A New Believer


I have listened to many systems over the years, and have never appreciated the difference speaker cables can make to a sound. In fact, I was so skeptical of the sound changes they can make that I have always not bothered with any special type of cables, generally going for generic (and dare I say it) roughly made ANY copper wire plugged in to amp and speaker. Well, imagine my surprise when I decided to do a blind test and listen to what difference cabling can make. Wow, my Vand 3A Sig's had been getting strangled! (some of you guys may want to strangle me if I told you what connects I had been using). So I am now a firm believer, cables DO make a difference.
joshc
Were you compaing "junk" cables to quality cables or did you also compare several quality cables and hear a real difference?

I've read more than once that cables to really matter as long as you have one that's adequate in size for the system requirements. I take this to mean that if your cables are too small you will certainly notice a negative effect, but once you get into the right sizes the difference are minor to non-existent though there has to be some difference otherwise the too small cables wouldn't matter.
Josh--

You need to do a double-blind A/B with matched levels to truly know if there is any difference. The human ear can detect minute differences in volume. A box to do this test is not available at Radio Shack. You need to check the volumes carefully with a meter and have the adjustments built into the A/B box with a high-quality pot. Only then can you conduct the experiment to see if you can really hear the difference.

Based upon everything I've read, there is no detectable difference in the sound quality (not to say volume) of any reasonably well-made cables. Hum, RFI, etc. can be brought into your system by a poorly shielded cable. But the sonic quality will not change otherwise.
how do the different speaker cables do their magic? explain it to me please.
"It is true, I used to be a hard core skeptic until the moment it was proven to my satisfaction it wasn't the plecebo effect."

well I guess that settles that.
Well Rok2id, I didn't expect you to concede so quickly, come on, state your case.

Great points Chicagojtw this is important to ensure that you aren't being fooled by any number of factors that can make you believe you're hearing something that in reality you aren't. This is going to be an interesting thread.