Cable curmudgeon

It sounds better to the listener in a particular system and room.

Totally! Agreed. That’s all that matters. But I am very curious: if it’s possible that a $200 cable sounds better than a $50 to the listener in a particular system and room, Is it possible that a $800 cable sounds better than the $200 cable to the listener in a particular system and room? Or is it once you get to a $200 price point for a single cable, there is no more benefit to spending any more money, regardless of the listener’s system and room, and then it’s impossible that a more expensive cable can sound better than the $200 cable ?

Further, what if you buy a $800 cable for $200 via a screaming deal used? Is this allowed? Will then the $800 cable I bought used for $200 in theory MAY sound better than the $200 MSRP cable for the listener in the particular system and room?

Last question: what if someone gifted you the $800 cable? meaning, you paid nothing for it. Is it possible that this FREE cable can sound better than the $200 cable you paid money in the listener's system and room? 

Cables, and to a large extent HiFi, is Jewelry.

Some cables are extremely complex to fabricate and can somewhat justify their pricing on that basis. A large part is to drive marketing as in "The same technology in our $40,000 cable is used in our $400 ones."

What really gets my goat is companies like Nordost and Audioquest with their demonstrably bad geometry and silly names. By their design, these cables are tone controls and will interact positively in some instances and egregiously awful in others. Salespeople blather on about PTFE, µm plating, etc. with ZERO understanding of why the cables alter the sound.

I once auditioned some AQ cables in a full Mac system that I would judge as pretty damn good.

I wouldn’t use Mac gear to assess any cables. They have a house sound that boosts tonal richness and rolls off the treble, which is why they’re often paired with B&W IMHO. It’s surely an attractive sound to some, but it’s a far cry from neutral and thus not a great vehicle for assessing the finer differences between cables.

moving from the $6k pre->amp IC to the $12k, the system became UNLISTENABLE.

So, you’ve shared one experience where a more expensive PC was supposedly inferior (lots of variables at play here BTW) to a “cheaper” $6k cable. Good for you! That means nothing. A lot of people throw around the term “confirmation bias” quite a bit here, but there’s another type of bias that also crops up here frequently, which is the representative bias. It’s when someone is exposed to results from a narrow sample sample or what they saw themselves a few times and extrapolates those findings across the board. Sharing one example of anything proves and means absolutely nothing.

So $200 is the absolute upper limit on price we should pay on cables?

No, not for me. I'm more in the $300-$500 per cable, but I've bought pure sterling silver Musicable for stupid money, tried some higher-end Wire-World and Audioquest stuff, and Cardis. Small differences-- not better or worse.

Currently I'm running Morrow and I'm pretty happy with their approach, materials and careful build quality. I like quality connections, pure materials, and price really varies by length-- I prefer the shorter the better. I prefer no ferrous metals in the cable circuit, connectors, or panel connectors in the gear panels- replacing that stuff to all copper/brass/gold-plate makes a difference. Overall, I get way better bang by improving my room acoustics, vibrations, reflections, etc.

Yep like I said @wesheadley dude.

Flute dude maybe wrong or maybe right?

Depends on your system. If you have a $3000.00 integrated and $1500.00 speakers then save your cash cause the cables are really only going to make a very minute change in your system. Money better spent on room treatment's.

Just opinion who am I to say how you spend your money.