The 25 foot speaker cables (Groneberg Quattro Reference) in my main rig were 2K. I recently replaced them with a 25 foot pair of Canare 4S11 speaker cables which cost me 130.00 for the pair professionally terminated. Right now I am very much leaning towards keeping the Canare cables in the main rig at 93% cheaper than the expensive ones. To me that proves that price is irrelevant to quality of sound.
What if the cable is too cheap that it cannot be that good?
I am a huge..HUGE fan of the cables from Chris Sommovigo---the Black Cat cables.
Yesterday, I was at a store that has some excellent gear, most of it very pricey! The conversation got around to cables...and the pricing that some of them demand. The point that was brought up was: the value ( price) of some of the cables just cannot be justified...not only in the construction aspect, but also in the performance aspect. Couple of examples were floated ( we all know the usual suspects) and I mentioned that the Black Cat cables could easily compete ( and in most instances- surpass) with these examples. As some of you know, Chris’s cables are priced more than fairly---and if you take into consideration the performance that they give...should be an absolute nightmare to the folks who are trying to sell multi thousand $$ cable. ( never mind the fact that they are at least as well made, if not more so!)
Black cat cables are maybe an exception here--as their price to value equation is off the charts IME, but the question becomes...what ( besides bragging rights) does the ultra pricey cable buy you...if it is not necessarily a performance increase due to?
Yesterday, I was at a store that has some excellent gear, most of it very pricey! The conversation got around to cables...and the pricing that some of them demand. The point that was brought up was: the value ( price) of some of the cables just cannot be justified...not only in the construction aspect, but also in the performance aspect. Couple of examples were floated ( we all know the usual suspects) and I mentioned that the Black Cat cables could easily compete ( and in most instances- surpass) with these examples. As some of you know, Chris’s cables are priced more than fairly---and if you take into consideration the performance that they give...should be an absolute nightmare to the folks who are trying to sell multi thousand $$ cable. ( never mind the fact that they are at least as well made, if not more so!)
Black cat cables are maybe an exception here--as their price to value equation is off the charts IME, but the question becomes...what ( besides bragging rights) does the ultra pricey cable buy you...if it is not necessarily a performance increase due to?
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I took the following post to heart and seem to agree with this poster, who is a highly respected audio designer. balanced operation- immunity to cables, longer distances possible, lower noise even in short runs and so on. https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/3-great-tube-preamps-which-would-you-purchase/post?highlight=AES48&postid=1741581#1741581 My frame of reference was the Benchmark DAC/preamp that supported the AES48 standard. I could not tell any difference with different price ranges of XLR interconnects to my Benchmark AHB2 amp. I had some other preamps and they did sound better with the more expensive Audience AU XLR I used over the Canare. Maybe they did not support the AES48 standard. I need to do some research on that. So now when I get my next system I will check for a preamp that supports the AES48 standard and also go with something like the Canare XLR. This will be going a long distance from my preamp to amp. This also gives me the flexibility to move the gear far away from the speakers. |
I have never really investigated it, but it is my understanding that Canare and Mogami are actually manufacturers of cables. Again, I have not looked into it, but I wonder how many other brands of cables actually have their own manufacturing facilities to create the cable, versus those that outsource their production to third parties? Who are these third parties who made your cables??? |
- 15 posts total