The Big Boys vs. the Little Guys

I was using JPS Superconductor 2 speaker cables and also had one SC 2 interconnect and I decided to try the LAT International (little guy) cables. In my system, the LAT was clearly better.

I forgot to mention, the quality of the LAT is excellent.

I hope to hear more comments in this thread -- I find this fascinating and enlightening. But I promised to weigh-in with my experience, and I'll do so now.

With interconnects, I had an all-Nordost system; Blue Heaven ver.2 everywhere except in the CD player to preamp run, where I used the Red Dawn balanced. I then tried Jaap Gunter's Lieder RIJN RCA interconnect in place of the Red Dawn (actually, I had both in place -- the Plinius CD-LAD preamp allows you to connect both and switch between them with a touch of a button ... nice feature).

Brand new, the Lieder sounded roughly equivalent, which is to say, very good. But over two weeks time, the Lieder pulled away ... and then left the Red Dawn in its dust. The Lieder had far superior detail and especially treble resolution. Cymbals crashed and tambourines, etc., had that "live" sound; by comparison the Red Dawn muddied the high treble ... it "shhh'd" that portion of the sound spectrum. I'm now in the process of replacing all my Blue Heaven ver2 with Lieder RIJN ... I mean, if Jaap Gunter's Lieder RIJN bested the Red Dawn balanced, it should be even more superior as against the RCA Blue Heaven.

Now, speaker cables. I initially had Blue Heaven. But my Snell Reference A Towers use an umbilical running from their outboard crossovers to the speaker. The umbilical uses Kimber 8TC, so I thought I'd give the 8TC a try ... in a shotgun bi-wired version. These 2 were fairly close -- the Nordost perhaps a little quicker, the 8TC perhaps more balanced ... but still pretty close.

But I still didn't feel I was getting the performance which I knew the Snell Reference A Towers were capable of ... so I ordered Bear Labs, USA, Silver Thunder Speaker cables. These were not available in a shotgun bi-wired version (at least, not at the time), so I also ordered Bear's jumpers.

Again, initially, it was a close call. But after a week or so of 24-7 break-in, the Bear Labs showed its mettle ... or is it metal? (Okay, ... bad pun). I think the Bear Labs is superior to either the 8TC or the Blue Heaven speaker cables: faster, resolution 10 feet deep, dynamic, and detail to die for.

Now, I'm not sure I've reached the last word in speaker cables for my system (and I'm open to suggestions here), but my experience is that the little guys provide better value than the big boys ... again generally speaking ... and I for one want to provide my "financial encouragement" to this segment of the industry.

I feel this way about much of the electronics, too. While Plinius may not strictly qualify as a "little guy," it is compared to the behemoths like Krell and many others. Yet, NOBODY can touch the quality Plinius gives you in their new 8200 MkII integrated amp ... with phono stage, no less ... for about $3,000. No doubt, you'd have to spend double, triple, or even quadruple that to get close to the 8200 MkII's quality from anyone else out there.

FYI, no ... I'm not associated with Plinius, Bear Labs, or Jaap Gunter's Lieder Cables. I'm just an audiophile searching for that sonic nirvana ... like you ... and I'm willing to "name names."

A further FYI, of course cables are system dependent. Here's my system (minus cables):

*Plinius CD-LAD preamp
*Plinius Jarrah phono stage
*Denon DP59L 'table (heavily tweaked -- ask me about that if you want)
*Grado The Statement cartridge (thanks, John Grado!)
*Sony XA7ES CD Player
*Snell A Reference Tower speakers (terrific speakers!)
*Snell SUB 1800 subwoofer
*Hsu Research 250 watt sub amp
*API Powerwedge 14
*FIM AC outlets, coupled to dedicated AC lines
*homemade granite, wood, air, and sorbothane turntable base
*homemade record cleaning machine

I hope to see more comments on this thread ... thanks for sharing! Warmest regards to you all.

Little guys? How about rolling your own! Can't get much littler than that and the money you'll save!

I do not see it as big versus little. I do not care who makes the cable as long as it sounds good. In my system I have a combination of Monster Sigma, Homegrown Silver Lace, Electraglide, Harmonic Tech, Apogee, Vampire and Synergistic Research. A rather eclectic bunch from manufacturers of all stripes. Suprisingly though, my Monster Sigma II speaker cables have proved to be the most consistent long term performer in my system.