I understand that cabling geometry would do and could do something for a better imaging like the other pieces of gear will help if they are well chosen....I dont doubt that....
But imaging is FIRST and LAST a result of acoustical controls methods....All there is,between these first and last steps, are welcome improvement but if someone want a good imaging and soundstage and more important than that a good "listener envelopment" experience with a good "source width experience" linked to it, a cable geometry, a good dac, and a very good amplifier will not be enough....At ANY price....
My experience and experiments confirm that to me.... Feel free to contradict me but i know what i speak about because i did it myself....
A TEST:
Pick Kurt Weill recording album 1958 "Three pennies opera" "Die Dreigroschenoper " with Lotte Lenya...
The recording engineer here was great and he put these mics at the different spot with art...
All along the opera, the voices are heard like in a 4 speakers system, coming in my right ears and left ears from my back, with the orchestra behind the speakers which are in front of me...My entire room is on the theater scene ....
Then i am on the theater among them....Not bad for a 500 bucks stereo system.... Try this opera with any gear and system at any price, if the room is not under control, the voices timbre will be unnatural, and you will not experience this music like if your stereo system suddenly become a 4 speakers system....
Acoustic is powerful.... Electronic is only the first step to Hi-Fi experience, i know that saying this will contradict what most people here think about audio...
Remember that i never upgraded my system for the last 3 years, and all my improvement cost me peanuts, the most important one being acoustic devices control....
I am a bit tired of cable wars, tubes/S.S. wars and digital/analog wars....
All these wars has proved to me that most people have no understanding of what really matters....
The three embeddings controls, but MAINLY the acoustical one is HUGE.....
Audio is almost equal to acoustic......
For example if the recording engineer on this Kurt Weill opera had not been a great master of acoustic, this recording would not have contained the necessary cues for my acoustic experience, and if my room have not been under controls MY EARS/BRAIN would have never been able to extract FROM MY ACTIVATED ROOM the information/cues contained in the recording files and recreate them in my room....And for this experience acoustic controls matters, never mind the price of the audio system....My 500 bucks audio system did it better than most costly one in a bad room.... Almost all rooms are, if not squarely bad, not optimal at all, unbeknownst to most....