Cable Costs Relative to System

After several years on the cable merry-go-round, I've gotten off and find that in a DBT, nobody in a group can tell any difference. I had Kimber, Crystal, Nordost, Cardas and finally an entire loom of Synergistic Research. I'm now running Mogami interconnect and speaker cables I picked up second hand for $100 total, so the percentage rounds down to about 10% only because I still have a Synergistic Research Powercell 4 with T3 SE power cable. I was running a Weiss DAC202 to a Vitus SS-010 so not likely to be bottlenecked by components...

Pop quiz...

1. Who is happiest when electrons pass through a few feet of megabuck exotic wire?
a) the electrons
b) the audiophile
c) the cable vendor

2. Does a $500 bottle of wine taste best when drunk out of a
a) plastic cup
b) crystal wineglass
c) makes no difference if you are just tasting the wine

3. Does upgrading the fuel delivery tube in a Ferrari 458 from rubber to one made of a space age polymer increase the power output of the engine by:
a) 50hp
b) 10hp
c) zero

Think about your answers...

LOL! Very funny.

this is an interesting forum!I do not know what systems Hifinut604 did test on,I will say I have done the same test with complete oppisite outcome!I even went further with the test than hifinut604 did,$.50cent i/c and $1.00 a foot speaker cable. I can here a huge diference between a $4,000.00 speaker cable and the cheap one,and the same effect with the cheap i/c and a $2,800.00,It was like going from a bycycle to a ferrai!LoL! with all the years I have done test, I believe the cables should cost way more than most eanything in your system,if you know what your doing!,one of my test was a $300.00 yamaha cd-player with resonance control on top and bottom with a $4,000.00 I/C,, woh and behold this out performed a spectral amp,cd-player,and pre-amp with lesser quality cables,,A whole lot of people were laughing! then there was the silence,I thought I about made them cry when they heard the yamaha player with better cables!,very true story!

As a dealer I had obvious advantages in terms of trying a vast array of equipment and cable, manufacturers would send me their complete arrays from entry to flagship with enough to do a whole system. The painful part was breaking cable in to be able to tell what it could do. I also had complete lines of BAT, Belles, AR, and Electrocompaniet, so I could do an entry or ultimate level system and run a gamut of entry to best cable. I used to go into affluent customer's homes where I saw systems well beyond $100k as a rule, they were not happy with what they were getting out of these systems. Wire was the fix, and generally my recommendations would cost them a fourth of what they had already spent on wire. There were times I spent over 8 hours doing A/B comparison work, but it was improvements we heard. Knowing the order to replace wire in is everything, if you start with power cords you won't hear nearly as much improvement as you would if you upgrade I/C's and speaker wire first.

How much you spend has nothing to do with what you are getting or how well it works in a system, many $10k speaker cables will make your ears bleed, especially if you have edgy interconnects on the front end to preamp link. Modest but excellent value components with twice as much spent on cables and power cords will embarrass guys with $40k systems that have lame wire. Once someone was sold on a $1500 amp we would spend two or three hours deciding what power cord they wanted with it. It blew my wife away that half the people buying a $1500 Belles would get a $1500 Kaptivator with it (although I'd give them a great price on a power cord with their amp purchase). In a well sorted out system my favorite $3500 power cords are magic, the kind of difference anyone with ears can easily hear. The equation I used to present was to compare the difference a high end component makes in a good system to the difference a $1500 to $3500 power cord makes, the $10k component makes a fraction of the difference the cord does at way less money. I want to point out that there are a lot of good budget power cords out there that give up 85% of what you get spending thousands, and that's not to say those who can afford it shouldn't get the best.

And that folks is the answer to how much to spend, judge the cost and improvement derived from cable against the difference an upgrade to components or speakers makes. Until you are out at the point of diminishing performance you are not done. Even modest equipment leaves huge untapped performance gains on the table without good wire. Too many audiophiles have figured out how to get their systems to where they can hear substantial differences to worry about those who think cables and power cords are snake oil. There are those who think it's ridiculous to spend anything more than a few hundred bucks on wire, I think it's ludicrous to spend tens of thousands on components and speakers and not focus on excellent wire.

Here's a bit of humor for you, I've noticed a very accurate correlation between those who are vehemently opposed to spending bigger amounts on wire and their political persuasion. Show me a judgmental person who has made up their mind wire is snake oil and it's a 95% chance they are republicans. Now that right there is funny.

Some might say "funny" is all the money you made off of democrats by selling them cables.