To make it even worse I notice that they're advertising that as a 'Digital Cable', so I'm assuming that they're suggesting it's for a digital interconnect where you could use half a kilometer of telephone wire quite happily.

I was buying some new home theater gear a couple of years back and remember the consultant in this particular shop telling me that I should buy some expensive RCA cable for the digital connection since he personally had tried it and found it 'gave much crisper highs'. Hmmm... Then proceeded to tell me that I shouldn't use my fiber-optic interconnects since the signal has to be converted more often. Of course, the lack of objective double-blind tests makes most of what's said completely meaningless (remember the old 'green felt pen around the edge of the CD' junk?).

That said, though, there are a lot of differences to be seen particularly with some components such as speakers. Anyone who hasn't gone and spent some time listening to some higher-end systems in a specialist audio shop should go and do so just to get a feel for what a good system should sound like.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by xmatt

 

I don't remember if I posted this or not but it is a fun site for used high end gear. A friend of mine closed down his used shop after he started up this website. It brought in more money than the shop did.

www.audiogon.com

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Bacchus
I don't remember if I posted this or not but it is a fun site for used high end gear.

 

He runs it out of Ann Arbor, MI. I hated that he closed his store because it was a great place to trade equipment. I could take sets of cables, amps, pre amps, and all the fun stuff home to try for a week. It was all used so you could get great prices. The only equipment he had new were cables, Cary Audio, Alon speakers, and Proac.

Just to give you an Idea, I picked up my CEC TL1 for $2400, and traded it back after 1 1/2 years for $2200. Not a bad deal.