Entry Level Cables

Oh, and right now I'm debating the Anticables and the Canare 4s11. Is there any particular termination that is preferred or "better?" Or does it just come down to personal preference?

Thanks again!

Bare wire is best, IMO, but most people choose spades or bananas out of convenience, or to provide a little more contact surface area with binding posts.

Having owned both Anti Cables and Canare 4S11, I think the Canare is a little more conducive to bare wire installation because the wire itself is more flexible, and because it's multi stranded it will spread under pressure and give you more contact area on the binding posts.

Put a little CAIG ProGold on the bare wire and install them. You're good to go.

The Anti Cables may work better with spades for the reason of increased contact surface area.

It's down to personal preferences.

I might help to understand that for most people (especially the gearheads) this hobby is a journey - you start somewhere and go from there as your tastes, listening skills and budget evolve (not necessarily in that order but you get the idea)

Little known fact but a very few manufacturers make most of the wire used by the entire industry. It's an expensive undertaking. Some companies have custom runs done with their own "formulation" but there are minimum orders...

Companies buy from them, then add various combinations of insulation (teflon, cotton, PTFE) cosmetics (techflex and shrinkwrap in fancy colors) and nice connectors...For instance single pair of RCA males can cost from about $2 to $400.

There are a lot of people who think that a bare wire is the best possible amp to speaker connection - all you have to be able to do is strip insulation...

There is also a very strong DIY tradition in a portion of the community. Lots of info and what are called "recipes" around. Go to Audioasylum dot come and vhaudio dot com

In all fairness the anti-cables are a legitimate design alternative - I have never heard them but they have stood the test of a few years on this board which is generally flavor of the month oriented

And you can't get hurt with 30 or 60 day moneyback guarantees - worth it to learn to hear the differences - its kind of backwards but the less difference you hear, the less you have to worry about it. There are a ton of factors that determine your sound in your room - cable is nowhere near the top of the list.

So start with one or the other, or roll your own. markertek and partsexpress are both good resources, there are many others.

Don't sweat it.You could have system multiples better and while I think Kimber makes excellent product for buck go for cheapies (even home dept 16 gauge extension cords would do) and them get Kimber latter.Heard anti is good and have bought Blue Jean before and they work fine.Put more into the cake,then the frosting and make the cables the sprinkles.Go for short speaker cable lengths and first spring for source to reciver cables and then splurge on speaker wires.
Chazz

For about $250 you can buy used Acoustic Zen Satori. This is one of the better cables - even better bang for the buck than Analysis Plus Oval 9