Need Good Advice - Speaker Cable


I have an Audio Refinement Complete driving Soliloquy 5.0 monitors and a Rotel 855 CDP. I've had them a year hooked up with well seasoned original Monster Cables. The last couple of months, I've been auditioning speaker cables to get rid of some grime in the highs and some thinness to some vocals.

The system with my Monsters is actually quite pleasureable. It has a vibrant, room filling, holographic kind of quality that is very exciting even at low levels. Bass is very good and the midrange can really be wonderful with terrific tone and color to the music. Highs can be very transparent also.

I've now tried in my system Transparent Audio The Wave 100 (lifeless and veiled sounding), Analysis Plus Oval 12 (pretty good resolution and good purity, but too rolled off sounding, not exciting), Mapleshade Golden Helix (amazing stuff really, very pure high end, a bit too bright, some sibilance and some nasality to vocals). Just received and now listening to Monster Cable Z-1 (it has the expansive Monster sound that I'm used too, fair resolution, decent bass, but some grime in the midrange so far).

Almost everything has a cleaner high end than my old Monster's, but nothing is as exciting, enjoyable and colorful as they are. I was thinking of trying a low to mid priced Nordost cable next.

This business of testing cables is still fun, but I'm not sure when/where it will end. Can someone who is familiar with my experiences give me some direction?

Thanks,
Chris
ssglx
At this point, you might consider build your own speaker cables. That might be more fun to try. DIY cables are relatively fraction of the cost of any decent cables.
Try Cardas Neutral Reference. It has a very balanced sound. The Cardas family as a whole has a pleasing, warm character. I think the Nordost would sound too lean in your system. Kimber Monocle or Bifocal XL would also be good choices, but may be too expensive. Acoustic Zen Satori would also be worth a try.
Budget is about $200 for an 8' set, I will buy.

The Rotel is hooked up with Transparent 100 Interconnects. In my view, my source components and amplifier are capable of everything that I want. Between the various cables, the system has had great bass, great midrange, very good resolution and low level dynamics, and an extended-sweet-transparent-clean high end. For me with my system, I will have reached my nirvana if I can put it all together with one (or a combination of) cable. I'm 80-90% there with my old Monsters.

Chris
Hello,
I agree with Pcs. I have tried cables from several respected makers and the cables that seemed to make the most significant difference were Audioquest. Crystal IIs and Slate come to mind as the cables that seemed to provide clean open sound for me. Another favorite is Canare 4S11, what a bargain. Good luck.