Cat-proofing your speakers...

holy moly, nothing like a cat question to lower the maturity level of this board even further. i'm with chadnliz. the comments on this board can be less mature than the comments on a youtube girlfight video sometimes, it's amazing.

as to your question, cocoabaroque, other than what a few of the previous people have said, i found it's easiest to go with on-wall speakers in our family room. i have a set of gallo reference avs that sound amazing with a sub and they are absolutely cat proof.

the other thing i suggest would be to just buy whatever speakers you like and get an extra set of grills to pop on when you want the speakers looking their best (company coming over, etc) if something ever does happen to your everyday grills. i would also cover the tops with something, though. some of the brands i can think of that sound great and have fully-coverable drivers (many of which are high up on the speaker so that the grill doesn't extend all the way to the floor) are: vienna, proac, totem, usher, and devore.

and one note about "declawing" a cat to anyone who might consider doing that, it's a very vicious thing to do to a cat - it's basically chopping off the last segement of their paws in a very unprecise way. sometimes you crush the last knuckle, sometimes they get a bit of the middle bone... it's not a nice thing to do.

yeah, four cats here, no smell.

and as to what sprink mentioned - the feliway - i will say that we have a couple of the "diffusers" (feliway comes in several different forms) and they are incredible in their ability to chill the cats out. they do minimize - probably eliminate, but i won't make that claim to be safe - scratching. in fact, every time i notice the beginning of naughty cat behavior i check the feliway bottle and sure enough, it's out of liquid.

they're expensive, though, that's the problem. so i would definitely try the spray around a pair of speakers, the diffusers are magic.

"Are the protective grills on the Gallo Nucleus Reference 3.5 Loudspeaker wire? If so, those may be an option."

actually, they're perforated metal (a baseball bat would barely dent them) - and the speakers are usually wall mounted (you can buy stands if you want), so they really are out of harm's way. there are some other manufacturers who have screw-on metal grills, which would work great, but i can't recall their brand names, sorry. i think canton used to make some, not sure if they still do, though... av123 used to, but they're no more...

and regarding chewing of cables (by dogs or cats) i knew a guy who had that happening and he wrapped his cables in double-sided tape (after wrapping paper around the cables so they wouldn't get gummy) and after a few gos at them, the dogs stopped doing it. he left the tape on for a couple of months for good measure, and they've never done it since, even with the tape off. i know that some people use double sided tape to keep cats off furniture too, but i've never tried it - fortunately for my nerves, my main systems are in places away from my pets.