I'm with prof on cables. In my experience they make such a small difference compared to other things that I've always considered them of negligible interest. I don't really consider myself an audiophile and I'm at a very unaudiophile stage of life with two small children. I find speakers make the biggest difference, having enough power makes a big difference, the room makes a big difference, the preamp makes a big difference, DAC makes a difference.
Room treatments make huge, easily measured and easily heard differences. I've got a digital EQ hooked up to the sub in one system and that makes a very noticeable difference. I have a measurement mic and I found my peaks, knocked them down at most 4db and it's still a huge improvement. I've also done this in the past with bass traps and various foam absorbers when I had my system in the basement.
I'm not someone who believes cables make no difference but I don't believe that the high end cable market is primarily about improving performance. I think it's mostly tone controls and accessorizing, comparable to putting a bunch of decorations on a vehicle or something. Power cords are, to me, the most egregious example of this. You can spend thousands on a cord for a component that takes a few watts. How can this make sense when you could just make the component battery powered and disconnect from the grid entirely? Wouldn't high end manufacturers be offering battery powered components or, at the very least, have an option to feed the component with DC from a far better power source than AC? There are hardly any battery powered sources or preamps out there.
