Cables

Cables are an often overlooked subject in the audio realm, and the effect cable choice can have on your system is often discounted. The cheap, flimsy cables that are included with devices should be upgraded at the earliest opportunity, as they are usually completely unsuited to the job. Even digital signals can be affected by cable quality. Still, seeing (or hearing) is believing, so come into the shop and decide for yourself.

Products

Cables and interconnects are used to transport a signal between components. They should do this with ideally no influence on the signal. However, in the real world all physical connections have their own properties, and cables should be considered a component in their own right. These properties include the cable's distributed resistance, capacitance and inductance, which act to form an electrical filter. The materials used and the construction of the cable also bear on the sound. With digital signals, the cable can "round off" the corners of a waveform, introducing timing error (jitter). This effect becomes evident very quickly as the cable length increases, and as the data rate increases (eg in high definition audio and video applications).