JD, thanks for your post here. I also feel endebted to your kind words. Further, in watching what part of your audio journey you have been kind enough to share with us over the years, I feel that there are few people in this hobby more devoted, dedicated, and methodical in wringing increasingly better performance out of every part of one's system than you.
As you said, we agree that wire has an effect on the sonics of a system. I even say the impact is substantial. In my opinion, wire is certainly a component, and when I really break things down, from our front end to our loudspeakers, our components are basically wire (think about it!).
And, as you have said, wire is overpriced. There are myriad reasons as to how this has come about, and I don't want to make this post overly long, so I will not go into why I feel we are in the fix we are today. But, I will say that if you really look into the source material of a lot of the cabling we use, the true cost is pennies on the dollars that we pay. That is not a universal truth by any means. Certain materials are of such purity that one could envision this level of pricing, though I am pretty well convinced only a very few, if any, companies are using this type of wire. Also, for companies such as Nordost, who have had to acquire the tooling and machinery to manufacture their own cable, the cost of paying for such equipment must be factored into the price otherwise they'll soon find themselves out of business.
But, again, if you put a list of the Top 10 cables in this marketplace over the past decade together, I'm fairly confident that this cable that I listed above would be on it. It's a Stereophile Recommended Component. All I'm saying is that I have a friend who sells the SAME EXACT stuff for $99/meter. I'd be more than happy to share the names with you offline of both the well known company and my friend...
Take care always,
Joe
As you said, we agree that wire has an effect on the sonics of a system. I even say the impact is substantial. In my opinion, wire is certainly a component, and when I really break things down, from our front end to our loudspeakers, our components are basically wire (think about it!).
And, as you have said, wire is overpriced. There are myriad reasons as to how this has come about, and I don't want to make this post overly long, so I will not go into why I feel we are in the fix we are today. But, I will say that if you really look into the source material of a lot of the cabling we use, the true cost is pennies on the dollars that we pay. That is not a universal truth by any means. Certain materials are of such purity that one could envision this level of pricing, though I am pretty well convinced only a very few, if any, companies are using this type of wire. Also, for companies such as Nordost, who have had to acquire the tooling and machinery to manufacture their own cable, the cost of paying for such equipment must be factored into the price otherwise they'll soon find themselves out of business.
But, again, if you put a list of the Top 10 cables in this marketplace over the past decade together, I'm fairly confident that this cable that I listed above would be on it. It's a Stereophile Recommended Component. All I'm saying is that I have a friend who sells the SAME EXACT stuff for $99/meter. I'd be more than happy to share the names with you offline of both the well known company and my friend...
Take care always,
Joe