why do people feel the need to buy expensive cable

Ainttitgr8,

One member here said they had thousands of dollars worth of cable and when they had made some DIY cable it sounded better than the expensive cable so they got rid of it.

No, the word expensive is relative to the highest cost of cables which is what $10-20K. It also depends on the person, what HE thinks is expensive for him. AND the word expensive reflects how much importance the person places on cables relative to the rest of the system. For example, just read the threads on High Fidelity Cables or Tara Labs Cables, you will find those folks who place extreme importance to cables. Fir them it's a paradigm shift, where most of the money on the system in some cases, I happen to know one case, is spent on cables. Thus cables become the overriding concern and cost. I myself eschew cables and have almost none in my system. You could say I went the other way. Ha ha ha

MGM wrote,

"The only item in ones system that has a sound signature is ones speakers . The cables used are going to determine how the drivers move . Find the cable that moves the drivers to the speakers full potential and then you have "The best cable for your system" Same goes with amplifiers."

Or put another way, the only thing in one's system WITHOUT a sound signature is the speakers, which output precisely the accumulated sound of the various components of the system, including the cables.

;-)

earlier in the thread I had some comments about my recent experience with 'crazy expensive' Tara Labs Grandmaster Evolution 1.5m XLR cables. one thing I mentioned was that they 'got out of the way of the music'.

Devilboy writes;

One thing they DO NOT do (and this one's my favorite), is "Get out of the way of the music". That phrase drives me mad. In fact, I believe they are doing the complete opposite.

I have to strongly disagree. no doubt some cables add coloration to the music with what else they do to transfer the signal. but some cables do actually further remove distortion from the signal path. and you can hear that.

these very expensive particular Tara Labs Grandmaster interconnects apply some exotic technology to the equation. some of the technology could be marketing speak, some of the technology is less likely marketing speak, and some of it is easily verifiable by the user.

cable geometry and metallurgy benefits pretty much is something none of us are in a position to actually verify. even assuming we believe our ears unless we go through the process of listening to various versions we are just guessing about cause and effect. so we must just accept the manufacturer's claims on those issues.

looking at the quality of the actual plugs it is easy to see where the cable manufacturer went to a much higher degree of effort and expense compared to other cables. we can see this. does that actually affect the improved performance? we don't know; but our experience with plugs and outlets with power cables does indicate that these things matter.

then there is the vacuum dielectric and air tube technology. we know this matters with cables. how much does it matter? we have no way of knowing really unless you would have one cable with it and one without.

then we get to the HRX dual monoblock floating ground station. the cables are grounded. here we don't need to take anything on faith. we can simply plug or unplug the grounding cable and listen.

now we easily hear the part where the noise floor drops dramatically and the music is revealed in much greater detail. it gets much more out of the way of the music. there are no trade-offs. crazy good. I wish for my finances it did not make such a profound difference.

you can sit there and plug and unplug and hear what is happening. it then becomes a question of whether that difference is worth it or not. no question it's not hype. it's simply life priorities.

I happen to have a 'borrowed' similar Tara Labs '2' steps down (Tara Labs Zero Gold) also on hand for comparison. this has an earlier version of the vacuum dielectric and grounding system. I also had the opportunity to try the Zero Evolution (the next step up above the Zero Gold) grounding box with the Grandmaster version. so I've been able to appreciate the steps up and what is doing what.

in the context of your system is it worth it?

happy to have anyone visit and they can plug and unplug that grounding box for themselves and listen.

The reason people often state that expensive cables will not make budget speakers sound better is because the budget speakers drivers are limited in their excursion . The more money one spends on speakers generally the larger the drivers will be in the statement speakers . (harder to drive to their full potential ). Thus cables that can send the proper amount of current is more important for those speakers . Hence being able to hear large differences in cables in those systems.