I'll take shielded and balanced every time as well. This has 3 conductors. An outer shield/foil and two signal carrying wires. The shield should only be connected to ground at the source.
There are many audio IC's which are not shielded, and in many situations that will be OK. Kimber is one brand that comes to mind on unshielded. That is, most of the time you won't be picking up radio stations from your record player or something truly bad like that.
Shielding does add a tiny bit of capacitance to the cable, as the foil or braid acts like a capacitor to the signal and ground wires. Perhaps this is why some claim to hear a dulling of the sound. Or perhaps they get less euphonic noise?
There are many audio IC's which are not shielded, and in many situations that will be OK. Kimber is one brand that comes to mind on unshielded. That is, most of the time you won't be picking up radio stations from your record player or something truly bad like that.
Shielding does add a tiny bit of capacitance to the cable, as the foil or braid acts like a capacitor to the signal and ground wires. Perhaps this is why some claim to hear a dulling of the sound. Or perhaps they get less euphonic noise?