Does Your System Sound Like the Real Thing?

Why should a cable have to make such a significant difference and cost so much to boot

Have experienced this and, as a diyer, it's VERY frustrating!

For the 1st part, obviously the transfer function and noise reflection/rejection -- why/how? I don't really know, wish an RF person could chip in here...

For the second part (the cost), well... two points: a) small proprietary wire runs are VERY expensive
b) when a cable geometry WORKS WELL (remember, a rca cable is asymmetric, so more complicated) one just indexes the prices vs other outrageously priced products.

I'm trying to work out the Valhalla. I still have a way to go...:)

Tubegroover, your response in the another thread is the reason I started asked this question. It's the 2nd 6/8 post by Tubegroover.

I figured as much and these cables were definitive in some of my responses on that thread.

On some kinds of music: yes, in particular on percussion, voice, and smaller ensembles. A distant perspective (meaning the microphones were relatively far away from the instruments they recorded) also helps the illusion of realism.

Real thing? Yes. My system sounds like crappy midfi. Most of the time I am pretty happy when I hear more of a recording than I had previously heard over years of listening. To me this seems to be some of the value I have gotten from my purchases. I would say in my experience the degree to which music has sounded like the real thing- voices, instruments has almost totally depended on the recording and my ability to descern what sounds true to life.