Current recording engineers - what cables used?

Thank you Shadorne.

All, thanks again for your input.  Not sensing overwhelming participation in this thread by active recording and mastering engineers, but perhaps they are not generally on this forum.

@shadorne , thanks for sharing video of studio so well described in the interview.  Very interesting.

@chrisr , I am going to take a wild guess that: 1. Many of the cable runs in David Gilmour’s studio (or any pro studio) are long, 2. That they are not all long, and 3. That the engineers use high quality cable for each application regardless of length because each are important and they believe based on their (exhaustive) testing that using better cables yields better results. (I mean really, changing directionality of the earth ground noticeably affects the sound of all other gear!?!)

My own experience (with only 0.06km of total cable length of all kinds in my main system) is that even changing out a 0.5m interconnect can have a favorable or unfavorable effect on sound.  This because as I have stated previously elsewhere, one of the important functions of good cables is to protect signals from stray electrical fields in the environment behind your rack, and the most polluted area is the square foot behind your gear where digital, power and low level and high level signals are all converging. In a pro studio, this electrical mayhem may be prevelant everywhere, but in your home it is at least occurring or likely to occur without adequate preventive measures at the back of your gear - so your wires better perform well in that environment.

And so, my take is sure, you want to protect and maintain signal integrity and linearity across frequency and time domains in cables, and long runs present a particular challenge all other things equal. But in especially “dirty” electrical environments you need to protect signals in even short runs AND THEIR CONNECTIONS. These latter challenges are faced by both pro studios and audiophiles, wherever cables of various types come into close proximity, REGARDLESS OF OVERALL LENGTH.

Another interesting takeaway from the interview @maplegrovemusic posted is that according to the studio manager, digital cables matter a lot.  This is a subject of special torture well down the lower rungs of cable forum hell here on Agon, and it is interesting to read where some especially compulsive engineers make the claim that digital cables and data transfer are an important, perhaps even critical, part of the overall recording process. I may share the link to this interview elsewhere on the forum just to stir the pot and see what bubbles up.

With 60 meters of cable and every half meter making a difference it is wonder you ever get to listen to any music at all. 

Imagine you have 3 cable manufacturers and 3 possible lengths of each and 3 spots for each cable and EVERY cable, position and length makes a difference.

27 different possibilities to test...

Now considering break-in of 200 hours for each change

5400 hours testing.

This above is not the same as choosing a well engineered cable from van den hul and ordering 23 Km to outfit your entire setup. 

One is paranoia. One is just taking a cost effective practical approach.

Uh, @shadorne the studio tested 20 different cable types before settling on Van Den Hul, then they bought 23km.  Is that paranoia, or just being thorough?  Is testing the directionality of the earth ground paranoia or just being thorough?  I guess it depends on your perspective.