Upgrading

It’s amazing cable companies even exist since all cables sound the same… Good Grief. Maybe many cannot hear the difference, too stubborn to want to accept they do or maybe using an old receiver from the 70’s with some Bose 301’s and even Michael Fremer could not either. Hahaha…
 

I would start with room treatment first if your space allows, then IC’s, Speaker Cables, then Power Cords. Power Cords can make as much of a difference as any other cable location, but if you’re not on dedicated circuits, respectable outlets/receptacles with good contact area then you may not hear the difference at first. You don’t have to spend a lot of money on receptacles as some Hubbell hospital grade outlets are a good place to start.

As always, trust your ears.

@adg101 - Placebo and expectation bias cannot be completely ignored.  I do not have the ultimate system, setup, etc., and I have heard differences in my system from cable changes.  So far it's been limited to analog interconnects (upgraded twice with positive results both times) and some power cords (mixed results) for me, I have not heard a difference with digital cables and I'm almost happy to avoid another rabbit hole.  I have not played much with speaker cables in my current system because I have a splitter as my speakers are shared between my HT and stereo rigs so I've just chosen to stay with what I have.

I did do the classic hardware store wire vs. $2k Nordost speaker cables using a Pathos Logos amplifier and $30k Focal speakers.  There was a difference, but nothing even close to justifying the increased cost.

I also find that I only really appreciate changes in my system after I've spent a lot of time listening to the current setup and then can almost always identify a difference (or not) pretty quickly.  Doing A/B comparisons rely on muscle memory and never seem to be very definitive to me.

@malbor - I'm not sure that your cables would be expected to degrade over time, but I'm sure there's always something bigger and better out there.  When I did my upgrades I started with power cords because the ones of interest were very affordable/cheap and after having a good experience I tried an entry level interconnect.  That experience led me to max out my budget (i.e. what I was willing to spend) on another cable farther up the line which also yielded good results.  I tried a digital cable from the same company and heard nothing, so just let it go.  I did try a more expensive PC on my DAC because I found one used that was of interested and didn't hear anything different that I could definitively point out.

My advice would be to not overthink it.  There's almost infinite options, so you have to be intentional about going down a financial rabbit hole (unless that's what you want to do).

If you think cables are the limiting factor in your system you are always wrong. Maybe if you are using Dollar store wire or a really badly designed wire but every other time no. No need to see system photos to know that.

The system photos may help for upgrade suggestions. Most onus have things we can upgrade.

Some people are more susceptible to suggestion. They make good cable customers. Is a new cable going to change your frequency response? No, not unless designed wrong. Will it change the distortion? No, never. Cables are linear devices. They don't affect distortion at least for analog. If you have a digital problem get a new DAC. Can they reduce noise? Yes if the ones you have are poor. Are they poor? Do you hear electrical noise? No, then cable will not matter.

Changing out cables is fun and easy so I do it sometimes.

@malbor 

Without knowing your equipment, we have no idea what to suggest and just because something is old , doesn’t make it bad or obsolete.