For $500 and under, I think both Clear Day and Anticables are tough to beat. I've had both, and they worked great in my system.
Budget Audience Clone?
I borrowed a pair of Audience Conductor e speaker cables and they sound fantastic in my system. I have been using Canare 4s11 which sound very good for the price, warm and full and reasonable detailed with a slight softening of transients. The audience has brought everything up a couple notches, including separation, detail, bass tightness and air. My question is, are there any budget speaker cables that are sonically similar to audience? I know the conductor e is not super expensive, but there are other life priorities right now. I should also mention that I liked some of the things that Nordost Blue Heaven did for my system when I borrowed them, but I love everything that the Audience does.