Which cable is most important to spend money on...

I would like to re-stress the importance of power supply to the house 110 volt outlet. If at all possible, install a "dedicated" circut to that point. This is not as glamorous as super-duper IC, SPK, power cords but can be more important than all the others combined. Iv'e learned this the at the school of hard knocks. If not possible then a good outlet makes a difference. In an apartment situation a good extension cord to a different outlet than you use now sometime helps, if only to separate dirty digital from analog equiptment. Let us know how it all works out, best wishes, Mike.

Mike, you must've read my post about discovering the (unused) 20A garbage disposal circuit in my apartment. There's now a 20 foot 10AWG umbilical running from under my kitchen sink to my ExactPower regenerator :--)

But I have to agree w/ you about the overwhelming gains from implementing a ded. circuit. Even in an apartment, if you can "latch on" to a circuit that is 20A instead of an ordinary lites 'n outlets 15A ct., it can mean a big improvement. In addition to a disposer, you can often find single purpose 20A circuits for microwaves, dish washers, washing machines, and even hair dryers (unfortunately in the bathroom) or steam irons in the ironing board closet. Make a good umbilical to supply your system and just don't use the microwave (or washing machine) while you're listening ;--)
.

Don't want to shipwreck this thread but, please indulge me in a "Time Out" for a moment. I think this is relevant.

Bob's (edit: Robert's) one of the best in the business when it comes to customer service and passion for his products. Having said that, I have found other interconnects and power cords that work better in my system than the offerings from Ridge Street Audio....

My experience with RSA wire leads me to agree with the system dependent qualifier...

Thanks for the kind words Grant. As for the rest of the quote, I have some issue with and the following is addressed not just to Grant, but all of us. Hope it's worth the read.

The way this is stated, which is all too common with many products - not ours particularly, it sounds like the RSAD cables compromised Grant's system and would most likely compromise most systems. Wouldn't it be a fairer statement to say a given competently designed product, RSAD cabling in this instance, didn't meet your personal tastes instead of the gist "they didn't work well with the system"? I'm sure we agree there's a world of difference between the former and the latter.

The latter would be like me saying the use of maple for drum shells instead of mahogany makes for an inferior drum. That ain't true. Truth is that for the type of sound I wanted out of the drum for the type of music I was playing, maple didn't give what I was looking for. That doesn't make maple bad. Truth be known, maple and mahogany are both very desirable woods for drums but for different reasons that have to do with preferences and priorities. One wood is not superior at the expense of the other being inferior. End of analogy.

In discussions amongst percussionists, rarely do you hear "This wood or that drum head sucks" but rather you hear "my preferences lean toward this wood or that drum head". Wished it were so in audio. In my view, what happens way too often in audio discussions and suggestions is fairly sloppy thinking or communication and instead of accounting for our personal preferences not being met, we communicate in such a manner that implies a given product is bad (or it's the "bestest in the universe(!)" for that matter.). If you think this through, this does a disservice to the enthusiast community and the sincere efforts of those manufactures who are endeavoring and are making a positive difference.

There are many types of playback presentation that requires gear with different and certain design premise and they're all available to discover, enjoy and come to prefer. Some will like 1/32 watt Tubed SETs with 178db efficient Horns and some will like 13 gigabyte watt S.S. amps with 40ft line arrays. Some will prefer Anna Log and others Di Gital. Some like Silver, some will like Copper (this assumes competency in design and performance). They're preferences and should be discussed that way I think. Not only would this facilitate more options for enthusiasts to consider and discover thus broadening the "music in the home" experience, but it would also alleviate a lot of the needless and dumb flaming that happens in many discussions.

So many thoughts here and I could go on but now I'm starting to ramble. How 'bout this:

Instead of "OMG, ****** sounded (Bad Audio Descriptive) and (Another Bad Audio Descriptive). "It" didn't "work" in my system. You'll do better with ****** because it's the bestest in the world.", why not "You know, I tend to prefer a (Good Audio Descriptive), (Another Good Audio Descriptive) sound instead of (Another Audio Descriptive) and (Another Audio Descriptive). ****** does that and fits well with what I want to accomplish but I can see where ****** would work with what you're wanting to accomplish. Let's listen and appreciate each other's efforts and be bestest friends forever."

One last thing I gotta through in. As has been pointed out, there's no broad brush stroke "Best" at the expense of another being broad stroked as "worst". There's at least two camps that audio enthusiasts and manufacturers will fall under: One says "iTune", the other says "iDon't". Both are valid system approaches because, again, they are personal preferences for one reason or another. Not one is right at the expense of another being wrong. As for RSAD, we ascribe to "iDon't". Where do you land? It's important to know not only for yourself but for others also if you want to genuinely help others who are embarking on a journey you've been on and experienced for a while.

Finally, if you were able to make it through this jungle read of a post, let me know and deservedly, I'll leave positive feedback in your profile here!

Cheers!

Robert
RSAD

It is not important nor wise to spend serious amounts of money on cables of any sort until you've got the fundamentals (source components, amps, speakers, etc) of your system down. In the interim there are any number of sub $100 interconnects and equally low cost speaker cables and power cords that will more than suffice. As you can tell from the above discussions, once you get past the initial stuff nobody really knows which is most important. There are numerous opinions, but it's really one of those questions that doesn't have a correct answer.