Don't skimp on interconnects, they are very important...

Dr. Ears

Super Member
One of the biggest mistakes that I see in high-end audio is a small fortune being spent on equipment and then using poor interconnects.
Price is not a good judge of performance, in my critical listening tests of RCA plugs, I found those expensive "heavy metal" CNC'd
RCA plugs actually degrade your signal.

A best buy in RCA plugs are Keith Eichmann's new line of RCA plugs, Keith was the original designer of the highly regarded
Eichmann silver bullets, all of which are of a very minimalist design.
His new line of RCA plugs starts at $30 for a set of 4, which feature silver plated copper and are my favorite for SS equipment, for tubed gear, I would go with his top of the line Absolute Harmony, which feature pure silver and go for $87 dollars for a set of 4.

I named my custom designed single ended interconnects, the "Quantum Interconnects" because I cannot explain the science of what makes them sound so good.

They feature a four nines silver ribbon wire with a natural silk dielectric embedded with oil at high pressures for the positive lead only.
For the ground, I use a solid copper wire with an organic cotton dielectric embedded with oil at high pressure.
CRITICAL: I keep them in separate sleeves meeting only at the KLEI RCA plugs.

All of the ingredients to make these are available at Parts Connexion.

An old vacuum tube customer of mine, who I had sold some demo interconnects years ago, asked me to make him some new sets after trying over $10,000 worth of fancy interconnects. He went with the old pure silver Eichmann RCA plugs for his SS MAC rack, which cost him $145 per set and he wanted the heaviest gauge of the pure silver ribbon wire, which runs $44 a foot.

Pictured are a set of my "Quantum Interconnects" with Keith Eichmann's BOTL RCA plugs, I just made myself 4 new sets to celebrate my acquiring my first piece of MAC equipment, the 1700 and my recently acquired Japanese version of the FX Audio.

I love the hybrid sound of SS MAC gear combined with the $68.49 little FX Audio preamp / tube buffer.
If, you are going to buy the FX Audio, make sure you buy the Japanese version because it is the only version, which features a toggle switch, which enables you to switch between zero gain and minus 6 db's of gain. The Chinese version goes for less than half the cost of the Japanese version, but has one pot controlling both the gain and volume, I could not find a setting I liked with the Chinese version and often use the minus 6 db setting.
 

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What works for you is what works for you. Your ears and brain are just as much parts of your system as your amp and speakers. But my ears and brain are not part of your system, so I may not experience what you are experiencing. It's possible that you are the only person experiencing exactly what you are experiencing.

Me personally? Belden 1505F Coax and Switchcraft 3502A RCAs sound as good as anything else I've ever heard. Buy, that's just me.

EDIT: And let me just say this, since I'm feeling edgy this morning: If you ". . . cannot explain the science of what makes them sound so good . . . " then there is no science involved.
 
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What works for you is what works for you. Your ears and brain are just as much parts of your system as your amp and speakers. But my ears and brain are not part of your system, so I may not experience what you are experiencing. It's possible that you are the only person experiencing exactly what you are experiencing.

Me personally? Belden 1505F Coax and Switchcraft 3502A RCAs sound as good as anything else I've ever heard. Buy, that's just me.

EDIT: And let me just say this, since I'm feeling edgy this morning: If you ". . . cannot explain the science of what makes them sound so good . . . " then there is no science involved.
I'm by no means a "cable guy" (I hope to try out decent cables at some point, but work with a limited budget), but I find that last statement a little ridiculous . There's plenty of scientific things that work that I can't explain. I was watching a movie recently with a line in it that was something like , "Magic is just science you haven't figured out yet".
Now I want some magic cables. ..
 
What works for you is what works for you. Your ears and brain are just as much parts of your system as your amp and speakers. But my ears and brain are not part of your system, so I may not experience what you are experiencing. It's possible that you are the only person experiencing exactly what you are experiencing.

Me personally? Belden 1505F Coax and Switchcraft 3502A RCAs sound as good as anything else I've ever heard. Buy, that's just me.

EDIT: And let me just say this, since I'm feeling edgy this morning: If you ". . . cannot explain the science of what makes them sound so good . . . " then there is no science involved.
I'm by no means a "cable guy" (I hope to try out decent cables at some point, but work with a limited budget), but I find that last statement a little ridiculous . There's plenty of scientific things that work that I can't explain. I was watching a movie recently with a line in it that was something like , "Magic is just science you haven't figured out yet".
Now I want some magic cables. ..
 
This is The Cutting Edge forum. OPs topic is perfectly fine.

Rinky dink stuff and naysayers should be sanctioned.

Agreed about ultimately being rinky dink. If you hear it, you hear it. Who am I to argue? But I am simply pointing out that, when you boil it all down, these threads are based only on testimonials. Why should I spend money based only on what someone else tells me he hears?

Skeptic does not equal naysayer.
 
It's not just the cable but input points themselves on preamps, amps or other devises that make a big difference in sound quality. So it's hard to compare Apples to Blood Red Oranges in the 'Witches Brew'

1) The RCA inputs might be very oxidized with age as to compromise your connection quality.
I always thought that '50 shades of gray' was referring to RCA inputs, boy did I have a lot to learn

2) Cable fit has a lot to do with the 'Goldilocks' principle; either they are too loose or too tight.
Sometime size doesn't matter.

3)The original parts might of been of a lower or very low quality. I'm a kind of look under the hood and where a manufacture will often cut corners is at the RCA inputs etc. 'Cold Joints' is not a bar in Alaska.

Michael
 
I made one pair using the 47Final Labs (sp?) design — bare wire contacts, signal doesn't pass through other-metal plug-connectors, or solder. The plugs only provide the grip and stiffness to stay in place and ensure high-pressure contact.

The best connector is no connector... so to speak.

The-OTA-Interconnects-After-Assembly-Audiopolitan.jpg
 
I steal some Holy Water, find a Black-Cat Bone, and only open a package of wire/cable/interconnects under a super blood wolf moon while playing In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida.

Just my two cents. A $1 interconnect is probably not very good, and a $100 interconnect is just plain crazy, especially the ones that are "directional" (isn't an audio signal a sine wave?) or have a battery attached to them. The truth probably lies somewhere in between. YMMV
 
I steal some Holy Water, find a Black-Cat Bone, and only open a package of wire/cable/interconnects under a super blood wolf moon while playing In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida.

Just my two cents. A $1 interconnect is probably not very good, and a $100 interconnect is just plain crazy, especially the ones that are "directional" (isn't an audio signal a sine wave?) or have a battery attached to them. The truth probably lies somewhere in between. YMMV
The cables that are directional have a grounding scheme employed in the construction of the cable. There is nothing strange about that, the theory is that it will reduce susceptibility to RFI/EMI and especially to solve ground loop problems if only one end of the cable, the source end, is grounded to the shield. Mogami uses that scheme in some of it's pro cables.
 
The cables that are directional have a grounding scheme employed in the construction of the cable. There is nothing strange about that, the theory is that it will reduce susceptibility to RFI/EMI and especially to solve ground loop problems if only one end of the cable, the source end, is grounded to the shield. Mogami uses that scheme in some of it's pro cables.

Thanks. At least that explanation has some science behind it.

I must really be getting senile. Industrial measurement and control typically uses the same wiring method. Typically grounded at the PLC or control center. I'm supposed to know a little about it...:oops:

How about that battery thing?
 
Thanks. At least that explanation has some science behind it.

I must really be getting senile. Industrial measurement and control typically uses the same wiring method. Typically grounded at the PLC or control center. I'm supposed to know a little about it...:oops:

How about that battery thing?

Very tiny UPS?

Here's one for you, I have a piece of Carver gear (three actually) that have a 9v battery inside, still have no clue what its doing in there as they've long lost their charge and all functions as it should?
 
Very tiny UPS?

Here's one for you, I have a piece of Carver gear (three actually) that have a 9v battery inside, still have no clue what its doing in there as they've long lost their charge and all functions as it should?
Wonder what would happen if you change out the battery? Also, if you were to re-cap and change out the battery? I'm thinking it might make things better, but who knows what the battery was for? Maybe, just like some old clock radios, it was to keep the information in place if you lost power to the unit.
 
Wonder what would happen if you change out the battery? Also, if you were to re-cap and change out the battery? I'm thinking it might make things better, but who knows what the battery was for? Maybe, just like some old clock radios, it was to keep the information in place if you lost power to the unit.
It's a surround processor with nothing to retain in memory, and the battery was only discovered because it was rattling around loose inside no longer connected. So I opened the others and low and behold they also contained them. The units operate flawlessly, as such I didn't worry about it, just thought it odd lol.
 
It's a surround processor with nothing to retain in memory, and the battery was only discovered because it was rattling around loose inside no longer connected. So I opened the others and low and behold they also contained them. The units operate flawlessly, as such I didn't worry about it, just thought it odd lol.
Makes no sense, but I am of the opinion if the designers put it in, there had to be a reason. I wish you well.
 
I made one pair using the 47Final Labs (sp?) design — bare wire contacts, signal doesn't pass through other-metal plug-connectors, or solder. The plugs only provide the grip and stiffness to stay in place and ensure high-pressure contact.

The best connector is no connector... so to speak.

View attachment 1455864
I am thoroughly intrigued by these wires, time to do some research. Thank you for bringing these to our attention. :thumbsup:
 
Lots of people must agree with me, I had been ordering it from Parts Connexion, when they ran out a few weeks ago I thought it was all over.
I called back last week and they had 700 feet of it back in inventory, which is a mere $11,165 dollars at their current sale price.
Chris Johnson didn't re-order it because he likes how it looks on his shelves.
See my upcoming post on speaker cables to learn more about the wires.
 
The RCA connectors by Eichmann in the first post are a very sound scientific approach to the very cheap ass idea that was RCA. I've got 3 pairs of interconnects with them and they do improve the sound. Glad to see a version of them is now under $100/set.
 
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