Age old question - what cable's worth it, and what's OTT?

OCdude

OCdude

OCdude

Soldato
Joined
24 Feb 2008
Posts
2,704
Location
Norway
I'm planning to 'finally' build my own setup in the not-too-distant future (fingers crossed!)

Anyway, after lots of jolly old reading up etc etc i've settled on what amp/speakers/TV i'm getting.... the only thing I haven't really looked into.. is the (speaker) cabling!

I've heard the "spend 10% of your budget on cabling" adage... and I've also heard people saying that you don't need 'great' cabling.. :confused:

Common sense tells me that spending £4k on speakers, then 50p on cabling would be a travesty.... but I don't know what brand etc to go for...

I see a lot of people going on about the QED anniversary cabling.. but yeah... any advice/recommendations would be gratefully received :p

[FYI my setup, will hopefully look something like: Onkyo TX-NR906 / Monitor Audio GS series speakers (5.1) / Pioneer KRP-500M]
 
Try this chap:
http://fatkatacoustics.co.uk/

Rubbish website, but the chap running it is spot on. This weekend I had a listen to a pair of £25 speaker cables that he was knocking up. Not far of a pair of cables that I have which cost...well lets just say that they were a lot more.
 
I use Linn K20 on my Kans. Depends on how you wire them - bi/ tri. Linn K400/600.

The K20 stuff is around £5pm - perfectly adequate without going OTT. :)
 
Mr_Sukebe said:
Try this chap:
http://fatkatacoustics.co.uk/

Rubbish website, but the chap running it is spot on. This weekend I had a listen to a pair of £25 speaker cables that he was knocking up. Not far of a pair of cables that I have which cost...well lets just say that they were a lot more.
Click to expand...

Good ol zanash, got my 0.5mm silver wire from him from my interconnects. Great lad and very very helpful, doesn't push you into buying anything or baffle you with jargon. Will send you cables to listen to and compare.

Honestly for that setup you are considering, spend more money on films to watch and spend £1.50 a metre on the 'van damme blue' cable. You can get it from a guy in the avforums powerbuy section located in the cable part of the forum. Good quality, and all you need to spend on cabling for home cinema use :D
 
Hypothetical question here, but say your lucky enough to buy some £25k Wilson Watt 8s and a £30k Krell pre/power amp combo. How much would it be advisable to spend on the speaker cables then? Would speaker cables costing £500-£1000 meter still be overkill?
 
Last edited:
-Ad- said:
Honestly for that setup you are considering, spend more money on films to watch and spend £1.50 a metre on the 'van damme blue' cable. You can get it from a guy in the avforums powerbuy section located in the cable part of the forum. Good quality, and all you need to spend on cabling for home cinema use :D
Click to expand...

^This.

And yes, I would call speaker cables costing £500 a metre "overkill" in any situation. How does price relate to quality on an item like speaker cables? Very rarely, its just people trying to make you feel you need to spend a given amount on them because the system is X value. IMO, its irrelevant, a basic cable can do the job providing it has the required conductor area relevant to the power and length of run to support minimal cable impedance. Extremely long runs should be avoided regardless however.
 
Dr.EM said:
^This.

And yes, I would call speaker cables costing £500 a metre "overkill" in any situation. How does price relate to quality on an item like speaker cables? Very rarely, its just people trying to make you feel you need to spend a given amount on them because the system is X value. IMO, its irrelevant, a basic cable can do the job providing it has the required conductor area relevant to the power and length of run to support minimal cable impedance. Extremely long runs should be avoided regardless however.
Click to expand...

Agreed.

I think everyone knows my feelings on cables here but the whole "10%" thing is just nonsense.
 
Said this before. All the Hi-fi mags in the Mid 80's raved about 1.5mm T&E solid core cable & it was dirt cheap. I've been using said cable for my HC for over 20 years now with no complaints.
 
now I dont know a lot about cables, but obviously there is many factors associated.

1. the material
2. the length
3. the wind/thickness of the strands

these all add up to the amount of resistance/signal lost/signal head room in the cable.

the thinnest cheapest badly constructed cable will not allow the driver to draw the current from the amp.

but if you open up a speaker with a crossover in it, how good is the cable inside it???!!!

I am sure there is a break point, which some of the others have pointed out. really cheap and nasty isn't good enough for the job. 500quid a metre is stupid.

I imagine the price break would be around 5-10quid a metre (for the best materials, wound by the best machinery etcetc). anything above that would be a bit OTT....even if you had spent 10k a side on speakers and 10k on an amp.

poo in = poo out...no matter how good the cable is :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom