And the worst part is, in most cases these cords are hidden behind the equipment! It’s not like you can even peacock with them!

You do cable management correctly, and all you can do is, “trust me, bro, I have these skookum cables that cost a shitton hidden back there…”

🤣🤣🤣

The metal does not affect the frequencies in the electrical signal.

You’re really overselling how big of a deal gold plated connectors are. Here’s a stereo 1/8” TRRS cable for $1.54 that has gold plated connectors. You even have to scroll down the page to see where they mention it because it’s seriously not that big of a deal.

I have a bunch of old audio gear where every time I use it I have to jiggle and rotate the audio connectors to clear the corrosion or else the audio will cut out and yes, I’ve used contact cleaner. It doesn’t have to look visibly rusty to be an issue.

Just ask an audiophile for a tour of their rig, and they're happy to have you stick your head against the wall to peer back there and see his $2000 worth of stupid cables. He'll even hold the flashlight.

And it's definitely a "Him," no other pronouns required. I've never encountered a female audiophile. The woman of the house (if there is one) is always in the other room, rolling her eyes, and sighing. Audiophile gear already has a very low WAF - Wife Acceptance Factor - an actual audiophile thing - and expensive cables are among the lowest WAF of all.

I mean, what else are they going to do with it, besides show it off? Play music? They've only got three records, and two of them are German sound effects, and the other is the 1812 Overture that skips when the (Actual! Real!) cannons go off.

I saw a video a while back where they routed audio through a banana, and nobody could pick out the audio that went through said banana. I can't find it, but here is a guy expanding on that video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fmCy686IC8

I dug up an article about it: https://www.zmescience.com/science/news-science/audiophile-banana-blind-test/

and they're delicious during times of famine or video game!

Wow, things must have changed a lot. I'll have to read up on that

And it's definitely a "Him," no other pronouns required. I've never encountered a female audiophile.

I have. Although TBH they were both on the spectrum, albeit not in the same way. One was even back in the early 90s, and had a bangin’ car audio system as good as any peacocking young man.

the other is the 1812 Overture that skips when the (Actual! Real!) cannons go off.

Oooo… insufficient vibrational isolation. That’s a low bar to cross with turntables; you either get or build a dedicated stand (not difficult), or your deck has that isolation tech built-in (upper midrange or higher). The easiest way to check for built-in is to tap the platter (from the side) and see if the entire deck shifts or wobbles in the case. If it does, it’s vibrationally isolated. Although how well it is, is dependent on a number of other increasingly technical factors.

Of course, this also predicates upon having this system in a space where you can crank the sound up to 11 without having the cops knock on your door with a noise violation in hand.

Isolation:

In the 90s, I had a buddy with a system that ran above $50k. He kept the system in a separate room, and punched holes in the wall to run the cables to the speakers in the living room. That was to offer isolation to the rack from the speakers.

The rack that held his system was square tubular steel, and he baked sand in the over to eliminate all moisture, and poured it into the tubing, tapping it down. The rack weighed a ton when it was done. I don't remember what he did with his turntable, but he probably had those little inverted cones as feet. I remember it had a really heavy base.

He got divorced.

In college, I knew a bunch of guys who put their turntables on a shelf hanging from the ceiling, closely resembling a kid's playground swing. It was supposed to isolate the turntable from footsteps in the room, but I liked to point out that it's really exposed to someone walking around upstairs. They didn't like hearing that.

BTW, the reference to the 1812 Overture was a real one. When I worked for Telarc, we put out an LP of the 1812 using actual cannons. When you looked at the vinyl, you could see where the grooves had to spread apart to capture the wild track of the groove when the cannons blew. MANY, perhaps MOST, turntables couldn't track it, and audio stores used to love to use that LP, and other Telarc releases, to demonstrate their wares. I used to get calls at work from fans who would actually BRAG that they blew out their giant expensive speakers with that recording. Well, good for you buddy, thanks for being a loyal customer, I guess...

I did a similar check on cables of various lengths during my undergrad. Basically just took some recording then plugged the output back into the input using cables from just a couple inches long (intended for connecting guitar pedals sitting next to each other) up to around 16 foot (I was a student and had no intention of spending money on 100 foot cables I'd never use again), also various qualities at the low end.

There was no measurable difference between any of them, whether it was a real audio signal being analyzed or even various types of noise (that tend to load up all of the frequencies).

The only difference between the different tests was the usual randomness of the lowest order bits on the recording device itself, which I believe is influenced by whatever EM activity is in the area, including the CMB, which can't be cut out without cutting out the input signal itself unless maybe if you do the test inside a faraday cage.

And if you're thinking "oh so then there might be a difference if you cut that randomness out", yes, but anything you listen to is still more affected by that interference than any cable choice and you probably never noticed that interference in the first place.

Oh also, if you're thinking of listening to music inside a faraday cage, it won't get rid of that interference because the music wasn't likely recorded in a faraday cage, so the recording itself already has that interference noise, you just won't be adding even more from your own setup if you did it in a faraday cage.

It used to be worse, older men would spend more and more for audio when all people lose hearing frequencies as a function of ageing.

What cables are you using? I can highly recommend Sommer cables, especially Spirit XXL for guitar/bass.

Yeah there is definitely a difference between $30 dollar headphones and $3000 Dollar ones. I bought cheap razer headphones and expensive mid range Sennheiser headphones, the Sennheiser are amazing, razer is practically garbage in comparison. Never cared about cables though as long as they work and last long, I don't care.

Yeah, from what it looks like to me audiophiles care mostly about speakers/headphones and sometimes about having a fully analog setup. Rest is very situational such as a sound card.

Mogami cables and Square Plug jacks. Both straight and right angles.