doing a IC now,its almost complete Am just searching for a good RCA connector ! would be interested to know your thoughts on the same ! if possible we can have the cables played at your place or you can drop into mine,you can also checkout my DIY towers !


Regards.

Am just searching for a good RCA connector

Just a couple of days ago, I was reading a back issue of Hi Fi + magazine ( Now bought over by The Absolute Sound - TAS ).

HiFi+ is to Europe what TAS is to the USA.... Extreme Subjective

That issue was ranting about how VERY SHABBY XLR connectors were, regarding sound quality, and that RCAs were FAR better, since much thought and many options were avaialble in RCA plugs, but little choice in XLRs.

The mag went to the extent of saying that single ended plugs + cables were FAR superior to their balanced counterparts...

Seems High end cable manuafacturers were designing their own XLR plugs, and because these would be produced in miniscule quantities, their costs would be astonomical ....

and I thought that expensive cables were ALREADY astronomically priced.... Recently heard a pair of balanced Interconnects priced at US $ 5500 a pair... and the system had 2 pairs in the path ! ( CD to Pre and Pre to Power )

I LOVED them,,,, but that is another story...

Recently heard a pair of balanced Interconnects priced at US $ 5500 a pair... and the system had 2 pairs in the path ! ( CD to Pre and Pre to Power )

Interesting......

I LOVED them,,,, but that is another story...

Very Interesting !!




RCA = Bullet from Australia. Good product.

A Final twist to the 'Shabby' XLR connector story.

Even if a GREAT new XLR connector is designed & fitted onto interconnects, they will still be constrained by the XLR sockets on the CD, Pre & Power Amps ...

Hi,

A Final twist to the 'Shabby' XLR connector story. Even if a GREAT new XLR connector is designed & fitted onto interconnects, they will still be constrained by the XLR sockets on the CD, Pre & Power Amps ...

I say final verdict should be either kick these guys out and do what you feel is right

OR

Stop listening to Music forever throw all our stuff and only rely on live shows

Btw Bhagvan I checked the Bullet RCA's,Damn expensive ! I for one cannot afford that for sure !

Amp buddy what RCA's you prefer ??

Regards.

Neutric has some nice RCAs... priced around Rs 700 EACH ! ( You need 4 for a Pair of Interconnects ! )

There are the Chinese Clones available in Mumbai for approx Rs 50 each.

Since you are a DIY.... remember the BEST connector is NO Connector.

Why not try an A/B with any RCA and directly soldered wires ?

Hi,

Rs 700/- wow thats not my cup of tea ! interestingly for 800/- we have Audioquest Silver ones,which I think should score over the Gold plated (plated mind you) Neutrik at 700/- !!

In Bangalore Am not able to get any decent one's china or otherwise ! only option is MX !!

Why not try an A/B with any RCA and directly soldered wires ?

Will do that ! anyways was planning to do that !


Regards.

Do post your feedback !

Thanks

Soundsgreat schrieb:

Hi, Rs 700/- wow thats not my cup of tea ! interestingly for 800/- we have Audioquest Silver ones,which I think should score over the Gold plated (plated mind you) Neutrik at 700/- !! In Bangalore Am not able to get any decent one's china or otherwise ! only option is MX !! Why not try an A/B with any RCA and directly soldered wires ? Will do that ! anyways was planning to do that ! Regards.

Check with Arn systems. They stock DH Labs. I think some 450 bucks a piece.

Hi,

Will surely do Amp !

Why not try an A/B with any RCA and directly soldered wires ?

let me quickly reiterate,By this you mean connect different RCA's and see the result ? After I posted I had a small doubt bout the solder direct part !! could you please elaborate ??

What I planned to do is One,to take various RCA's and compare them, Two take the ready cable and compare it with the branded ones !

Vinny thanks,will surely talk to sridhar and see what they have !

Regards.

Soundsgreat, you are welcome anytime to come over for a listen !

I did like ANs suggestion of no connector at all . Since you are into DIY you really can "Hard wire" the connector into your amp.

AN thats a really nice view on cables..never though that the actual connector quality would be a bottleneck.

Hi,

Arj shall send you a PM for further proceedings !

Ok Now I got the solder direct part , Although I thought the same but had double minds whether what I thought was correct or wrong !

Thanks for clarifying Arj ! Let me give it a try later (as now its not feasible for me to hardwire the IC to Amp )

Ok I was finally able to get some decent RCA connectors which didn't cost my arm and leg !! and the cable is finally done !

Am posting that in a new thread,so please guys check it and give me some feedback !

Regards.

read a few of the interviews on the website Arj recommended. Thanx Arj!
One of the interviews that stuck w/ me was Jon Risch's. It looks like the cable industry is following his model - 10X retail price so a $100 materials worth cable gets sold for $1000!
The other interview that stuck with me was Drew Baird's (Moon Audio). I actually know Drew Baird as he lives about 1 hr driving distance from me & I visited his room at RMAF2007. He's a nice fellow & is trying to provide people with the highest bang for their buck. Pretty damn handy with this hands & with the soldering iron. His comments that when he fixes/mods cables for customers that are pricey he sees that they use very cheapo components that one would not expect to see in expensive cables but unfortunately do rang a bell! This seems to corroborate Jon Risch's cable retail price model!
I've learnt over time that no matter how much you pay for cables, it is usually too much!
There is some technology in making the cables - probably the most in the metallurgy. The connectors, insulation, etc are pretty standard - usually most people are using Teflon which is a very good dielectric & has a very low loss tangent & there are several connectors of high caliber to choose from (DH Labs, Vampire Wire, Cardas, LAT International, Parts Connexion, Michael Percy Audio, etc, etc). Thus, a retail price of $5500 for 1m is totally ludicrous no matter how good the cables sound - they certainly aren't good worth $5500. BTW, I'm not trying to put down these cables in any way, shape or form - merely trying to state that the cable industry seems to have lost it's perspective on things.
Anyway, this is the world of product pricing - a very slippery slope! I better not go there any further.......

bombaywalla schrieb:

Anyway, this is the world of product pricing - a very slippery slope! I better not go there any further.......

How true cost and price are 2 different things and quite unrelated(except that cost is usually less than price). And that is true for everything that is sold with the only mediator being volume of sales.
all that matters is want/desire and need.

I guess used cables give a better value for the money as the cost/price divide is much much lower.

the cable myth will break sooner or later.

People will realise that paying big bucks for cables is worthless and there will always be a few brands that will offer value for money products(sane prices) with equivalent performance to cables 3x+ the price and their sales will pickup.
They are out there, its for us folks to spread the word if we come across vfm stuff.

Manek

Manek, the whole problem is cables are so system specific. the cable which sounds fantastic on one system can have a very different effect on another. I have done quite a lot of A/Bs on cables especially ic and speaker cables with another audiophile here and it has been a really interesting experience..considering that i was rather cable agnostic for quite some time.

But i doubt if the price hype bubble will ever burst. that is something not specific either to audio or to cables..but rather built into our psyche

Manek schrieb:

the cable myth will break sooner or later. People will realise that paying big bucks for cables is worthless and there will always be a few brands that will offer value for money products(sane prices) with equivalent performance to cables 3x+ the price and their sales will pickup. They are out there, its for us folks to spread the word if we come across vfm stuff. Manek

Manek, there are several VFM cables in the market today than there were when you & I got into this obsession......errrrrr.....hobby ( ) So, I believe that this testimony to the fact that people have realized that there is a lot more snake-oil to cables than there is real technology.
Byt, yes, as long as there are audiophiles the world over that think that the more expensive a cable the better it must sound, pricing on many cables will continue to be in the ludicrous region.
(BTW, just to be clear I do believe in cables & I do believe that they make a difference; it's just that I'm not a proponent of limitless spending on them).

it's just that I'm not a proponent of limitless spending on them

I believe that the "Rule of Thumb" is to spend 10% to 15% on Cables. In most cases, no other upgrade can bring the change that a judicious choice of cables can bring to system sound...

Amp_Nut schrieb:

it's just that I'm not a proponent of limitless spending on them I believe that the "Rule of Thumb" is to spend 10% to 15% on Cables. In most cases, no other upgrade can bring the change that a judicious choice of cables can bring to system sound...

yup! that's the rule of thumb but check out most people's systems & add the total cost of their components & then total what they spent on cables. you'll see that they are spending much more! It's like Arj wrote - people want, so they buy. And, buy w/o total perspective of what they want to achieve. Often, somebody convinces this person that the cable will fix the issue (while it might be something totally different).

Re. cables bringing an upgrade to the sound - I will agree only *if* the user has taken care of the AC, room acoustics, isolation, rack damping, equipment chassis damping. Otherwise, my experience shows that the noise floor in the system is just too high that the hi-(sp)end cables cannot do justice to their stratospheric prices.
Of course, just my experience. YMMV.

bombaywalla schrieb:

Re. cables bringing an upgrade to the sound - I will agree only *if* the user has taken care of the AC, room acoustics, isolation, rack damping, equipment chassis damping. Otherwise, my experience shows that the noise floor in the system is just too high that the hi-(sp)end cables cannot do justice to their stratospheric prices. Of course, just my experience. YMMV.

Cables and their impact are still a mystery to me
i used Transparent cables and then tried the equivalently priced Solitone IC. the Soundstage expanded and went backward and vocals became soothing treble became delicate. but the impact is far more visible than isolation/damping. although i agree about accoustics to be much more critical. power makes an impact irrespective of cables as well...

So if we should take price out of th equation( ) ..in a pure VFM I find the 2nd and 3rd from the bottom of most cables to be the good performers. design/materials and dielectric are perhaps the major contributors...is that something you would agree with ?

Hi,

VFM I find the 2nd and 3rd from the bottom of most cables to be the good performers. design/materials and dielectric are perhaps the major contributors...is that something you would agree with ?

Arj I somewhat Agree with you here ! Yes it is very much understood that the primary things has to be in place for anything to work !

Re. cables bringing an upgrade to the sound - I will agree only *if* the user has taken care of the AC, room acoustics, isolation, rack damping, equipment chassis damping. Otherwise, my experience shows that the noise floor in the system is just too high that the hi-(sp)end cables cannot do justice to their stratospheric prices. Of course, just my experience. YMMV.

But if you take my own example,my listening room is perhaps the most unsuited from what you've mentioned ! in my room there is no scope for a single thing you've pointed ( Am really helpless in this regard ) !

But still I did notice or was able to differentiate the difference in sound between two different cables ! I don't know what you can call that or categorise it as !!

But please don't take in the wrong way ! Am 100% in agreement with your statements above ! but its just that perhaps one can also find the difference without it,this is a rather small observation that I have made thats all !


Regards.

I agree that in a Hi Fi System, cables offer the highest margins to the manufacturer and reseller.... though they often do what nothing else can ... so we have to pay the piper for his tune !

I recently heard a Rs 1 Lakh pair of interconnects, and they did .. to a Rs 10 Lakh system, what nothing else could... so I guess that 3 meters of cable for Rs 1 Lakh was VFM !

i never ever thought i would say this and still do not beleive this is the best way but cables are a good way of tuning one system to ones tastes..

whole problem is change one component and cables may need to be relooked again..so they still need to be the last "component" change.

Arj,

That was EXACTLY the way I felt.... until recently.....

I now believe that at a Good performance level, quality and improvement is in all aspects, establishing 'tue' or absolute quality, making one product distinctly superior to another.... for cables too.

Arjun,
I seem to agree with you some in that cables 2nd & 3rd from the bottom seem to be the best perf for money. Right now I have a set of cables that are 2nd & 3rd from the bottom & that's really all I was willing to pay for & the perf is very good to my ears.
Previously I had cables that were 2nd from the top (note!) & those performed superbly in my system. From that particular manuf, going lower in the hierarchy meant rolled off top-end, fat bass, etc.
So, cherche la femme!

Looks like the 3 of you have experiences that are diff from mine - so be it! You heard what you heard & I'm not going to contest that.
For me, I found that the cable-swapping game became far more interesting & revealing once I took care of the other stuff. I am lucky (No, make that "very lucky") to have such an opportunity to make changes in my listening room.
I agree w/ Amp_Nut the margins on cables are like almost nothing else in audio.....

Amp_Nut schrieb:

I recently heard a Rs 1 Lakh pair of interconnects, and they did .. to a Rs 10 Lakh system, what nothing else could... so I guess that 3 meters of cable for Rs 1 Lakh was VFM !

3M ?

I was under the impression that the IC's were 1.OM long and had a list price of Euro 2,500/- for 1M - I could be wrong....

To take a different tangent;
Yes, what ARJ says is perfect - cables are 'expensive' tone controls - in most cases & then there are 'some cables' that are more than 'tone controls' & are 'components' in themselves. One has to hear them to understand them & live with it for the understanding to penetrate - sounds absurd - but some day all audiophiles will experiance it. Non believers like Amp Nut too were convinced & he was man enough to put money where his mouth was [ear was in this case] !!! He [AN] was a full 'anti cable / snake oil' etc. kind of an audiophile.

I have had such an experiance with Transparent PLMM power cords - component change for me !!! Not a tone control...

bombaywalla schrieb:

Looks like the 3 of you have experiences that are diff from mine - so be it! You heard what you heard & I'm not going to contest that. For me, I found that the cable-swapping game became far more interesting & revealing once I took care of the other stuff. I am lucky (No, make that "very lucky") to have such an opportunity to make changes in my listening room.

B'walla, my guess is that Isolation and racks plays a far more important role on wooden floors than concrete..eg My room is solid concrete floor+ mosaic tiles and thick vitrified tiles on top of that..and i am on third third floor. e.g. for me isolation is not that great a problem (i still have the Feet of Silence below the transport).

Power is definitely an issue.. power in mumbai is perhaps the best we have in india today ! and bangalore will fare as one of the worst. the US with its higher current and lower voltage diistribution may just have different behaviour, although i was very little onto Hifi during my stay there..

Acoustics => Room + placement as we all understand is the most crucial (And most expensive) of all components and optimising on that with all compromises each of us have needs to be done and i am with you totally there as well.

So i guess all of us will still have the samme experiences only that the magnitude of each of these factors contribute differently to each and hence different results Convenez-vous ?

BTW i did not understand "cherche la femme!" does it not mean "search the woman" ?

bombaywalla schrieb:

One of the interviews that stuck w/ me was Jon Risch's. It looks like the cable industry is following his model - 10X retail price so a $100 materials worth cable gets sold for $1000!

I too rezlly liked his very pragmatic and no nonsense approach towards this..also explains why cables (Non Snake oil) are very expensive..an how if you are into DIY ..can get so much more for ones Buck

bombaywalla schrieb:

...The connectors, insulation, etc are pretty standard - usually most people are using Teflon which is a very good dielectric & has a very low loss tangent & there are several connectors of high caliber to choose from ...

a bit OT but i rcently read about the triboelectric effect on audio and how it could have an impact on cable transmission ie conductor to dielctric relation. apparently this is another thought process initially started by Be Yamamura and now quite a few folks including Pranawire as well as Pear cable (!!) follow as well.

[quote="Arj"]
So i guess all of us will still have the samme experiences only that the magnitude of each of these factors contribute differently to each and hence different results Convenez-vous ?

BTW i did not understand "cherche la femme!" does it not mean "search the woman" ?
[/quote]

Arj, I guess that at this point it's just nit-picking: if the factors you cited (isolation, room, power, etc) have different effects on different people's systems then the experiences cannot be the same!
I've been to several auditions & note each time that people are hardly ever scientific about the audition in that they hardly ever try to correlate the sound to these various above cited parameters. Thus, it becomes all the more important to get these parameters under control before swapping cables so that the user knows that it's just the cables upgrading/degrading the sonics. IMHO.

That phrase was used here in the context of "go figure!". Otherwise, when I've seen that phrase used it usually means, euphamistically, "find the motive" w/ the understanding that men often create a crime to acquire a woman. (Today I know that the reasons for crime include a lot more objectives but that's besides the point).

[quote="bombaywalla"]
One of the interviews that stuck w/ me was Jon Risch's. It looks like the cable industry is following his model - 10X retail price so a $100 materials worth cable gets sold for $1000! [/quote]

I too rezlly liked his very pragmatic and no nonsense approach towards this..also explains why cables (Non Snake oil) are very expensive..an how if you are into DIY ..can get so much more for ones Buck[/quote]
Actually, I was indicating that I did not like Jon's approach & sort of "blamed" him for the cable manuf escalating their prices to the ludicrous level with the 10X mentality.
I mean it's pure greed - you can make a healthy pofit with a 2X margin. If you sell factory-direct, 2X your cost. If you sell thru a retailer, 2X to the retailer, 2X to the end-user. So, 4X the manuf cost. Still high but much better than 10X & nobody's losing any money.

bombaywalla schrieb:

I mean it's pure greed - you can make a healthy pofit with a 2X margin. If you sell factory-direct, 2X your cost. If you sell thru a retailer, 2X to the retailer, 2X to the end-user. So, 4X the manuf cost. Still high but much better than 10X & nobody's losing any money.

really dont know about that..in the end price is a perception of value and nothing to do with cost in fact one might end up making more margin (with fewer sales) with a 10X rather than 4X ..and in the end everyone is in business for the money...

but smart consumers know how to get to max value with min money while for some other people money is not a factor and would rather pay more for a brand and the assurance/aura it provides. nothing wrong with either but the internet (Jai ho !) has been a boon for the value conscious buyer

Arj schrieb:

in the end price is a perception of value and nothing to do with cost

yes, I could be off by saying that 4X price is sufficient for the manuf.
In the end, I think that, as you wrote, pricing & value are related in a very complex fashion & often are loosely connected to each other.

Bhagwan69 wrote

3M ? I was under the impression that the IC's were 1.OM long and had a list price of Euro 2,500/- for 1M - I could be wrong....

I was referring to a Pair of 1.5 m interconnects ... Hence 1.5 m for the left channel and 1.5 meter for the right channel

Hmm Interesting thread on cables by wise men It is sad that a fresher in Audio will fall into the cable trap before realising that there are areas where he could have spent his money for better return. Majority of the Dealers/retailers knowingly or unknowingly fails to educate their customers about the much needed "ROOM".

Marketing is all about creating the need in the buyers mind!

VERY true Ani,

Specialy in mid-fi systems, the dealer probably makes 50% on the cables, compared to the rest of the system profit !

At the same time, I would not under-estimate the value of cables.

A couple of months ago, I heard a rather expensive system with GAMUT Balanced cables feeding Gamut mono blocks, and maybe a 15 feet run of Bland-n-dul ( Van Den Hul ) cables from a 2 Box CD player..... sound.. to my ears was VERY medeioce.

Change in cables and the system began to reflect its price....

Cables are sometimes (?) used as "tone controls" to compensate for deficiencies, this is the wrong approach, as you will be juggling cables endlessly, every time you change a component or even re-position the speakers. Proper speaker location, mechanical isolation and cable selection, all contribute in their own way, and present different consequences. They ALL need to be addressed.. any one of these is no substitute for the other.. IMHO ofcourse !

ani schrieb:

Hmm Interesting thread on cables by wise men It is sad that a fresher in Audio will fall into the cable trap before realising that there are areas where he could have spent his money for better return. Majority of the Dealers/retailers knowingly or unknowingly fails to educate their customers about the much needed "ROOM". Marketing is all about creating the need in the buyers mind!

thanks for getting reality into picture Ani !

yes it does depend on the resolution of the system ie as long as the bottleneck is any other component and not the cable this discussion would be irrelevant...

eg with my Sugden music is good with several cables and one needs to listen "hard" to see the differences I mentioned above..the moment i try it on the leben the difference is very clearly highlighted...it better be at 3.5 times the cost

Amp_Nut schrieb:

Cables are sometimes (?) used as "tone controls" to compensate for deficiencies, this is the wrong approach, as you will be juggling cables endlessly, every time you change a component or even re-position the speakers. Proper speaker location, mechanical isolation and cable selection, all contribute in their own way, and present different consequences. They ALL need to be addressed.. any one of these is no substitute for the other.. IMHO ofcourse ! ;)

so true !

Amp_Nut schrieb:

I agree that in a Hi Fi System, cables offer the highest margins to the manufacturer and reseller.... though they often do what nothing else can ... so we have to pay the piper for his tune !

That one sentence in bold takes the cake for me
So very true it is!!
Cables in general really brings about the least amount audible change in a system but the cable game is so interesting because it does what nothing else can do.
It changes only a couple of parameters keeping all other things "constant". You know your system is the same...but one day you start hearing a lot tighter bass with a cleaner background!!! WOW!! I wouldnt call this a "tone control job" at all.
But how do you achieve the same thing by changing an equipment ? Almost impossible. An equipment change would change the whole balance of the system. You may not really want that...and in most cases people looking out for cable upgrades actually love their existing system and they are only looking to get the most out of it. Which is a nice feel !!

abhi.pani schrieb:

Amp_Nut schrieb: I agree that in a Hi Fi System, cables offer the highest margins to the manufacturer and reseller.... though they often do what nothing else can ... so we have to pay the piper for his tune ! That one sentence in bold takes the cake for me So very true it is!! Cables in general really brings about the least amount audible change in a system but the cable game is so interesting because it does what nothing else can do. It changes only a couple of parameters keeping all other things "constant". You know your system is the same...but one day you start hearing a lot tighter bass with a cleaner background!!! WOW!! I wouldnt call this a "tone control job" at all. But how do you achieve the same thing by changing an equipment ? Almost impossible. An equipment change would change the whole balance of the system. You may not really want that...and in most cases people looking out for cable upgrades actually love their existing system and they are only looking to get the most out of it. Which is a nice feel !!

Is'nt this true of all "audiophile" equipment :-)

Why blame only cable manufactueres ?

sivat schrieb:

abhi.pani schrieb: Amp_Nut schrieb: I agree that in a Hi Fi System, cables offer the highest margins to the manufacturer and reseller.... though they often do what nothing else can ... so we have to pay the piper for his tune ! That one sentence in bold takes the cake for me So very true it is!! Cables in general really brings about the least amount audible change in a system but the cable game is so interesting because it does what nothing else can do. It changes only a couple of parameters keeping all other things "constant". You know your system is the same...but one day you start hearing a lot tighter bass with a cleaner background!!! WOW!! I wouldnt call this a "tone control job" at all. But how do you achieve the same thing by changing an equipment ? Almost impossible. An equipment change would change the whole balance of the system. You may not really want that...and in most cases people looking out for cable upgrades actually love their existing system and they are only looking to get the most out of it. Which is a nice feel !! Is'nt this true of all "audiophile" equipment :-) Why blame only cable manufactueres ?

Well, I was not blaming cables, I was only giving them credit for the things they do. The importance they have gathered is not totally unjustified IMO.

Sorry Abhi, i was only referring to the "high cost/margin" on speaker cable. I was referring to this alone..

sivat schrieb:

Sorry Abhi, i was only referring to the "high cost/margin" on speaker cable. I was referring to this alone..

I got it .