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speaker cable prices

I read plenty of articles on the demise of high end audio and have been an enthusiast for 40 years and worked at a high end retail chain for ten years back in the 90's. I still own several systems and buy and sell gear to keep tweaking my systems. Nonetheless I'm pretty shocked at the prices of cables in particular- I look for a decent pair of speaker cables to run from a Pass amp to a good pair of speakers and can hardly find a pair of 8 ft cables for less than $1000- most are commonly 2-3k for a pair of cables. 

Is it me or is this ludicrous? 

What are people buying for an average pair of cables ? Can a pair be had for $300?
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Showing 2 responses by chrisr

chrisr's avatar
chrisr
541 posts
 
Is it me or is this ludicrous?

It's not you.  The high price is justified however as cable marketers put some real innovative work into the design of these cables.
What's ludicrous is that there's no audible benefits; they do not "disappear" more than any other simple 12 awg cable made of pure copper and PE insulation.
The upgrade path proposed by exotic cable manufacturers is always more copper... entry-level is 16 awg or smaller, going larger as you move up the line. Double the copper...
LOW R,L,C is KING over everything else; that's where the real differences are; the key is to not screw it up with bad connectors... choose pure copper / silver terminations also.
chrisr's avatar
chrisr
541 posts
 
Also crutchfield cables... you can choose from 18 to 10awg OFC, they are figure 8 in a black jacket; I know some high-end cable makers stay clear from black jacket because it deteriorates the sound, but for less than $2 a foot, it must not be all that bad.
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