I've seen a lot of discussion around on different message threads about various interconnects and speaker wire. I thought perhaps a dedicated thread for this topic might be in order.

I'm currently using a hodgepodge. My cd player and sattelite are using Phoenix Gold interconnects, while my DVD player is using Monster digital coax and S-video. I'm also using Monster for my LFE connection to my sub. Since I RARELY use my VCR now (gotta love DVD!), I just have some old Radio Shack gold connections hooked up to it.

I just set up my home theater a few weeks ago and haven't bothered swapping around cables and types as I'm pretty happy with what I have. I did do one test between the no name S-video cable I was using and the Monster S-video. I thought the Monster provided a slightly richer color, but made my wife take a blind taste test. She also picked out the Monster as slightly better, confirming to me it wasn't my imagination justifying the purchase.

I know a lot of people feel that Monster is kind of the Bose of the wire world, good marketing but the product (while not necessarily bad) isn't really all that. But it was available to me and in my price range.

Even though they are currently WAY out of my price range, I am quite interested in hearing about some first hand experience with TMC yellows and whites. I found a forum somewhere on the web and everyone raved about them. They all said at first they thought they had made a huge mistake, but after they let them burn in, the improvement was dramatic.

As for speaker wire, I wired my Boston System 9000 set with AudioQuest FLX16/2 speaker wire. While I have nothing else to compare it to, my Boston's sound great. My uncle helped me with some of the install labor and was impressed with the quality of the speaker wire. Said it was a lot better than what he was using.

Anyway, what are you guys using out there? What do you like or dislike? Has anyone noticed a dramatic improvement swapping for a different type or manufacturer?

An excellent idea, and something I've expressed some interest in before myself. Here's my $0.02.

My system is in a bit of a transition at the moment, since I'm experimenting with some different cables and trying to pick up some particularly nice stuff as the opportunity (and wallet) allow. Like Owl's_Warder, I was intrigued by all the talk about TMC's cables. A little persistence on Audiogon has allowed me to pick up a couple sets of TMC cables at a nice price. I've got TMC Yellow and TMC White going to my Model 750 (Whites on the surrounds; I intend to upgrade to Yellow there). I've got a TMC Yellow on my digital coax from a Panasonic A310 to my Model 1050 -- for this, I don't see much difference between TMC White and TMC Yellow (the Yellow is still burning in right now, so I can't say for sure yet), but the TMC White was noticeably different from the other digital cables I've used (Monster optical, Monster coax, BetterCables optical, BetterCables coax -- all of which sounded almost identical). I played with Monster, BetterCables, and TMC White on my VCR (fiancee watches TV from the digital cable box through it a lot): the BetterCables was a bit of an improvement over Monster, and the White was an improvement over the BetterCables (sound stage and sound floor). I've used several interconnects on my CD changer (all burned in at the time they were compared) -- Monster, TMC White, TMC Yellow, and a pair of Magnan Type Vi's that were loaned to me. I had interesting results here: the Type Vi's (retail around $600 or so) were an amazing improvement over the Monster Interlink 400 Mk II's, the TMC Whites didn't fair well when compared to the Type Vi's (they had a "weaker" sound than the Magnans), but the TMC Yellows actually sounded better than the Magnans on my system (somewhat less bass until I cranked it up at which point they were equals, but more and clearer mids and treble, somewhat better sound stage, and the dead silent background a lot of people observe in TMC cables) -- it was not an earthshattering difference, but I liked the sound more. I've got the Magnans on the CD changer until I can get my hands on a pair of Yellows for it. I am very interesting in doing a test of the Outlaw PDA cables. When they are available, I'll be getting a pair to test, and will probably compare them to TMC White and Yellow on my CD changer. I'll report my findings here for anyone interested.

For video, I've switched over to BetterCables S-video entirely. I have been fortunate in not having any problems with the S-video switching in my 1050, and have BetterCables older "premium" S-video from digital cable to VCR and VCR to receiver as well as the new Silver Serpent S-video from DVD to receiver and receiver to TV. I have found them to be better than the Monster S-video cables available at Best Buy, although they aren't as convenient and are slightly more expensive (~$50 or $60 for a 1-meter cable, I think). In fact, the change was immediately apparent when I used them in the DVD signal path -- better contract, richer color. I didn't see as much benefit when using them on the VCR.

I got very lucky with speaker cable this spring, while studying for the Professional Engineer exam. My future father-in-law gave my fiancee an old pair of his speaker cables, suggesting that she "loan" them to me. A pair of 2-meter Transparent MusicWave Supers, plus a set of jumper wires for the bi-wire binding posts on my Paradigm Studio 60's. I went from Home Depot 12ga biwired to the Transparents. Talk about an eye-opener! I've got the center channel biwired with BetterCables, although I've also used some old Monster M.75 (which bears a strong resemblance to a gray garden hose -- heavy stuff); both performed similarly. Trying either as the high-frequency in a bi-wire arrangement with the Transparent was comical/disastrous -- the Transparent was too much for them. I'm thinking about trying to get a pair of TMC Gold speaker cables to use as high frequency with the Transparents or as bi-wire for the center channel; if I do, I'll post my findings here. Lastly, my three surround speakers are wired with 30' to 40' runs of Monster XP white speaker cable.

My system (since a lot of this is system dependent):
Outlaw Audio Model 1050 receiver
Outlaw Audio Model 750 amp
Paradigm Reference Studio 60 v2 main speakers
Paradigm Reference Studio CC v2 center
(3) Paradigm Reference Studio ADP v2 surrounds
Panasonic DVD-A310 DVD player
Mitsubishi CS-27309 27" TV
Panasonic S-VHS VCR
Time Warner digital cable

Oh, good point on the system info:

Toshiba SD-2109 DVD Player
1050
Boston Acoustics System 9000 Spkrs:
Micro 90x's FL, FR, and RC
VRS Micros RL and RR
Micro 90c FC
Micro90pv 75-watt powered subwoofer
Dish! Network Satellite
Proscan PSVR72 VCR
JVC AV-27920 Television

Thanks for the heads up on the BetterCables S-video. Maybe I'll be able to switch sometime soon...

Do you people actually believe that cables make that much of a difference? I mean sure, a good cable or wire can offer better filtering of from outside interference and should offer untainted signal transmission, but once you get a decent cable you are not going to get any better at any price point. Spend that money where it will do some real good! I would be willing to bet ANY amount of money that in a blind test no one on EARTH could accurately pick one quality cable from another, and by quality I mean something like Monster or better. I spend some dollars on quality cable but nothing that's outrageous.

Of course, I'm sure I'll here from some who can *certainly* tell the difference, and in fact they may even believe that themselves. I'd also be willing to bet very few of these people are electrical engineers!

All IMHO, of course.

Tim

For a long time I figured that cables were cables -- all it's got to do is move a signal, right? I won't argue that many cables are so insanely priced that any possible benefits are effectively killed by the additional cost, as I agree. However, I have heard benefits in using cables of a higher quality than Monster. Yes, a lot of this is opinion and personal preference, and some is self-deception to justify the cost of cables, but in my experience I have actually heard differences, in many cases extreme differences. Read my first post in this thread -- I compared four different cables, all burned in at the time they were tested. The $600 cable was an indefinite loan (so no need to convince myself the money spent was worth it since I had no money in it), and the other two cables had cost me maybe twice what good Monster Cables cost at Best Buy or Circuit City. I switched cables (not blind for me), but my fiancee had no idea what I was using. We both heard noticeable differences between the four cables (the differences between TMC Yellow and Magnan Type Vi were slight, and did boil down to personal preference).

Don't dismiss all the fuss over high-priced cables until you test it with your ear. Among all the hype and nonsense there are real benefits to be had. And, just for reference, my education is not in electrical engineering -- it's in mechanical engineering, which by necessity requires a good bit of electrical study. And the Magnans were loaned to me by a college professor whose undergraduate degree is in electrical engineering.

I'll be the first to admit that I haven't listened to *any* of these high priced cables and I guess in a way that makes my opinion invalid to some degree. Having said that I still am *very* skeptical that these cables are able to appreciably offer cleaner signal transmission from one quality brand or model to another.

Two more points I'd make:

1) Burn in? What the heck is that? Do these cables actually heat up so much that they change their chemical composition or what? This phenomenon alone seems dubious at best.

2) What about all those plain copper wire interconnects within the amps / receivers? The theoretical limit of any cables ability to transmit a signal would still only allow the signal to arrive just at left, no better, no worse. Everything else is distortion.

Once again, IMHO.

Tim

I'll take a shot at responding to these.



"Burn in" is not an exact description of what I understand to be the process involved in breaking in cables, but it's as good a name for it as any. It is not heat related or even entirely chemical composition related. From the bits I've seen written on it (and this is a bit vague to avoid over-stepping the info I have on hand -- I'd do a little searching online but I've had too long a day today), "burn in" involves factors like crystal structure of the conductor (as current aligns the crystals in the wire over time, the signal can travel better); capacitance/inductance of the conductor, insulation, and shielding (which takes time for that trickle of power to carry to a saturation or equilibrium point); and a few other "weird" interactions between the components of a cable. Yes, it all sounds bizarre and perhaps even absurd, but there's a lot of information out there on the subject. I've noticed improvements over time as cables burned in, although not as substantial a change as involved in speaker break-in.



I suspect that the specs Outlaw developed for the 750 and 1050 call for a different grade of copper and insulation than you'll find in an Optimus receiver from Radio Shack. Are they doing that just for marketing? Nope. Do some people pop open their speaker cabinets and re-wire their speakers? Yep -- and they don't do it just to kill some time. You buy quality components and count on the manufacturer to provide good wires and such. But your on your own for speaker cables and interconnects. Which is why we have this thread.

For a long time I thought it was sort of bizarre that people could get so fired up over cables, but I've actually tried some different cables and my ears have told me it can make a difference. If you want to decide if your ears see a difference, trade out those Monsters for some TMC, or BetterCables, or Phoenix Gold, or Audioquest, or Tributaries, or Kimber, or whatever else catches your ear. You may find no difference whatsoever. Or you may find yourself re-visiting your CD collection.

Edit: Let me add this suggestion -- anybody out there want to volunteer to provide a better explanation of "burn-in" than my jumble, or an explanation of the benefits of high-end cables? If work slows down some, I may try to do a little research. Also, we don't want to get entirely off topic, so anybody who wants to add comments on the interconnects and cables they're using should jump on in.

[This message has been edited by gonk (edited August 07, 2001).]

The other thing to keep in mind when auditioning cables is to do a double-blind test. That means that not only should you not know which cable is currently in use during the test, but the other person who is responsible for switching them shouldn't know either - label them cable A and cable B so that the person doing the switching only knows them by those names and no other. If you switch the cables yourself it is really easy to trick yourself into hearing differences, and if a second person does the switching but is aware of what cable is what, they can easily impart subtle, almost sub-conscious, clues to you which you *will* pick up on, that's just the way people are wired, and will bias your opinion no matter how objective you think you are.

I am not an electrical engineer, but a mechanical engineer with a decent amount of experience with data acquisition and a lot of good BS sessions with other EE's. My unconfirmed [open for more experience] thoughts:

Burn in is indeed an electrical charge alignment of the atoms in the make-up of the cable, alternating currents can do that. I believe its biggest influence is in the capacitance and inductance realm, which is critical. Low end cross-overs (i.e. low or high pass filters) are routinely just RC or RLC circuits, so if the cable has a varying inductance or capacitance, it can effect signal attenuation. Those being my understanding of the facts, I can't even being to imagine how small the contribution could be in a system with such low voltages and short cable runs. In a system running at 20 volts, with milli-amp current over 100 meter runs, though, you can see quite significant aliasing of mid to high frequency data.

As far as the 'little copper wire inside the components go, I tend to be in agreement. It does seems strange. My only thought is that extremely short solid conductor may perform very well, whereas longer (1 meter) flexible multi-strand cables are much more fickle. Obviously shielding is paramount, but it also is fairly remedial. If it is shielded, it is good for just about anything. But I could see why someone would feel strange about connecting a set of $100 cables to a $90 component with little bare copper connections inside.

My personal experience has been that cables which are correctly shielded perform better than those 'half-way' cables on the $5.00 rack. I have never done a good blind test, but then again I don't own any really expensive cables. Speaker wire is critical without question. Coarse wire from home depot sounds completely different from fine wire by Monster. Again, its an inductance phenomena, I would suspect.

I do think, without reserve, that cables and speakerwire and all of the esoteric changes involved at that level are 'ultra-fine' tuning a system. Proper speaker placement, careful routing of wires and maybe a power conditioner would be my order of operations for a system tuning long before buying ultra expensive cables. But maybe I'm just limiting my system. Who knows? The debate started in the early days of audio and will continue as long as we don't have digital impulses piped directly to our brain. But its always interesting to hear another point.

Sandy.

if products were priced and sold based on quality monster cable would be out of business along with many other cable companies and would be replaced by audioquest cables and other companies that use better technology.audioquest uses solid(as opposed to stranded)copper which causes less sound distortion-if you dont beleive me buy the cheapest audioquest speaker cable and compare to any other cable at double that price(or even greater)that uses stranded cable.