Responding to one of Mark's posts above, I am not a Luddite either, but I am a Neanderthal (figuratively as well as genetically I think).
As I've said many times before, I love these cables threads on A'gon, because they go on and on. As some have noted above, it is nice to be able to have a civilized conversation abut this subject. On the other big websites, you can't talk about it. No mention of DBT is allowed at the Cable Asylum, and that's fine - I am not critical of that rule. At Audioreview.com's Cable forum, you can't suggest that anything sounds different from or better than 12 gauge stranded from a hardware store or the interconnects that come in the boxes of mid-fi components without being drowned out and subjected to ridicule.
Here we have 3 or 4 camps with subgroups all talking, and the benefit is someone may learn enough to question his own assumptions and either find a killer cable that makes his system sound better or save a lot of money by deciding for himself that the cheap stuff is just as good.
I was going to say something about alternating current and "direction," but I think Clueless has covered the subject better than I could.
I have tried and rejected some mid-priced speaker cables (like Nordost Blue Heaven, Kimber 8TC and one of the MIT cables) because I didnt like the way I thought they sounded (on a sighted basis, and one or another of them may have revealed some deficiency in the system I was using at the time, - so if I were testifying in court that is all I could say). I have played around with sub $400 interconeects, compared them to the Radio Shack cables recommended by John Dunlavy (which aren't as bad as they are annoying to use) and settled on some well shielded cables with locking WBT-like barrel connectors made by a local pro gear company that cost $40. The interconnects I use seem to me to get the job done. For some strange reason, all the other interconnects I have tried seem to alter the signal somehow or, let in too much rfi, emi and just noise from light fixtures and such. I don't know how an interconnect makes the sound brighter or duller, but some seem to do so (again on a sighted basis - the differences I perceive may disappear in a DBT).
I am inclined to believe the ees who say simple competently designed cables are as good as anything else you can buy. Their arguments make sense to me and since I'm cheap I am biased in their favor.
The initial point of this thread way up there was not "don't all cables sound the same," but is it necessary to spend a fortune on good cables. I think most people here probably agree that it isn't necessary. Disagreeing are a lot of people who havent responded including a few who have invested in the Nordost Valhalla or that even more expensive stuff, and who evidently thought it made sense to do so.
What does it mean when you know less than someone who is "clueless?"
As I've said many times before, I love these cables threads on A'gon, because they go on and on. As some have noted above, it is nice to be able to have a civilized conversation abut this subject. On the other big websites, you can't talk about it. No mention of DBT is allowed at the Cable Asylum, and that's fine - I am not critical of that rule. At Audioreview.com's Cable forum, you can't suggest that anything sounds different from or better than 12 gauge stranded from a hardware store or the interconnects that come in the boxes of mid-fi components without being drowned out and subjected to ridicule.
Here we have 3 or 4 camps with subgroups all talking, and the benefit is someone may learn enough to question his own assumptions and either find a killer cable that makes his system sound better or save a lot of money by deciding for himself that the cheap stuff is just as good.
I was going to say something about alternating current and "direction," but I think Clueless has covered the subject better than I could.
I have tried and rejected some mid-priced speaker cables (like Nordost Blue Heaven, Kimber 8TC and one of the MIT cables) because I didnt like the way I thought they sounded (on a sighted basis, and one or another of them may have revealed some deficiency in the system I was using at the time, - so if I were testifying in court that is all I could say). I have played around with sub $400 interconeects, compared them to the Radio Shack cables recommended by John Dunlavy (which aren't as bad as they are annoying to use) and settled on some well shielded cables with locking WBT-like barrel connectors made by a local pro gear company that cost $40. The interconnects I use seem to me to get the job done. For some strange reason, all the other interconnects I have tried seem to alter the signal somehow or, let in too much rfi, emi and just noise from light fixtures and such. I don't know how an interconnect makes the sound brighter or duller, but some seem to do so (again on a sighted basis - the differences I perceive may disappear in a DBT).
I am inclined to believe the ees who say simple competently designed cables are as good as anything else you can buy. Their arguments make sense to me and since I'm cheap I am biased in their favor.
The initial point of this thread way up there was not "don't all cables sound the same," but is it necessary to spend a fortune on good cables. I think most people here probably agree that it isn't necessary. Disagreeing are a lot of people who havent responded including a few who have invested in the Nordost Valhalla or that even more expensive stuff, and who evidently thought it made sense to do so.
What does it mean when you know less than someone who is "clueless?"