good cables yes, expensive audiophile grade ones.... no.
This..... all that aligned copper crystal bullshit. From memory the last phone cable I made cost about £30 (maybe) most of that was the connectors, never use those cheap thin black ones that come for free they are genuinely shit.
Speaker cable is much the same, the cost of the big brands with the fancy plastic sleeves is obscene, you can get good quality copper cable from a 'good' shop for a fraction of the price, I terminate the AMP end to gold banana plugs because the copper oxidises over time but I'm a bit fussy like that
@DD, I'm not saying that better kit can equal better sound quality, that Musical Fedility Amp was beautifully put togther, toroudal transformers and quality to the point that even the PCB track lengths were the same per channel. I've been round electonics for more than 25 years and have had a hand in a few 90s systems.
What I am saying is that buying expensive kit alone wonlt give you great sound, even if we put aside what kind of sound profile you are after. Cram a big system into a small room where the speaker positions are compromised and it will sound shit, use cheap interconnects and you may as well have brought kit at half the price. Play low res MP3s as your source and it's never going to sound any good. Getting in deeper mismatch your AMP and speakers and you could have just wasted a whole load of cash.
I see more expensive systems brought more because people think it looks flash than I have ones that have been given the enviroment they really need to appreciate the quality. In my pre child days not only did the carpet go but all the furnishing apart from one leather sofa, anything that produced secondary vibration was also removed. I chose to run it clean so no EQ but I could have used a pink noise system if I had dissapeared that far up my arse.
I'm ot accusing you of such but there is a great deal of snobbery around Hi-Fi mainly from those that are more interested in telling you how much money they have spent than music. My point was about the ability to get a decent system together for small money by buying used separates and making your own cables rather than letting a Hi-Fi shop fleese you for stuff you just don't need for your application.