I recently bought a power cord and USB cable and thought I was spending too much. I then reviewed the cost of all cables which I have invested throughout the years and was shocked at the result. Actual price paid for the cables come up to approximately £11k.
I am curious to know how much have you guys invested in cables. The total cost of cables, actual price paid (interconnects, speaker cables, digital cables, power cords) which are connected in all your systems if you have more than one including the ones kept in the closet.
Cables make huge differences! Investing money in cables and power supply is important. Don’t feel guilty about expensive cables. May I ask what are your cables? (interconnects, speaker cables, digital cables, power cords. etc)
Sure, cables are important but are they as important as the rest of one’s kit? I did a tot up on my IC, cable and mains cable spend and was horrified to find I’d spent more on those than my speakers! I sold a load of them off when I moved house, bought cheaper alternatives and put the surplus funds towards a system upgrade. I could detect no tangible difference until I replaced the WH Phantoms with Kudos KS-1 which is almost a third of the price but outperformed their counterparts.
Being active obviously means a greater commitment to cables
Currently £53k worth of wires although this value will increase by around £24k, there’s a few that will move up to Music and another 3 Burndies
More than 10k€. Uplift is above box level and so it should be. My experience, system etc.: it makes sense to follow a holistic approach to cables, e.g. all cables Naim or Nordost or…not mix and match.
Perhaps I am in the minority here. I consider myself as a cable fanatic and put much importance on cables. Once I have settled with the equipment with no plans of moving up to better or costlier gear, I will usually look at better cables.
Yes, the question can be phrased as “How much have you spent on cables”.
Same experience as it will all depend on matching. Costly cables do not guarantee better sound as they will need to match the sonic character of the equipment. I am currently rotating my mains cables on the DACs and found that some cables sound better on a DAC while some sound better on the other DAC.
About £3k, three powerlines, a hiline and two lots of A5. Then there was about £200 on a bunch of ethernet cables and a couple of digital cables from Bluejeans.
Naim provide cables in the box that do a decent job, one of the attractions of Naim was that you didn’t need to muck about with the likes of Nordost, then they brought out the hiline, then the powerline and screwed it all up because they worked. Fortunately for me, when I tried an interconnect the superlumina didn’t so I was able to afford a used 500 and get it DRed instead.
“Once I have settled with the equipment with no plans of moving up to better or costlier gear, I will usually look at better cables”.
I think I know where this thread is going Ryder and it’s probably down a path which has been trod many times before! The more scientifically minded of us will probably argue that beyond the material, shielding and construction of a cable, there’s really little else to separate one from another, so spending big Bucks doesn’t necessarily equate to a better sounding cable. However, I know from my own experimentation that cables do seem to have different sound signatures and as commented in my previous post, I preferred a cheaper cable over a much more expensive one. For me, I’m just keen to avoid being taken advantage of by any manufacturer who I believe is charging way over the odds for a product, just because they know Audiophiles are easy game.
My cable “investments” have been relativly modest in comparison to others in this topic.
I replaced my NAC5 speaker cables with SLs. Had the floor up so no visible cables which helps the other half.
My 555 CD is a relativly early model so I bought an SL interconnect to the 552.
Total spend: £6K or so. Not a lot considering the whole. Well worth it ? Hard to say.
VFM is not easy with cables.
Almost nothing, relative to most Forum users, I suspect…
The biggest cost would be my pre-loved set of Naim NACA5 cables, bought very recently, for £170. These replaced my NACA4 leads, which cost £16 (no, that’s correct - 2 by 8 metres at £1 per metre in 1982 - A4 was new then). A few SNAIC’s, both Grey & Black - most expensive was £59 from eBay, cheapest was a new one at £21 in 1985. Interconnects wise, the most I have paid is £35 for a Chord Cobra Phono to DIN in 1992 (for my Arcam Alpha+ CD player). Or a Naim Grey DIN to DIN (as a spare) for £30 quite recently.
I have no ‘exotic’ leads, anywhere - and never have had. Just standard Naim leads or in expensive Chord ones.
I have a Hiline and Power line Lites (x5). PLLs made a significant improvement over the standard Naim mains leads.
The Hiline was used so all in about £850 ish.
My network cable is a Catsnake 6a at around 40 quid.
