Choosing the right interconnect

yaowenxun

Choosing the right interconnect
For while it's impossible for an interconnect to improve the sound of a CD player beyond its inherent capabilities, a good cable will let more of its ability through, while a poor one will hold back the product's performance. Or to put it another way, the more revealing a cable, the better.

And cables do make a difference - in general terms the more expensive a cable the better will be the purity of the copper (or whatever) in its conductors, and thus the easier it will be for signal to get through. And it's not just copper: some exotic cables use silver or even titanium for their conductors, while a few wires from van den Hul, for example, use carbon fibres rather than metallic cores.

It's worth trying a few cables and listening for the improvements - when you get to the point where you can't hear a difference, there's no point in spending more on a cable. At least one manufacturer will loan you a trial pack of cables, letting you make these comparisons.

Bear in mind, too, that the components you're going to use with the cable may well limit how much of an improvement you can hear. If you're using an amplifier and speakers with a soft, mushy, warm sound, don't be surprised if you can't hear much difference between cables.

The general rule of thumb to apply is that about 10% of the total cost of your system should be spent on cabling. So if you're using a ?00 CD player, a similarly priced amp and ?00 speakers, about ?0-100 would be a sensible cable spend. Split this 50:50, and you could buy a very decent interconnect and two runs of perfectly respectable speaker cable (at about ?-2.50 per mono metre).

If your speakers are designed for biwiring, you will of course have to allocate a bit more of the budget to the amp/speaker connection, since twin runs of cable, or special biwire cables, will be needed. In general terms, biwirable speakers always sound better when biwired - they're just made that way! Again the guidance is to spend more until you can no longer hear the difference!


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