It's Simple

Jim (Jea48) and Shadorne, thank you kindly!

And thanks very much to Ian as well. Your lengthy second post makes many excellent points IMO, some of which indeed point out variables whose potential influence on cable and component comparisons is commonly under-recognized.

Your reference to Rod, btw, I assume is to Rodney Herman, co-designer of the original SOTA turntable. The one I purchased in 1983 still functions as well as ever, by the way!

Another thing your post does, when juxtaposed with the responses by some others earlier in the thread, is to reinforce a perception I’ve had for some time that some here are much too quick to hurl accusations of trolling. Which can often turn what might have been a constructive and informative thread into a series of pointless exchanges of insults and ugliness. The "believers" and the "non-believers" are often equally culpable in such exchanges, IMO.

Thanks again. Best regards,
-- Al

Shadorne...you are incorrect, IMHO!  I’ve had $20k preamps etc.. the more high fidelity a component, the more twitchy it can be to even the subtlest changes in the audio chain.  Then again, not everyone can hear that well nor care as much as the next guy or gal.

Ian, your summation is fairly spot on...all I can offer is extensive experience with tons of gear and cables...the preferred remedy is of course in the ear of the beholder.

@dave_b

It depends on the meaning of “high fidelity”. I interprete that to mean “faithful to the source recording” which means that “more twitchy it can be to the subtlest changes in the audio chain” is NOT high fidelity but “highly finicky”.

I understand that “high fidelity” can mean different things to different folks - a highly euphonic (distorting) tube amp may be marketed as “high fidelity” when it is really adding a great sound of its own circuitry to the recording...far from faithful to the original but a sound that is nevertheless highly desirable to those who enjoy it.

One of the world’s top mastering engineers (Doug Sax) used his brothers proprietary tube designs to master countless pop and rock - giving it just that touch of tube warmth that made his services in highest demand for decades. A high fidelity setup will allow you to hear what the mastering engineer intended.

If the audio chain consisted of one box connected to the master feed via lossless transfer on the input and your brain connected directly to the output via cyber/lossless transfer then perhaps you would have a bit of a point.  As it is, everything matters and does alter the sound to varying degrees on all equipment.