Cables for a high-school newbie


Im on an extreemly tight budget. My goal for cables is simply to open up my current system, tighten the bass, and sharpen immaging, i dont want to color the sound at all (well, maybe a tad bit darker to counter the metal dome tweeters on my speakers). I have a sony cd player, Onkyo Tx 8211 reciever and a pair of NHT SB-3s (best speakers under $1k i've heard... and they're only $400 new if you shop around). are cables worth the dough at this level or not, and if so what brands should i be looking at? I need both interconnects and speaker cables. I listen to rock, small group jazz, metal (too bad metalheads can't figure out how to make a decent recording), and classical in that order.
thanks for the help
dk89
Speaker cables: Make them from Home Depot 14 gauge outdoor extension cord (it's orange with a longitudinal black stripe). No, I'm not kidding. A 50-foot cable should cost you less than $20. There's a very positive review in The Absolute Sound, April/May 2004.

Interconnects: Go to www.starlink-dss.com and scroll down to the Petra component video cables that say they were "formerly Music Boy." You get 3 six-foot cables (component video cables, remember) for under ten bucks. Or get the same cables as "component digital cables" for under 5 bucks. Again, I'm not kidding.

I've replaced $500+ cables with this stuff and find it extremely musical and involving. The Home Depot speaker cables simply demolished some $1200 wires in a friend's system. If you reterminate the ICs with better connectors, they sound even better. Do a search here and on Audio Asylum under "HD-14" and "Petra" or "Music Boy" to learn more. Good luck, Dave