Who thinks $5K speaker cable really better than generic 14AWG cable?
I recently ordered high end speaker, power amp, and preamp to be installed in couple more weeks. So the next search are interconnect and speaker cable. After challenging the dealer and 3 of my so called audiophile friends, I think the only reason I would buy expensive cable is for its appearance to match with the high end gears but not for sound performance. I personally found out that $5K cable vs $10 cable are no difference, at least not to our ears. Prior to this, I was totally believe that cable makes a difference but not after this and reading few articles online.
Here is how I found out.
After the purchase of my system, I went to another dealer to ask for cable opinion (because the original dealer doesn't carry the brand I want) and once I told him my gears, he suggested me the high end expensive cable ranging from $5 - 10K pair, depending on length. He also suggested the minimum length must be 8-12ft. If longer than 12ft, I should upgrade to even more expensive series. So I challenged him that if he can show me the difference, I would purchase all 7 AQ Redwood cables from him.
It's a blind test and I would connect 3 different cables - 1 is the Audioquest Redwood, 1 is Cardas Audio Clear, and 1 my own generic 14AWG about 7ft. Same gears, same source, same song..... he started saying the first cable sound much better, wide, deep, bla...bla...bla......and second is decently good...bla...bla...bla.. and the last one sounded crappy and bla...bla...bla... BUT THE REALITY, I NEVER CHANGED THE CABLE, its the same 14AWG cable. I didn't disclosed and move on to second test. I told him I connected audioquest redwood but actually 14AWG and he started to praise the sound quality and next one I am connected the 14awg but actually is Redwood and he started to give negative comment. WOW!!!! Just blew me right off.
I did the same test with 3 of my audiophile friends and they all have difference inputs but no one really got it right. Especially the part where I use same generic 14awg cable and they all start to give different feedback!!!
SO WHAT DO YOU ALL THINK? OR I AM THE LAST PERSON TO FIND OUT THAT EXPENSIVE CABLE JUST A RIP OFF?
@shadorne ... I don't think it's that components won't work resonably well with less pure conductors or less exotic architectures. It's the fact that many of us on here are OCD and have good hearing.. So we notice these tiny differences and then mess with what those differences offer. I'm sure you know this. I, personally, don't have super pure copper in my cables, but having experimented with different materials and architectures has led me to believe these subtleties do make a difference. So if some say purity matters, I won't dismiss it out of hand until I experiment myself.
If you need 99.9999 pure copper versus regular copper then you have serious problems with your components. We are talking infinitesimally small differences in performance. Components should be properly designed to handle infinitesimally small differences without any affect on performance. It is easy to design the output stage or the input impedance stage of an amp to handle a useful range of loads (all commonly used types of cable) with aplomb.
I have no doubt that much more expensive cables with the correct much more expensive construction( silver etc) could actually represent an improvement in the right system to the right ears and would never knock ANYBODY for paying for them and being happy with the results. I just know that my system is not ready yet for these very expensive cables, whether I can afford them or want to afford them is irrelevant right now.
Dynaquest, you obviously have no idea what the costs may be. You’re just guessing and extrapolating from there, and that’s not useful to the discussion. My above comments on consumer protection laws still stands.
The above comment about silver from Randy-11. Randy, did you know that silver conducts electricity significantly better than copper? Superior conductivity is only one of its benefits. Why don’t you google this, you’d be surprised at the other main benefit.
213runnin says: "The idea that a manufacturer can "choose" to sell $5/ft(their cost) cable for $750/ft shows a complete ignorance of basic economics."
The above statement demonstrates a complete ignorance of the reality of high end cable/IC/wire marketing and sales. Though the numbers are estimates, the concept is real. If these over priced audio products were under the perview of the FDA or the FCC, they would be under investigation by the government...but they physically harm no one and generally only take advantage of the those with money to waste, little understanding of science and no interest in research. I'm not too concerned about those that are duped into giving money away, but it does bother me that these manufacturers get away with hawking this 21st century snake oil equivalent.
If you think that more expensive cables don’t represent a good value, then don’t buy them! Why the crusader-like fervor ridiculing the choices of others that feel and act differently regarding how they choose to participate in this HOBBY?
Some of these posts fall only slightly short of suggesting that the sale of hi-end cables should be outlawed. Really? Why? On what basis? C’mon folks, that is a complete loss of perspective.
How do others’ buying decisions affect you? Are they buying these cables with government subsidies paid for by your taxes? Are they stealing from you to pay for them? Are these expensive cables polluting the environment compared to cheaper ones? Are your children being exposed to life-threatening addictions by hi-end cable manufacturers? Are your constitutional rights being violated by manufacturers and buyers of expensive cables? Are your lives or way-of-life being threatened by the hi-end cable marketplace? Do expensive cables kill you? Can they readily be used to kill you?
Please step back from this thread, take a deep breath, and think this over for a while.
The idea that a manufacturer can "choose" to sell $5/ft(their cost) cable for $750/ft shows a complete ignorance of basic economics. Also ignorance of the expense of exotic cable designs, and the cost of high purity silver, now that I think of it. I was going to dig up some links to educate in these areas, but I realize that where dogma is concerned, logic and education can not help.
The only negative with ref 2 is that you don't get as much bass as with the more expensive by a lot models. With the more expensive by a lot models and their greater bass extension, you won't need the sub you think you are missing, and the money for the sub will be better spent at anticables. And Their Customer service is great to top it off!
A manufacturer can produce a cable of "exotic" design and beautiful appearance for $5 a foot. He can then choose to sell it for $10 per foot or $750 a foot. If it looks good enough, he might decide to market it as exceptionally high-end and sell it for the higher amount knowing that those with a higher disposable income, but no particular knowledge of basic acoustic science, will assume if it is priced at $750 it MUST be better and will, accordingly, sound better. Once the cables are changed out their eyes will widen and their jaws will drop at the amazing increase in sound stage, transparency, texture and openness the new cables provide. This actually is science...the field we know as psychology.
so i guess the Anticables ref 2 wire at 5ppm impurity must be bad stuff then. Guess thats why its only $6 a foot Oh and won more absolute sounds editors choice awards that I can count And has a 30 day money back guarantee My order is in........
It continues to astound me how naive the economic logic is in this discussion. Since when does cost of goods have any real bearing on what the price of a cable is? Any rational cable manufacturer would seek to price the cable to value derived and keep a price ladder across their range. So if the top end cables which give that last bit of performance to a $500k system are worth $50k to the purchaser then that is is what you should charge. Sure another competitor can try and undercut but frankly at this end of the market you're not selling on price but on value (real and/or perceived). Having spent my career prIcing pharmaceuticals this is a logic the whole industry is based on (which causes its own problems but at least no one can claim they're suffering because of being denied the latest cables😄)
"There is a strong demand in the market for high purity copper with a purity level of 6N or more, which is used to produce the wire material of highly integrated semiconductors. It had been developed and put in practical use in 1997. As a matter of fact, the only companies in the world today producing high purity raw copper in large quantities are none other than Nikko Materials Co. Ltd. and Mitsubishi Materials Co. Ltd. The business circles of integrated semiconductors demand a guarantee of high quality for raw materials, and in fact no enterprise is satisfied with the copper that has less purity than 6N copper for the purposes of mass production of their products. ACROLINK, the only cable-maker in the world that uses 6N copper and copper of higher purity receives a guarantee of analyzed values through a tie-up with the aforementioned two companies.
There is a strong demand in the market for high purity copper with a purity level of 6N or more, which is used to produce the wire material of highly integrated semiconductors. It had been developed and put in practical use in 1997. As a matter of fact, the only companies in the world today producing high purity raw copper in large quantities are none other than Nikko Materials Co. Ltd. and Mitsubishi Materials Co. Ltd. The business circles of integrated semiconductors demand a guarantee of high quality for raw materials, and in fact no enterprise is satisfied with the copper that has less purity than 6N copper for the purposes of mass production of their products. ACROLINK, the only cable-maker in the world that uses 6N copper and copper of higher purity receives a guarantee of analyzed values through a tie-up with the aforementioned two companies.
Currently in the field of audio cables, representation of the purity degree of raw materials has been offered in the form of 6N, 7N, 8N, etc. However, from the viewpoint of scientific reality, the percentage of raw materials should be calculated by the differential value method. Strictly speaking, the purity of copper should be shown in the form of numerical numbers, after the total amount of the quantitative measurements of the other metallic elements( impure materials )other than pure gold on the periodic table, are subtracted from 100. Under the current situation where there is no agreement to show quality standards, the values of the amounts of the raw material( indication of purity) will vary according to each case where some impurities can be counted and others can not. In other words, it is even possible to remove intentionally a certain impurity, i.e. a certain metallic element with a higher value, from the measurement. For instance, general purpose Japanese copper metal has a purity degree of 4N5 with a purity of 99.995% but there are several impurities such as Ag that have very high degrees of impurity. If it is excluded from the targets for the differential value method, it immediately enables you to publicize the data that the copper has a high degree of purity, i.e. a higher degree than 5N because Ag has the purity degree of 10ppm or so.
Cables produced by ACROLINK, use self-stipulated 6N copper constructed using the same process as is used with wires for semiconductor devices, which requires a guarantee of high quality. More precisely, the purity of the copper needs to be over 99.9999% and the total of any impurity metals must be less than 1 ppm.
Impurity metals in over 6N purity copper are measured mostly with highly precise measuring instruments called GD-Ms (GD-Mass), and this type of analysis work requires advanced know-how. Leading other brands, ACROLINK has disclosed to the public the analyzed values of representative elements that may affect sound qualities. These were selected out of the whole body of elements consisting of fifty or sixty items."
213runnin, I do agree with your other points. The only thing that I meant to bring up is that for a lot of our gear, while it is very expensive, we can look inside and see from the build quality some of the reasons why.
But for the cables, who knows what it costs to produce them, plain as well as exotic. You ask me if I know, and I was trying to say I have no idea, but starting at a base case wire such as Canare, Belden, Mogami, it can get way expensive quick. It may well cost that much more to manufacture it, I was just bringing up the void in knowledge and you can't take the top off and see why, one way or the other. .
Geoff, you are trying to be persuasive by making your argument implying that 100 times this or that might be meaningful, and not explaining that 100 times a tiny fraction of 1% is still not a material number, is it not so?
Jitter Geoff stuttered: most high end wire is 99.9999 pure. Do the math. That’s more than 100 times purer than 99.95% pure copper. Hel-loo
to which jitter replied,
"Let say the high end wire was 100% pure. The monoprice wire at 99.95% pure is 5 one hundredths of a percent purer. In multiplication that amounts to .05 of 1%(.01) purer."
Gee whiz, I must have had more math than you, jitter. Your numbers don’t make any sense. I have to assume you're pulling my leg.
Geoff stuttered: most high end wire is 99.9999 pure. Do the math. That’s more than 100 times purer than 99.95% pure copper. Hel-loo
Let say the high end wire was 100% pure. The monoprice wire at 99.95% pure is 5 one hundredths of a percent purer. In multiplication that amounts to .05 of 1%(.01) purer.
213runnin, I am not an attorney, but I would respectfully disagree that selling a $50 cable for $5,000 and saying it is one of the worlds best would be running afoul of any consumer laws. There will always be someone who purchased the cable who will believe it is the best, and it would take a very ignorant manufacturer who could not "dig up" a couple of extremely satisfied customers.
Now I will say I have no idea about manufacturing costs, but I think that the fact you can get 12 gauge 99% pure copper speaker wire for less than a dollar a foot, and that once you figure in the magic ingredients mixed in with the copper and any added coating to the copper, and then factor in the cost of the fancy cover and a great connector, you still have a reasonable manufacture cost per foot. I hate to say this, but how much R&D does it take to make a piece of wire? Just an opinion.
Two simple points. One, I'm not claiming that selling a $50 cable for $5000 is against consumer laws. I made several points, it's not clear to me whether you disagree with any of those.
Two, the kind of speaker cables we are talking about here are not simple 12 gauge copper. Look up wireworld.com speaker cables, Audioquest, etc., and note their designs which get quite exotic. I have no idea how much it costs them per foot to make some of those designs, care to make a guess?
Jetter Ok Geoff, I was being lazy and didn’t bother to look up the specs, here you go, costing $15:
Choice™ Series 12AWG Oxygen-Free Pure Bare Copper Speaker Wire, 50ft. Get the most out of your home audio system with high quality, oxygen-free, pure bare copper speaker wire from Monoprice! This speaker wire features two conductors made of high purity (greater than 99.95% pure), oxygen-free bare copper. Pure Bare Copper is a superior conductor to the copper clad aluminum (CCA) conductors used in most other inexpensive speaker wire. ..
Copper clad aluminum conductors in most other inexpensive speaker wire? What? Whoa! Are they smoking crack? Talk about a marketing genius!
Most high end copper wire is 99.9999% pure. The Japanese stuff is even purer. Do the math. That’s more than 100 times purer than 99.95% pure copper. Hel-loo!
Geoffkait: Besides, the uber expensivo cables usually aren’t copper. Hel-loo!
to which jitter replied,
"Yes I know, silver or gold, emblazoned with magnets and graphene. With the correct directionality marked, of course, and cryoed."
Ok Geoff, I was being lazy and didn't bother to look up the specs, here you go, costing $15:
Choice™ Series 12AWG Oxygen-Free Pure Bare Copper Speaker Wire, 50ft. Get the most out of your home audio system with high quality, oxygen-free, pure bare copper speaker wire from Monoprice! This speaker wire features two conductors made of high purity (greater than 99.95% pure), oxygen-free bare copper. Pure Bare Copper is a superior conductor to the copper clad aluminum (CCA) conductors used in most other inexpensive speaker wire. ..
Besides, the uber expensivo cables usually aren't copper. Hel-loo!
Yes I know, silver or gold, emblazoned with magnets and graphene. With the correct directionality marked, of course, and cryoed.
Ok, here is another way to look at it. I am a certified public accountant, in fact one who is about to retire, which is to say I deal in numbers ad nauseam. I can tell you that every manufacturer has a cost of his goods manufactured, which with his profit will determine the price he sells it to the retailer for, which in turn will have a relationship to the ultimate price the consumer pays.
In all my years of being a member on A'gon I have heard every conceivable argument saying how great expensive cables are and every argument saying what a rip off they are. Those that say the expensive cables are fantastic assume the cost is relative to or at least somewhat attributable to the better materials and R&D. If not this, what (other than supply & demand)?
Is there anyone here who has any idea what it really cost per foot to manufacture and have reasonable mark up for the expensive cable? I sure don't. If 12 gauge 99% pure copper cable cost less than $1 a foot, is the expensive cable $1.50, $5.00 $50,00 or $500 a foot? Until someone can provide some insight into this, the question of rip off (in relation to cost of production) or not will not be answered.
A couple of observations. Let me know if I am totally off base.
1. Many latch on to one or two characteristics of sound when choosing cables. For me it's how quiet a background and bottom end. For others it may be the treble end, cymbal decay, soundstage etc. many cables may perform better with what I am listening to vs your preferences.
2. The current cable quality you are using will play a huge role in your evaluation.
3. How revealing your system/speakers.
4. The music you listen to. If your into garage band grunge, less nuances to compare vs classical, jazz or well recorded genres.
5. Expectations for new cable. If you are looking for "I hate how my system sounds...maybe these expensive cables will change my mind" you will probably be disappointed
213runnin, I am not an attorney, but I would respectfully disagree that selling a $50 cable for $5,000 and saying it is one of the worlds best would be running afoul of any consumer laws. There will always be someone who purchased the cable who will believe it is the best, and it would take a very ignorant manufacturer who could not "dig up" a couple of extremely satisfied customers.
Now I will say I have no idea about manufacturing costs, but I think that the fact you can get 12 gauge 99% pure copper speaker wire for less than a dollar a foot, and that once you figure in the magic ingredients mixed in with the copper and any added coating to the copper, and then factor in the cost of the fancy cover and a great connector, you still have a reasonable manufacture cost per foot. I hate to say this, but how much R&D does it take to make a piece of wire? Just an opinion.
You are free to believe whatever you like. I don’t think lawsuits are ever likely because all the cables work and are generally not harmful. Since when did someone successfully sue a vendor for selling a $50 product for $5000 or $4950 profit .... sorry but it is not illegal to make a profit and you don’t have to prove your input costs to customers....
Well, no, if the cables do not improve sonics as advertised, then that’s false advertising and is breaking consumer laws. Ripping off the consumer is a favorite target, and an industry doing it on such a grand scale as you suggest would draw the FTC like flies. Consumer protection groups would be sending people and cameras to the CEO’s, catching them getting them out of their cars and asking them if they think it’s right to sell snake oil.
Then there is civil lawsuits. Mcdonalds had to pay millions because their hot coffee burned customers, and they had to put a legal disclaimer that their coffee was hot on the paper cups! Surely corporations whose products don’t even work as they advertise would draw class action lawsuits as lawyers who see easy millions would be on them like white on rice. But there are no legal actions or lawsuits, which speaks volumes to a reasonable person.
The profits suggestion is nonsense. Perhaps you could provide some links to back up the idea that cable companies sell cables that cost them $50 for $5000. If that were the case, their corporations would report profits that would put their stocks through the roof and investors would be clamouring to get on the bandwagon of 1000% profits. It would be all over the media.
Don’t invest in expensive cables if you don’t want to. But to suggest that everyone who does is a sucker is what the cable crusaders seem to do. The alternative is that they are missing out on better quality sonics by spending more. Maybe it’s a class envy thing. Some can’t afford to spend a few hundred extra and are bitter about it. I don’t know, but threads like this always go the same way.
@shadorne Funny you should bring up the Bryston viewpoint. I was chatting with Mike Pickett from Bryston a while back about this exact topic. You are absolutely correct about their stand on this matter.
@geoffkait you brought up the option of investigating cable/IC options via The Cable Co. I would like to say that those of you in the USA have an extremely valuable resource at your disposal. How I wish that we here in Canada had such an option. In order for us to evaluate any of these products, it's an outright purchase, and that's that. Yes, I'm jealous !! :)
I second this one... There’s not a single audio buyer that do mindlessly throw money at cables. Choosing a cable is very involved - there’s a lot of studying of features and benefits, lots of questions on compatibility with hi-fi components, consultations with the cable makers, etc.... The consultation phase is so crucial to successfully plant the belief that the cable considered represents an improvement, an upgrade, when in fact it’s so far from the truth. Another crucial element of the cable buying process is the long break-in time necessary, in order to bias the consumer evaluation and trial and to conclude with a successful adoption (no return and next upgrade readiness). Not simple to sell a $5k illusion!
dlcockrum Contrary to popular opinion (apparently), not many audio buyers mindlessly throw money at cables that don’t provide audible benefits in their system, according to their personal tastes and preferences.
eggs ackley! Besides, most cables have 30 day guarantee or whatever. And I doubt any well heeled audiophiles with half a brain pays retail these days. Lol not to mention high end cble can be had for great bargains right here on Audiogon. One man’s treasure is another man’s trash. Lol and anyone can borrow high end cables or power cords from Cable Company for extended auditions. So, one has to ask, uh, where’s the beef?
I suspect all this hand-wringing over cables that has been going on like forever will prove to be nothing more than a symptom of Mid Fi angst and jealousy. 😩
Contrary to popular opinion (apparently), not many audio buyers mindlessly throw money at cables that don't provide audible benefits in their system, according to their personal tastes and preferences. It is a crowded market and suspiciously regarded by many, so the market itself sorts out (over time) those that do not provide improved sound quality on a consistent basis.
You are free to believe whatever you like. I don’t think lawsuits are ever likely because all the cables work and are generally not harmful. Since when did someone successfully sue a vendor for selling a $50 product for $5000 or $4950 profit .... sorry but it is not illegal to make a profit and you don’t have to prove your input costs to customers....
I've got some disturbing news, in that case. Tannoy Loudspeakers has been in the business for a lot longer than Bryston. They use all manner of "cable jewellry" wire in their speakers.
Personally, I don't need to hear what amp or speaker makers say. I listen to my gear. If something within budget improves SQ, then I'll use it. I've had speaker cables and IC's that did not improve things, and and those that did. It's no big deal.
If a product is useless, the maker may get away with hyping it up and using marketing techniques to sell it for a time, but the truth will come out and lawsuits usually ensue.
The theory that the cable industry is nothing but snake oil and has been ripping off the consumer for over 30 years without getting into legal or other trouble is ridiculous. In this sue happy culture they never would have made it out of the 80's.
The cable industry is still around because their products do improve SQ. It's also true that some gear probably can't benefit from after market cables and some people's hearing is of a lesser ability. Ever hear a guy who can't carry a tune bellow it out anyway? Many around him can hear that he's way off the melody, but he can't tell the difference.
I think it is more likely that the best amplifier designers know that there are limits to technology and also human hearing. At some point extra costly aesthetics and marketing become much more important than measurable improvements in sound.
From a marketing perspective, it would be foolish for an amplifier manufacturer to criticize the highly lucrative business of high end cable accessories that their dealers and retailers enjoy. Margins on cables/cords are in the thousands of percent and picking a fight over the usefulness or not of cable jewellery would bite the hand that feeds of the retailers...
That said, Bryston has been quite honest about the benefits of power cords. As a well established pro highish end brand they don’t seem to endorse the idea that you need special power cords for their amps.
@shadorne In regards to your last post on this thread about the cable for the Boulder amp I have a theory. It is much broader in scope than just Boulder. I suspect that from a manufacturers point of view, any product that they are selling, regardless of price point, will be purchased by a very diverse clientele, that have vastly differing opinions as to which cable is "best" for them (this thread is proof of that). The customer will quite probably want a cable of their own preference, especially in higher end gear, for the product being purchased, and will quite possibly discard the generic cable supplied from the product manufacturer. So the device is sold with a cable that is, in a manner of speaking, inexpensive to manufacture, and "disposable" This is my take on the matter. I'm just guessing, but it seems sound to me. No pun intended :)
Does it truly matter if it was a bogus original post? There have been some interesting comments and points made all the same. And of course you are going to get 50 different ways to paint black! No two peoples ears are the same and audio is a very perception based science, if you can use that word. No two people are ever going to hear the same thing and more than likely will each have their own viewpoint as to who is right, thats human nature.
Well over 400 responses to an original post that was bogus!!
Definitely proves a comment I made early in the thread.
"It has been said, put 10 audiophiles in a room to discuss cables and they will emerge with at least 11 different theories. Now I’m thinking they will never leave the room!!"
It’s OK with me, if you’re having fun go for a 1000!!
Some of this boils down to purely financial sensible choices. NOBODY is going to spend 5k on speaker cables for 4k speakers....at least I hope not! I feel the whole question can be a little irrelevant until you are at a mega bucks system level to start with. I know I am never even going to contemplate spending close to or more on cables than components period! So to even be in a situation to consider 5k cables I would probably need to have spent at least 30 to 40k on speakers....and I very much doubt that will happen in my lifetime. Obviously not saying they MIGHT not make a big difference, just that I fear I will never find out.....
I'm proud to say I just spent $150 on some Silver Stager Solids, IC's that look so cheap, yet the sound is better than my $300 cables. I say that those forcing their views on anyone not of their belief should read this thread repeatedly until the feelings go away.
No no with the number of big brains working on the development of those $5k a foot cables, it's actually a bargain believe it or not... the electrical engineers at nasa and space x are taking lessons to make their electronics and machineries more performant. They too cryo everything to make transmissions crystal clear.
jayctoy, I think there may be another side to this topic you didn't address above. Agreed that there are people who don't or can't hear any difference between any cables, regardless of price, for this topic lets forget this subgroup. But for some of us that can hear the difference, its not an all or nothing proposition. If I like the music I am playing I am going to connect with it no matter the cables I am using. It does not become an all or nothing proposition. So for us that it is only an incremental improvement, and not a matter of "emotionally connects" or not, $5K seems a bit off the wall.
That said, if I was rolling in green and had my kids set up pretty and I easily afforded a megabucks system I wouldn't think twice about it. But only if.
If you don't believe 5k cable make a difference then stick with cables you have, no one will force you to buy, But before you disagree try it with your open ears and wallet...I too many yrs ago, I went to a friend house, cables total price 10k, I was shocked, my ears shut off.Many years later I came back to listen, I knew why they are expensive.The music in that room emotionally connects to the listener, it's like live...I respect to those who can't hear the difference.in time you will, when you are ready to spend.
I just posted Neotech XLR and Speaker Cables on Audiogon. The price and performance will surprise many people.
These are UPOCC Copper and Silver Cables in my opinion being in this hobby for 25 years and falling for the cable crap for many years. These are High End Audios best kept secret.
Guys: It's a tad bit hypocritical to be put off by someone for insulting / 'defaming' a post when you openly insult everyone who does not agree with you/your stance on cables not making a difference viz. your broad stroke statements about them as a group.
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