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Best way to hear sonic signature of a cable?

For all the cable-heads out there: can someone suggest a way to test cables? the best way i've come up with so far is using only a headphone amp (with a volume control) and a cdp and listening through a set of cans. this keeps only one set of interconnects in the system. but it still doesn't tell me what the interconnects will do once a preamp is added, etc.

what do you folks do when you don't have enough resources to swap out an entire system with difference interconnects?
kublakhan

Showing 1 response by rsbeck

rsbeck
887 posts
 
A better way is to blindfold yourself and have someone else switch the cables
and see if you can even tell which is which. If you can't, then don't buy the
hype. If the more expensive happens to sound like crap, keep the cheaper
one. Lather, rinse, repeat. Next, take all of the money you were going to
spend on expensive cables and go out and listen to more expensive speakers.
See what kind of speaker upgrade you could get with that money. Ask
yourself which is the larger bang for the buck upgrade. Listen to the different
speakers with your eyes closed or have someone else switch between them --
see if it is as hard to tell the difference between speakers as it is to hear the
difference between cables [while blindfolded]. Ask yourself if you'd rather
have better speakers with inexpensive, but well-performing cables or the
same speakers but with more expensive cables. These are the tests I would
suggest.
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