Affordable cables

DIY cables always look good on paper. I even got sucked into it for a while myself. One audio bud devoted decades- not years, decades- building every idea and material, tearing down and copying, reverse-engineering, you name it. After all that his finest most proud achievement was blown away by some random old SR cable pulled from my used cable drawer and costing less when new than he paid just in parts to build his masterpiece. Not just my opinion either, he heard it himself. And was crushed. Not disappointed. Crushed.

There’s a lot of things in audio very much open to question. This ain’t one of em.

You are wrong there Steve. My simple diy ic`s are cheap but I can guarantee that you`ll never find anything better, they are perfectly clean. Only loss will be in the connections. 

I do not have a super expensive reference audio system, or golden ears, and I cannot argue which cable is objectively “best” but this i can say....on the advice of others, i went with Blue Jeans LC-1 interconnects and I am very pleased all the way around.

They have a very low capacitance rating (greatly desirable esp. for turntables), robust shielding and heavy duty connectors. A basic 2’ pair is around $32 but you can get any length you like.

The sound is a huge upgrade over my previous RCAs and I think their products are a tremendous value. As the old saying goes, they’re “all balls, and no bullshit”. For its price, I’m not sure you can do better unless you DIY

Technical
I have all bluejean cables but I was curious about others. 

emtrey

When I started , I was very cynical of costly speaker cables. Then I heard the difference they made in a system.  

I started with Dick Smith's finest speaker cable, around $4.50/m (similar to Radio Shack?)
The difference was significant. And have been updating ever since.

I went to Merlin Chopin interconnects to tone down a bright Plinius pre/power amp. Didn't realise part of the problem was the QED Silver Anniversary speaker cables I was using. Then progressed up to Merlin Verdi, and Merlin Vivaldi.

Now on Mad Scientist Nitro Nano power cables, and Audience AU24SX interconnects. Most probably my last.
Can't replace the in-wall Merlin Scorpion speaker cables.