Audioquest vs. Others

@guakus,


You weren’t singled out by me and you don’t need to convince me that you own Audioquest cables. My beef is the blanket statement made here by someone, not you, that Audioquest purposely makes broken cables to lure you into the more expensive ones.  Like many, I started with Audioquest cables and in my case were the Indigo Blue speaker cables.  I had them for years and don’t remember why I unloaded them as I kind of wish I had kept them. 

Audioquest is a quality brand cable, like them or not and they are probably as good as any of the other brands out there.  It all boils down to personal taste and system synergy. 

You do for sure ;-) sort of the ideal customer. I would suggest sending that list to Bill Low and asking for a chat. As an aside, the Jitterbug is an amazing bit of gear. One famous factory automation company i worked with on a $100 m project bought them by the gross, jitter not welcome in a network of machine controllers…

For the junior economists out there, yes production cost in a luxury good rarely sets price, ignore it at some peril.

@stereo5 actually he did make that comment….

@tomic601


oops! My bad, I was too lazy to re-read the entire post. Thanks for setting me straight. To the OP, that is quite the libel statement you made. When to talk to Audioquest, make sure you tell them of your accusation. 

@stereo5

I did make the statement that Audioquest breaks cables. Seriously, who decides to mix sulfur with copper and think, "yeah, this is going to sound amazing." Especially when you don't see "Purple Copper" being used in any of their top tier products. For example, the difference between Suregrip 500 series and 1000 series, besides $80-$90?  One uses "Purple Copper" (sulfur + copper) and the other uses "Red Copper" (or, just plain copper).

I am all for creating a diverse and affordable range of products, but not when it means using materials, that by their design, will dull the sound quality.

Look at many of Audioquest's competitors. How many of them boast about using high purity, high conductivity OFHC or some other rendition of "pure copper" throughout their entire product line? What does Audioquest  use? Long Grain Copper, Perfect Surface Copper and Perfect Surface Copper Plus.  Which translates into: Not-so-conductive copper, Not-so-conductive copper with a polished surface and pure high conductivity copper with a polished surface.

Again, I don't hate Audioquest, but I am disappointed in their current line up. In my opinion, they have sacrificed too much quality in order to mass produce for a more common market place. You can find Audioquest at Best Buy, Nebraska Furniture Mart and other common stores.

Why does this concern me?  Because it offers more fodder for the "snake oil" argument. It's no wonder the nay-sayers pick on Audioquest, when they test their low to middle tier products and don't hear a drastic difference. (Notice that none of those nay-sayers test their $9000 speaker cables, interconnects or power cables.) 

Anyway, I am happy to take the heat as I have not only invested in Audioquest  for decades; they took thousands of my dollars and time, but have decades of experience with their product line.