looking for interconnect under 200 dollars

what does someone do with all of the opinions/recommendations ?....

Suggestions provide for a good starting point as to what products to be on the lookout for audition. The more suggestions that I see for a given product, the higher that product resides on my "to-audition" list.

The system for which the cable (or any product) is under evaluation greatly influences the "value" of a suggestion. If I am assembling a Rotel/NAD system for which I need cables, I am not likely to pay much attention to all the praise from owners of "high performance" cables. And if I looking to assemble a system that nails the tonality and harmonic structure of the piano, I am not likely to pay much attention to cable suggestions that get a lot of praise from a Rotel/NAD system owner. It's all relative to what we currently have and what we are looking to improve upon with our next system update.

Hello again MrT, I do believe that we have done this dance before in another thread.
Yes, there is no substitute for listening to a component or cable in one's own system...I agree.

However, I do believe that we can limit the choices from 10,000 to 10 by reading input from members in this forum, many of which we can do background checks on and find out what their personal musical tastes are (soundstage, tonality, etc).
If we find one that we have found to have similar tastes to ours from previous experiences, I have found that we can trust this experience in the future.

I will mention Jafox, Jadem6, Aggielaw, Vetterone, Tbg and many, many others to be of beneficial help to me. I have found that over the years their tastes in music runs similar to mine, so their reco's hold more weight than others whose musical tastes varies from mine.

This doesn't eliminate all other suggestions, but it does help to narrow the field. After all, no one can hear all of the audio offerings out there on the market these days.

Cheers,
John

Cheers,
John

is it group think and political correctness to follow advice and well-meaning opinions ?

what are the consequences of not doing one's research and hard work ? there is no substitute for trial and error. no can tell another what he or she will like. even an audio dealer will tell you that.

the idea that following the opinions of others in a hobby as hours may not be rational.

i think random works as well as being given a list of purchase candidates selected by audiophiles. is there any evidence which disproves my hypothesis ?

for every successful example accriung from following advice, there may be a counter example.

Just want to be correct here, so, IMHO, I agree with Stingreen, try the anticables. I also agree with John but I think he is overreacting to Stingreen and IMHO, he should offer his interconnect recommendation proposed by Danovak.

Lots of good ideas here, so my post may be redundant. One factor that must be considered is your system, as some cables will sound better than others with the equipment you own (and we have no info here). I have owned and used a fairly wide range of <$200 interconnects, and among the better ones, I've found there isn't a vast amount of audible difference. Somewhat perversely, the distinctions between cables become clearer as the cost/quality of your system increases, so "budget" systems are likely to be less revealing of nuances between cables. If you buy used cables here on A-gon, or perhaps from UsedCables.com, you will be able to afford better cables. Based on personal experience, the cables I suggest you consider are: Kimber Hero; Nordost Blue Heaven and Red Dawn; BetterCable.com's Silver Serpents; Alpha-Core TQ2; Analysis Plus; and various AudioQuest models. If I were forced, however, to recommend only one interconnect in your price bracket, it would be the Kimber Hero. I have owned Kimber products since I first met Ray Kimber in the early 1980's. He puts his personal integrity behind everything he makes, and his products have always provided high value for the dollar. If you want further guidance, you might try calling The Audio Advisor and getting their opinion.