Speaker cable upgrade please help........


I am very happy with where my system is today but I still wonder if I am hearing everything it is capable of. Do the Audioquest cv-6 24dbs speaker cables I am using allow me to hear what my amplifier and source are capable of? I have coughed up the dough on some nice interconnects going between Acoustic Zen Silver Ref II and Audioquest Cheetah 36v dbs but have kept my speaker cables through several system upgrades. I love the sound I have now and wonder if a move into one of the following would provide much improvement. I am looking at the following: Audio Magic Sorcerer, Coincident TRS or TRS Extreme, Audioquest Mont Blanc or Volcano, Audience, others I should be considering? I have been hesitating on this upgrade because I know there are two schools on high end cables. I know of audiophiles who have $10k in speakers and really nice digital and amplifier and use home depot speaker cable. I also see those who go crazy and spend as much on cable as on the components upstream. Thanks for your much needed help.
nicksgem10s

Showing 1 response by irvrobinson

Rsbeck, you must like pushing on a rope. :) Do you realize where you are? You're trying to make a sound, objective argument in a forum where people *want* to believe there are easily audible differences between two speaker cables.

Nicksgem10s, you should listen to Rsbeck anyway.

Regarding actual product, try www.bluejeanscable.com. These guys are just using Belden and Canare wire with decent quality terminations at reasonable prices. Their service is pretty good too. Of course, I like 10ga zip cord with WBT spades and bananas, but that's a do-it-yourself project, and the WBTs just look and feel nice.

There are, incidentally, measurable differences between cables, but almost nothing will be measurably or audibly better than 10ga zip cord. Silver is about 5% more conductive than copper. 5%. And there's no measurable difference between a silver conductor and a copper one that's 105% of the size of the silver one. Well, at least not at audio frequencies. (A smaller conductor will have less skin effect in the MHz range, but compared to MHz audio is like DC.) Resistance, capacitance, inductance. That's all there is. No one can reasonably explain why two conductors with similar specifications will sound different. There's just the assertion that they do. Would you spend $280/ft on an unsupported assertion? Not me. And as Rsbeck implies, cables don't have complex side-effects that active electronics do, like intermodulation distortion, even and odd harmonic distortions, or added noise, or the myriad of other things active circuits have to worry about. Since our ears & brains can be so easily and provably fooled, why would anyone believe someone's assertion that are differences that can't be measured or explained?