2. cables
  3. 124957-818

Are audiophiles still out of their minds?

I've been in this hobby for 30 years and owned many gears throughout the years, but never that many cables.  I know cables can make a difference in sound quality of your system, but never dramatic like changing speakers, amplifiers, or even more importantly room treatment. Yes, I've evaluated many vaunted cables at dealers and at home over the years, but never heard dramatic effect that I would plunk $5000 for a cable. The most I've ever spent was $2700 for pair of speaker cables, and I kinda regret it to this day.  So when I see cable manufacturers charging 5 figures for their latest and "greatest" speaker cables, PC, and ICs, I have to ask myself who buys this stuff. Why would you buy a $10k+ cable, when there are so many great speakers, amplifiers, DACs for that kind of money, or room treatment that would have greater effect on your systems sound?  May be I'm getting ornery with age, like the water boy says in Adam Sandler's movie.
dracule1
jl35
3,955 posts
 
if you have loads of money and the $10k cables sound best to you after auditioning many cables at different prices on your $100k speakers...
dracule1 OP
1,085 posts
 
jl35, I don't think all are but some I do.
jl35
3,955 posts
 
vs someone who buys $10k speakers and slaps on cheap cables without auditioning, simply assuming cables don't matter...
jl35
3,955 posts
 
yes, some are
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 
Repeat after me, "It’s only a hobby. It’s only a hobby." In terms of price spread high end audio is not really a whole lot different from say model railroading, mountain climbing or stamp collecting or even baseball card collecting. There will always be ridiculously high priced products in any hobby. Not every mountain climber can afford to climb Everest and of those that can most undoubtedly don’t want to. The Mickey Mantle baseball card from his rookie year is how much?! I suspect the the whole answer to the high priced audiophile cable debate is whether the SQ of very expensive cables is superior to inexpensive cables, generally speaking. I far don’t see any real evidence to the contrary, only a lot of who shot John. I can't help pointing out that inexpensive cables, say Radio Shack, might actually sound better than much more expensive cables if they're broken in and the expensive ones aren't, they're cryo'd and the expensive ones aren't and/or they're inserted with the correct directionality in mind while the expensive ones aren't.

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