What do audiophiles want from a cable?

In fact, you never know how good your active components might be until you give them a great connection. I had no idea that even finely aligned and tuned Nak deck could sound that good until I put the Purist Neptune fluid cable on it. Some say that vintage equipment usually reacts less to cables. Well, I don't have enough experience to voice an opinion, but in my system I would say that the deck, the phono stage and the cd player responded just about equally. But, for already quite warm system Purist's Venustas or of course Dominus, both Luminist Revision, would probably be a better choice overall, though with at least the Venustas you would lose some of the Neptune's incredible soundstage and natural flow. Anyway, now that I got that cable I want even more than before to upgrade the active components it connects, which is unfair to them - they sound better than ever.

waxwaves, perhaps you're right.
i sometimes develop ignorance towards business that is too far away from truth.

One attracts another and so it goes...

I,like many others on this forum believe that cables should be looked upon as you would any other component in your system.
I wish I didn't hear differences in cables because I would have saved a lot of money in the changes i've made and no one wants to have  un-necessary expenditures.
So this post is for the argumentative naysayers out there.
I agree that you haven't heard differences in cables but have you ever asked yourself why you haven't ??
With so many knowledgable posters stating the importance of using the correct cable in their system. Have you ever thought ,what is preventing you from hearing a difference.
I'm sure we all have auditioned various components at a dealers showroom and either purchased or had a home audition of the component that we thought was great (we do use this word much to much) only to find this great component doesn't thrill you as it did in the showroom.Now why would that be ? Interaction with the room ? not compatible with your associated equipment or maybe its the cables that was used at the showroom which you refuse to admit might make the difference.
So if you are happy with your system,wonderful.
I do wonder why you argue that if you don't hear it then nobody can
hear it
Enjoy

goldenera, see my long post above, but in brief...

1. are the differences real? - use a double-blind test to see (I've done this with turntables and there are differences for sure)

2. were the differences caused by re-connection or by the cable itself? - again, do a test - the connection might have had some corrosion on it

3. are the differences really improvements?

4. if yes, to all above, then are the improvements cost-effective relative to things that are known to matter greatly (such as speaker freq. response; room treatments; phase delay, etc.)

in sum, I have tested these things for decades and cables are about the last thing to do (usually); interconnects would come after speaker cables

FWIW, I have Kimber on my speakers - and I got them at a very large discount - I consider having them bi-amped to be more important