Will a RCA to RCA adapter hurt the sound?

I have used gold plated RCA adapters from Radioshack to join 2 of the same cable to make longer cables and never experienced any sound degradation. How long though are you going to extend the cable? IME with using adapters I've only extended cables to either extend the length of my turntable cables, or from preamp to amp which was just another 3-4 feet of wire. Those were the times when I had no sound issues. Another time I used these adapters to extend the length of my subwoofer cable and had no issues there either. I joined 2 6ft cables.

Before you move your rack, listen to your kit with the single RCA cable that you presently have in place, establish a sonic reference. Than try adding the additional RCA and adapter... and listen again. Repeat if necessary. Then do what you have to do.

In theory, everything counts, every interconnection becomes a bit of a degrade. In the extreme, in practice, audiophiles have been known to hard solder patch lines from one component to another with huge gains in overall transparency (that's right, no IC's), though impractical for most of us, it is a cleaner, simpler path.

Let your ears be the final judge.

Happy Listening!

If you're not purist and crazy about it, than it shouldn't. 

I don’t think that anyone can say with any certainty, so the experiment suggested by R_F_Sayles would seem to be worthwhile. FWIW, though, my guess is that **if** a difference results it is more likely to be caused by the added length than by the adapter. Depending, that is, on the output impedance of the component driving the cable, the lengths that are involved, the susceptibility of the interconnected components to ground loop issues (ground loop issues can be sensitive to the resistance of the return conductor in an interconnect, and therefore to the length of the cable), and other variables.

I assume, btw, that you are referring to line-level analog interconnects.  Not to phono cables or digital interconnects, for which I would recommend against using an adapter.

Regards,
-- Al

Would it be plausible to sell the two pairs of shorter cables and purchase one pair of the length you need?

thks guys= Yes these are line levels from my preamp to my amp- Just extending one meter- Really do not want to take full rack apart move everything then try it and it does not sound right- anyone know which adapter I should get- Does cardas make an rca/rca-??-thanks for all the help---

No way to know for sure other than try and compare.  

Despite the fact that you're asking the question, you already know the answer.  Unless this is a temporary, stop-gap measure I cannot imagine you would settle for this kludge in the quality of system you've put together.  Man up and do the right thing.

MHO, if you're running esoteria equipment and you've got the 'ears' to hear such, you've already noticed...
But, agreed with the above comments, replace with full length when you can see doing so.  It's just more 'sanitary', less potential for needless noise to creep into the mix...
Shop around...I got a good deal at PE on some AV cables that I simply peeled off the 3rd line.  You get 3 pairs for the $ of 2, which made it an even better deal.  But the back of my equipment looks like an sea anemone, so mass quantities of cables made sense.  

thanks- I was able to move things around without having to use the adapter- thank you all for your help!!!

You are only as good as your weakest link, and that crap is all made in China.

*L*  It's getting to the point that the only things not made Elsewhere...

...is Us. ;)

Yes they will bad idea!!