I started in the 60s. BFD. Why on earth would you need to do so much experimentation with wire?
I grew up in a Audiophile world who swore on how good brand X cables are and how much of a difference they make and all that. Trust me I get your comments I went down that path and wanted to hear see and test it all for myself. I read all the scientific reasons how a cable works. I also been to countless trainings from B&K, Crestron, Elan, Polk, Sumiko which REL is apart of or was when I went along with Sonos Faber etc.
When I got really into cables I started to believe all the hype and basically just tested cables instead of listening to music or watching movies. I became obsessed with finding " the right mix of cables to make my system sound the best". I believed using cables would "tune" a system to perfection so it would balance out the sound exactly how I wanted it to.
It's a crazy world of wire man let me tell you. I went to a training with Transparent Audio and they where releasing the Opus line of speaker wire. These things looked like vacuum cleaners in-between 3 feet of speaker wire and cost 36k. At that time I was working for a extremely high end company called Soundex in Willow Groove PA. They carried some of the highest end gear money could buy. It was a basic day to install a 1/2 million dollar theater in just equipment alone. So people would buy the extreme Transparent cables thinking that it was needed to support their 120k Wilson Audio speakers and Krell Monoblocks for 7 channel surround systems. It was crazy the amount of money but that didn't phase me. I wanted to know what those speaker wires did, why one needs that high end of a cable, why is there these network devices in the wire and why why why basically peaked me every single day.
When trying to learn about this madness you have to take opinion out of the picture, you wallet especially if you can't afford them which they get way out of hand quickly.
But when I was hanging out in New York with B&K's top engineer's I always asked what cables they use and why. They told me that Kimber Cables are very good high quality cables and perform over and over when they are designing their preamps and amps. Very reliable and they checked out on the scientific side of things. They also told me that the network boxes like MIT and Transparent where bullshit and a huge waste of resources. They understood why those companies put a lot of effort into them but in the end built bullshit products.
Actual Audio Engineers are always thinking outside the box if you will or in their case inside of one. They where trying to build a perfect conductor and came up that those things.
I had Transparent middle of the road cables in my system many years ago when I had Dynaudio speakers and Rotel and B&K gear. I also had Kimber Kable and when I took out the Transparent cables and installed Kimber 8TC speaker wire and HERO Interconnects in-between my CD player and my preamp and amp I really heard a noticeable difference.
So now what I learned over my time is the difference I heard was the Transparent cables filtering out the top end, not performing the signal correctly and basically coloring the sound. Kimber just allowed the signal to pass with using their weaving technology to shield out interferecene and just used high quality materials to do so.
Nothing wrong with Kimber Kable but I have issues with MIT and Transparent . I have issues with most wire companies honestly over my decades of testing them in real world systems not on a bench with a scope or reading posts on the internet of people fighting over this very topic. I have no time to argue about this topic at all but I do enjoy sharing my experiences if someone is willing to listen to my madness LOL.
When I met Ray Kimber I was amazed on how he was not into what most consider snake oil products and wants his cables to perform so anyone using them can enjoy the system they purchased and not worry or have cables cause issues sending signals. He's an experience I'll say that more like Bob Carver on the Doc Emmit Brown way LOL.
So I'm not the guy who is going to go around this forum and preach about how good audioquest cables are and all others suck ass. Your a moron if you use Monoprice or Blue jeans. Thats not for me my man. I'd rather talk about how good ones system is and if you are using mono price or even Transparent which I basically hate I'm not going to call someone out on that or call them a fool or anything like that. Everyone has to learn for themselves what cables do why you need certain levels , meet performance spec's and HDMI cables overall I think has been a train wreck and I really wish we would just use Fiber Optic cabling to transfer digital signals between all digital equipment. I build Fiber Optic cables as well as all other low voltage in home wiring like Coax, Cat 5/6 BNC etc. I find quality cables and proper terminations are key to building a good reliable system. When cables fail the system fails.
My comments about audioquest is the fact they do their jobs properly and are reliable. They also solved some issues we where having in the field with RF interference with IR emitters in a Universal Control system. The Cheaper HDMI cables cause issues and don't perform well.
When I met with HDMI engineers they flat out lied to us. They told us that HDMI either works or it doesn't there is no pink green screen there is no speckles etc. I wanted to whip all these asses because in the field we dealt with all the above issues as I have been installing HDMI since HDMI came our right after DVI.
Improper HDMI cables always where the cause of these issues especially when they got longer. YES I have ran Monoprice and other brand loner HDMI cables only to have to pull them out and replace them with other cables that actually worked. YES I have an issue with Monoprice cables I will not use Install or recommend them to anyone BUT I will also no clown anyone who decides to use them or has them in their system and they work just fine. I just had to many bad experiences with them to ever give them any more of my money I don't care if they where free I don't want them in my house.
Sorry for the long reply LOL.
