Speaker Cable Suggestion

without knowing your budget it is hard to make a recommendation.
But got to start somewhere.....here goes it.....
beleive it or not, the Monster M2.4S bi-wire speaker cables are not bad at all.
But if you want to step away from the Monster brand, consider Audience(conductor or maestro models could be had cheap used) and Acoustic Zen.
With B&Ws, the Acoustic Zen Satori Shotgun speaker cables would be a good choice and a good deal on the used market, depending on the length you need and of course if your budget allows.

FWIW, I think the interconnect upgrade may be more beneficial. At some point I had M950I interconnects and when I replaced them with Acoustic Zen Matrix Reference II the improvement was huge. On the absolute scale, the improvement brought by the AZ interconnects was bigger than upgrading a speaker cable from Monster M2.4S to Acoustic Zen Satori Shotgun.

In my mind, starting by upgrading your interconnects makes more sense.

Mglennyc, I went from M550i to M950i and don't recall dramatic difference. Not the same going from M950i to AZ Matrix RefII though, where the difference is very noticable.
The soundstage just exploded with the AZ interconnects. And I still had the Monster M2.4s speaker cables!

The reason I suggested going with an IC change at first is because this is in the input stages to the amp. Changing the speaker cables will result in an improvement, but the new sp cables will only pass what the components before the amplifier supply through a set of M950i interconnects. So that is limited to the resolution of the M950i, which unfortunately is not that great.

If you are looking for an 8ft pair of speaker cables, at this price, attempt to find a used pair of AZ Satori Shotgun. If you are looking for smoother highs and increase in soundstage, the Satori is hard to beat in this price range.

If you get good ICs, the next thing to further improve the sound is to get a good power cord for your cd player. That will further reduce the glare and metallic qualities. Try Audience powerChord. For a good pair of ICs and this power cord you will easily fit into $500.

Mglennyc, great to see you are getting there....step by step.
AZ Satori speaker cables should improve your system even further. Enjoy!