I think some cables are just a little too expensive.

That is obscene. But to a billionaire, mere change. The more people we allow to amass wealth, the more these type of products will come to exist.

The more people we allow to amass wealth,

Allow? You got me on that one. I think the cables are way overpriced, BUT allow to amass wealth.  In a free world that's the only thing I want to see, no one allows anything....Hard work and save your money...Allow?
Strange choice of words. Maybe I misunderstood.

Regards

Your saying the technology will filter down. In the 90's everyone was going nuts for digital systems because jitter was a real problem. Mark Levinson DAC's and transports were the best. But Toslinkc do and still tends to suck. What the big boys were using was an AT&T fiber optic system.. I mean they had to have their own interface chassis that contained a master clock to prevent jitter that the fibers from the DAC  and transport interfaced. Funny thing is the discs sounded horrible. 24/192? That was science  fiction back then. dCS still does something like that with a their Vivaldi 4 box -system, but that's dCS. When you're the best, you're the best. So yeah when you look at it that  way. BTW  digital will never out do vinyl. For years audiophiles have been saying that digital will get so good, it'll put the debate to rest, Hasn't happened yet. Because analog keeps getting better too. The audiophiles pressings, the advance in cartridge design. If you properly clean and use Last Record Preservative, if you clean your stylus and put Stylast on it, your records don't wear out. One more quick one: I went to a used record store in Chicago. Place had a good rep. It was all garbage from garage sales. But he had a Bowie Ziggystardust from the 70's that was an early Mobile Fidelity mint. Took it home vacuum cleaned it, applied Last and I lost track of how many times I played it. Over 100 easy. Just used a graphite brush. When I was a kid, that was science fiction.
Peace!

How many pairs will Transparent sell over the next 12 months? Certainly a high-profit item! Just what the well-heeled need to complement their $21K Transparent ICs! 

ChrisminiYour job should you accept it is...finding out what is in these cables to justify the price!

I heard a guy did that on youtube. Probably not the 65K model. I was told resistors and capacitors. I borrowed a $6000 balanced and it did sound awfully smooth. 1998. They made their networks out of aluminum back then. Most designers can't wait to tell you why their gear is worth so much. Not these guys. Very hush hush.

No speaker "needs" that cable. If you listen and compare and feel its worth it, its worth it. What more is there to it than that?

"What more is there to it than that? "

There is the part where people complain about sour grapes. It happens all the time with expensive items.

Another cable bashing thread...no wait, is it another thread about digital vs vinyl? Nah...may be the next post from OP clears the confusion.

The man with a headphone setup....what is your end game?

Expensive what's $20 ,000 to $30,000 for good quality  cables .....

Transparent makes some very good low cost cables...and yes, if you have a 7 figure system in a custom room, no budget restraints, top of the line Transparents might be a perfect match...

Am I the only one that thinks it looks like a snake that swallowed a broiled chicken?

Almost.  Looks more like a snake that swallowed a stealth sports car.  Maybe that accounts for 60K of production cost!

Not worthy of these speakers
https://backesmueller.de/en/products/line-serie/bm-line-100.html

They are entry level cables.

65k there are much better cables out there for much less e.g. PURIST.

I passively bi-amped a pair of Nautilus 802’s and I ran Transparent Super’s to the mids and tweets and Transparent Plus to the woofers. Used 2 Pass Aleph 5 60W pure and I mean PURE class A single ended. Problem was the channel powering the woofers were doing 90% of the work. So I’d swap them out once a month. To be honest it really wasn’t worth the trouble and I’ve got 2 amps drawing 300 watts idle.(to be honest, I still don’t think bi-wiring does all that much, if anything) So yeah I used more moderately priced Transparent cables. I was really loyal to one shop and that’s what they carried. I bought a used Transparent AES/EBU for $500. My DAC and transport(Micromega) had 3 possible interfaces. So I found the cheapest coaxial, and I mean cheap. No shield and the diameter of a Q-tip. Plugged both of them in. The $500 110 ohm vs. a coax Best Buy would be embarrassed to sell. I spent 2 hours bouncing back and forth and couldn’t tell the difference! I would bet none of your guys would either. So either Micromega pulled some stunt to save money on the receivers or... I used to think there’s a lot of speaker companies. Now the audiophile world is inundated. And more than any other product we deal with, more money doesn’t mean better sound. Just my opinion.

Hey tablejocky. Are those self powered speakers. If so, yeah you could do without $65,000 cables. I've never heard of them. How much would a pair set you back? Or is it if you have to ask...

The more people we allow to amass wealth, the more these type of products will come to exist.

WE...who is we?...am I part of WE or you are going to classify who is WE?
ALLOW....I am supposed to ask you for permission?
AMASS....like steal?...or hard work?

what are you...some kind of a local commissar ?

I figured we as the fading middle class were the WE. If you are not in the we, you are either a billionaire or wish you were. We as a society allow folks to amass billions while we are taxed into oblivion and the nation crumbles. My conscience won’t allow me subscribe to unfettered capitalism that enables one person have 1000 million dollars.

I will confess - I just upgraded to Transparent Reference interconnects and speaker cables.  And I do remember years ago, prior to my first Transparent cable purchase (Super interconnects and speaker cables), thinking that this was a ridiculous amount of money for cables.  But I had listened to a complete system I was buying, and decided to go with everything I had listened to, including the expensive cables.

A year or two later, I tried the Transparent Ultras, and they were a shockingly big improvement.  So I upgraded (with full trade-in value).

This upgrade, to Transparent Reference, was because I also upgraded to Rockport Avoir IIs.  I upgraded the cables for two reasons.  First, the speaker designer (Andy Payor) recommends Transparent Reference when the Aviors are reviewed.  Also, I believe they are wired internally with Transparent.  I was trading in Transparent Ultras and got full value on the trade, or it wouldn't have been affordable.  (Full disclosure - when I listened to the Rockports, they were actually wired with Reference XL,  but that was way out of my budget.  I 'settled' for Reference.)

I really can't see ever going any further.  As expensive as the Reference cables are, they are worth it (to me) for this level of speaker.  But after the Reference level, Transparent's price curve gets really, really steep.  And the Rockports may well be my last speaker purchase.  Short of winning the lottery!

"Hey tablejocky. Are those self powered speakers. If so, yeah you could do without $65,000 cables. I've never h"eard of them. How much would a pair set you back? Or is it if you have to ask..."

chrismini-

I'm just goofing on the whole premise...
Those speaker have a list of $500,000.00
 A $65,000.00 cable set is too cheap!


Prices for audio gear are what they are. Value is in the ear of the listener with an open wallet.

If I was wealthy I would have an amazing system. More analog. SME, Lyra, Graham Elite, all Pass amplification, Wilson, dCS, whatever cables fit the bill, custom listening room, power gear, and yeah I got a $3,000 headphone system and yeah I envy audiophiles that can afford $65,000 speaker cables, but I make the best of what I got .

hell, $65k is less than the sales tax on the systems those cables will go into...

Who cares!  65k speaker cables has nothing to do with 99.9% of the world. It doesn't matter what the 0.1% do with their money.  Probably even way less than that.  It has no bearing on what you or I purchase.  It has no effect on the prices of products that you or I pay for.  There are high end products everywhere in society.  It is not just confined to high end audio components.  Cars, wine, pets, healthcare, etc. Stop the whining and move on. Just worry about how to make your own system sing to your ears.  

Folks are free to spend their money as they choose but for me, there better be a brick of gold in that pouch thing.

There is something seriously obscene about such products. Enough to turn many would be audiophile people off imo. 
Products designed strictly for the upper elite have no room in my system, whether I could afford them or not. I wouldn't feel right about it, just me. My whole system cost half the price of that speaker cable and I am so proud of its sound. This is too crazy for simple guys like me. Let's see if there are other discussions on here that don't cater to billionaires lol.

I would be surprised if they sold many. Some years back, Transparent was considered top of the heap, but I think the whole "network" thing is a bit out of fashion these days. It seems to have fallen out of favor with the audience who spends that kind of money on cables.

Bananas are optional. Is there a surcharge for them?

The shortest length is 8 feet. They do not mention custom lengths.

I find Nordost cables to be generally very good

It would be helpful if everyone posting would leave their opinions regarding how much people spend. 
If one wants to spend a lot on cables and they hear a difference then they can. If they don’t they don’t. 
This is not a site for politics and the elites or whatever that even is. Some people spend it when they don’t have it and some people don’t spend it and have a lot of it. 
Stick to audio advice not your opinion on your perceived ills of the world. Many thanks!

Me too!
cdamiller5
I find Nordost cables to be generally very good

I have also listened to many AudioQuest cables and they have a slightly dark sound. May be a good fit. Look up the CV8. Not very expensive and good quality. 
As I have stated here previously, I prefer and use Nordost. TYR2 and Frey2 are both extremely good. The Heimdall is also very good and less expensive. 
Kimber is also a good cable

I use MIT, and I’m very happy with networked cables.  Would love to try equivalently priced Transparent cables.  Unlike MIT, they are optimized at the factory to work with specific components.  If the components change, the cables can be sent back to the factory for adjustment at no additional expense.
I have mixed feelings about the word ‘allow’.  In the old days, people strove to get ahead so they could afford such ‘prizes’, and this was not generally looked down upon.  Things have changed.

Psag 

A free society or democracy creates opportunity for the people that live under it. We are ALL ALLOWED to participate. Within any society, life is not always fair. Some people don’t get it....they just continue to complain about it, and want someone else to “make up” for it or pay for their own shortcomings.

But..... I agree with MIT as well. 

Agree with ebm. Purist cables are great. If you have the coin, spend it anyway you want. You can’t spend from the grave. I’d love to listen to a 7 figure system, then buy it used for 5 figures. 

Everyone loves a conscientious communist. 
Well at least oxy morons do.
Foolish wisdom.

https://www.feedingamerica.org/sites/default/files/research/map-the-meal-gap/2016/2016-map-the-meal-...

1 in 6 children in America are food insecure. Pretty high price for the kind of “freedom” only cronyism creates. Expensive objects like this are meant to reinforce the identity of people who are so far removed from everybody else that they need to measure their status against one another, rather than against the principles  of an ethical and spiritual life. They need ways to signal their worth to one another. That’s the cultural function of these products. 

A friend just bought me a $99 DAC and I am really thrilled to have this thing. I used to have a fantastic system but ran afoul with the law and bye-bye big system. Losing all that didn't cause me to stop being an audiophile. Man I caught the bug in 1975. One thing I have to remind myself it's not about the equipment. It's about the music.

Simple reality, if they didn’t sell them, they wouldn’t make them. And the premise that ANYONE would ALLOW an individual to make whatever amount of money is offensive. 

"And the premise that ANYONE would ALLOW an individual to make whatever amount of money is offensive."

It might even be a criminal offense when an individual is making money, In most of the countries, it is a duty of some government institution.

Where is the contradiction? What is the lie?

Here's what ya do. Next time you got see your doctor, steal some blank prescriptions from him and write yourself for schedule II controlled substances. You know: :morphine, dilaudid, fentnyl, Xanax,Adderall. Party your ass off while listening to Pink Floyd or Smashing Pumpkins. Sooner or later, if you don't OD, you'll get caught. Pay a big time defense attorney $12,000 and at least stay out of jail. But you'll lose your job because nobody wants to work with a junkie. The only marketable skill you have and there's only one telephone company. Sell all your records and gear as you can't sleep under a turntable or eat records. And that is how it's done.
The end.

in 2005 i purchased a set of Von Schweikert VR9SE speakers, which could be bi-amped. so i used 2 stereo darTZeel NHB-108 amplifiers and used 2 sets of $33k Transparent Opus MM speaker cables.......$66k list price. i did not pay full retail, but a fair portion of that number i admit. i did trade up with some other Transparent cables to acquire the 2nd pair.

it did sound awesome. here is a review i wrote about that experience.

https://positive-feedback.com/Issue26/lavigne_vr9.htm

it’s the only ’review’ i ever wrote and i have no illusions i did a particularly good job at it. there is a good reason i stopped there,

shortly after i wrote that article, a friend in HK wanted to buy the VR9SE’s, so i sold them and one of the sets of Transparent Opus speaker cables. but it was fun to listen to that system while i had it.

and if you have never listened to the very top level of cables, you really have no idea what can be done.

my system now is much, much better than then. and i have not used really expensive speaker cables for a number of years. i am about to spend a large sum of money on a phono cable but don’t yet have it......so can’t really talk about it yet.

i don’t view expensive cables as necessary for a top level system; but i don’t have any philosophical conflict with the idea of expensive cables to reach a particular sonic goal. it’s just a tool to achieve a level of performance. if it has something unique about it to get you where you want to go, and you can afford it, then go for it.

if owning expensive cables is the goal, i can relate to the view that that is a bit much. but the world is full of vanity, and few are immune from it. so don’t get your panties in a bunch about it.

and if we have to be hair-shirt ultra politically correct here on Audiogon......really?

1 in 6 children in America are food insecure. Pretty high price for the kind of “freedom” only cronyism creates. Expensive objects like this are meant to reinforce the identity of people who are so far removed from everybody else that they need to measure their status against one another, rather than against the principles  of an ethical and spiritual life. They need ways to signal their worth to one another.

That’s the cultural function of these products.

+1

Folks, plz stop communistic, socialistic and other mass fairness ideas... that is totally utopia and it’s already being proven by others bad experiences. All communists and socialists ending being saved and fed by capitalists. Maybe those ideas looks sweet and fair but reality is different. The idea to fight rich, to take everything and to share among everyone that exactly from what Soviet Union was started.... and where is Soviet Union now !?....at the end of their socialistic madness capitalistic countries was sending them huge donations shipments of food and second hand clothing, for people to survive. Such a shame. So, let’s better concentrate not one the prices, what is kind of personal aspect but on SQ pursuit. 

This thread has disassembled even faster than usual cable threads.

surfmuzz,

You are aware that food banks and other caritative institutions exist in the current capitalist world, too? They receive huge donations shipments of food and second hand clothing, for people to survive. They have customers in their own front yard.

Oh my, the power of cables...