I know I am very late, but great job on the explanation @adam
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thank you man
After reading through this thread, the the one posting peoples custom cables, I’m reminded of some advice I was once given…
“They’re all crazy…might as well be pretty”
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I love Schiit:
USB PYST. This is the complete redefinition of USB cables. It actually, physically transports you* into an alternate universe where superbly-mastered, 24/192 music streams 24/7, free of charge to all listeners, for all genres. Supermodels in this alternate world are all deeply into high-end audio, and will beg to go out with you. Butterflies swirl in fantastic colors over clean-lined porcelain cityscapes, everyone is a millionaire, and flying cars run on air. It’s a beautiful place to be!
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the most depressingly real description of what people getting into this hobby might believe will happen
The exact opposite is also true. I mean, KZ cables suck. Really suck. Literally, they suck the midrange out of the IEMs. They’re also for sale for ONE DOLLAR everywhere on eBay. They’re not worth that. KZ are just shooting themselves in the foot selling their IEMs with this shitty cable.
I thought all KZ IEMs were V-shaped until I bought a decent 10$ cable. Lol.
I’ve put my reply here so as not to clog up the ‘What did you buy today’ thread…
I totally agree with @SpeleoFool and also @LeDechaine
I’ve heard high end $100k systems not mine of course lol so never had a chance to switch cables etc but systems like that are so resolving that micro nuances maybe audible to a trained ear?
With most iem’s being of such low impedance cable swops can be more audible imho…however this my well be down volume levels not being exactly matched 
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Cables…yes they can sound different. A cable that changes the sound is nothing more than a fixed frequency equalizer. I’m not just saying that - physics explains this very simply with resistance, capacitance and, inductance of a cable. Not surprisingly, an equalizer uses guess what to augment each band? Resistors, capacitors, inductors. Spending money over and over to find that one cable that happens to do exactly what you’re looking for is kind of…ehem…dumb. An actual equalizer will work on every system and every component every time. Buy a good EQ and be done with it. Forever.
What do you all think of this?
I question the efficacy of analogue audio cables, but digital data is either transferred or it is not transferred. So besides (I hope) being made of better more durable materials… a USB cable will either transfer data fast enough or it won’t.
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Sooo… Do cables matter? I think we have been through enough exercises to come to the healthy conclusion that yes, yes they do. But then there is this stupid shit!
I laughed for a good few minutes while watching this! Nothing against Jay here, I think overall he was as fair and objective as he could be. And I’m sure there is something to the science behind it. But come on, look at these stupid things. To me it’s just funny! I won’t even mention the price. Oh well, to each their own I guess. But for me, hard pass, regardless of bank account status. Happy Monday, folks! Why not start the week with a laugh and some controversy!
I actually got some of those cables a few months ago after a friend pushed me toward them, nice stuff, I most like their speaker and power cables for my system, but found that their interconnects didn’t really suit my setup well, so still using my audience stuff for that (and some audience power mixed in as well since I can’t really afford to recable the entire thing lol). Worth the price in my current system, but definitely wasn’t where I’d put my money for past systems I’ve had
Yes, I have looked at the audience stuff before. My humble system definitely doesn’t warrant those but if I had a system that was worthy I would consider them for sure. I draw the line there, however! 
No, for my setup, World’s Best does quite nicely. I guess things change pretty dramatically when you start moving into the “Biff and Muffy” side of the audio spectrum…
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They make some more affordable stuff like the ohno interconnects and if you look used you can find stuff well under msrp for older cables, might be worthwhile in the future if you move up later on to the point where it makes sense. But the mogami, canare, belden, gotham, etc from places like worlds best, bjc, etc are great places to be as they are cheap and good, better than bottom of the barrel stuff but not breaking the bank. I will say you can find even better value than those if you just keep your eye out on the used market for some of the nicer cables, sometimes people just sell off older higher end cables for almost nothing just to get rid of them so sometimes you can find steals. But it’s not something to really worry about the majority of the time lol
Yes, you just need to go very very very high lol
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I went Mogami for 99% of the interconnects. I like that there is consistency in the signal path from device to device in the chain, and they seem to be performing very well. I went slightly higher quality for the speaker cables (can’t remember what brand at the moment).
Thank you for mentioning the used market for cables. I never thought about that! I will definitely be paying attention moving forward.
As with mostly everything in audio, the used market makes things previously unfeasible feasible lol. I think I’ve bought mostly all my cables used or demo since like hell I’d pay some of the new prices some of these command lol
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I don’t remember the source, but I read an article about audio cables and there are times that certain factors need to be considered. most of it had to do with cable lengths, how much power they’re supporting and how resistance, etc, affected the overall / total performance.
Yes, I would generally keep cables as short as you can (but at least usable short), although there are some exceptions such as digital cables where you might want to go a longer length due to reflections and whatnot, really all depends on the specific cable at hand and what you are trying to use it for/with
Plus 1 here for the world’s best mogami interconnects.
- Functionality aside, they are art-pieces
- Having a constant conductor spacing would enable the technically inclined person to compensate for the effect of the cable
fun fact: brains will believe and still accept a placebo even if they know its fake
my opinion is mostly just “does it look pretty” and “is there little length issues” and then its good
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