Inexpensive But Good Interconnects/RCA Cables - Try Complete Cable Concepts/jmshearer

Not looking to start a debate about cables here, but thought I'd share my experience for anyone that's interested.

A few people have asked what kind of interconnects/RCA cables are good. Maybe they don't want to spend a lot on exotic cables, but don't want the cheaply made, and sometimes overpriced stuff from the big box stores.

Here is a place to check out:

jmshearer | eBay »

The guy that runs it has a few different types of cables available for sale and also does custom orders. You'll notice that he uses the same type of cabling (i.e. Belden) that some other companies use but the prices are very reasonable compared to his competitors.

Of course you can always buy parts and make your own cables but if you just want a low hassle option these are worth looking into.

 

I have been making my own interconnects for a while.
It is a fascinating hobby( maybe I should get out more)
I have learnt a lot reading about the theory behind interconnects.
I have to say that a large number of manufacturers still use PVC insulation, and stranded wire. These are not the better ones dispite their high price tag.
Teflon and solid copper are.the Belden cables that jmshearer offers use this type. They should be very good.

 

Nice! Thanks for posting.

 

Just an FYI, something I just noticed is that cheapest RCAs he offers use Belden cable that has a copper clad steel conductor. If you really want an all copper conductor, you have to buy the RCAs that are $20 and up a set for the 3 ft. RCA cables.

 

Just wanted to give some more positive feedback for this seller. I accidentally purchased the wrong cables (my fault) and the seller was very good about doing an exchange/upgrade. Very refreshing considering some of the customer service experiences I've had lately.

 

I tried to view a link once on this topic but it wasn't active any longer. Do you use separate conductors and inter-twine them for shielding? Do you run a separate shield/ drain wire?

 

Always made my own with Mogami cable (2524 unbalanced, 2552 balanced), with gold plated Neutrik connectors in my mastering studio, and never felt the need to upgrade.

 

They look like almost exact copies of Blue Jeans Cable products right down to the source wire and connectors. Prices are identical to Blue Jeans Cable from what I can tell. If the construction and terminations are identical to Blue Jeans Cable (i.e., correct termination impedances, cold-welded connections, secure strain relief, etc.) then they're very good cables.

 

They're not quite the same. They are also less expensive than BJC, which is why I bought 3 pairs of them instead of BJC.

 

I thought you were going in a different direction for that last sentence

 

I have not used a screen or drain wire.
So far i have used two parallel conductors,a twisted pair and my favourite, x17t or webro foam satellite cable.
This is the best sounding one so far, and by a large margin. It seems well suited for use between CD player and amplifier.it takes away any artificialness
Bass gains more weight yet seems tighter!the cable needs little work. The PVC outer sleeve is removed, along with the copper braid .
We are Now left with a 1mm(approx) solid copper conductor for the hot connection, and a solid copper foil.
This is covered in heat shrink (polyethylene 12mm)and terminated in whatever rca phono plugs you fancy. I often use braided sleeving to add to the appearance .
The foil having no holes or gaps keeps any noise out
For what it costs to make it is in my humble opinion better than some highly respected kit.
Common mode noise rejection is used on loudspeaker cables.
At the moment i am very productive! Being a recently retired engineer i need to be doing what i do best. The beauty is that I have greatly improved my system and had a ball doing it.
Anything i don,t know i find out!
I intend to sort my my mains out but am not in a hurry!
My first pair of interconnects took all day!!my second 4 hours,
Now it takes probably 1 hour.
Cables do make a great difference.
Atlas cables seem genuine! They explain in great detail the theories behind many designs till i ,m lost.
It's not just the cost of bits and pieces. It's the design.stranded wires cause problems, solid core don,t capitance. All play there part.
Am working on XLO design( very frustrating!!!)
Great hobby ! Great people on forums.

 

Forgot to mention that I cannot take any credit for my cables . TNT Audip on the net, have amongst many other things a DIY cables section.
There are mountains of info, practical stuff . Its wonderful.

 

I love to have a quality set of cables but prices for them are more than I wish to spend. I'm sure there are sonic advantages to having cables made with more copper content verses the tiny conductors inside most common varieties.

A guy once told me, some 20 years ago, that he rewired his house phone line with 18g wire and he heard a big improvement. I wasn't sure if it was true but I suppose it could be plausible.

I would really like to put some better cables on my audio system one of these days though. I see that the TNT site is working now so I'll take a look at what they got to say. Glad to hear you're keeping yourself busy at something unique and audio satisfying.

 

There are two types of copper in general use today, and they've been in general use for over 60 years.

C10200, also known as Oxygen-Free (OF). While OF is considered oxygen-free, its conductivity rating is no better than the more common ETP grade below. It has a 0.001% oxygen content, 99.95% purity and minimum 100% IACS conductivity. For the purposes of purity percentage, silver (Ag) content is counted as copper (Cu).

C11000, also known as Electrolytic-Tough-Pitch (ETP) is the most common copper. It is universal for electrical applications. ETP also has a minimum conductivity rating of 100% IACS and is required to be 99.9% pure. It typically has 0.02% to 0.04% oxygen content. Most ETP sold today will meet or exceed the 101% IACS specification. As with OF copper, silver (Ag) content is counted as copper (Cu) for purity purposes.

So basically, the copper wire and the wire gauge in a $20 interconnect/RCA cable is identical to the copper wire and the wire gauge in an $800+ interconnect/RCA cable. There are some exotic audiophile interconnect/RCA cable makers who use larger gauge wire, but it's pointless because the tiny voltage and current that travels through the cable doesn't do so any better than it does through a non-garden hose-size cable.

That's genuinely funny! So he thought that he could somehow improve on the tens or hundreds of miles of plain old telephone wire coming to his house by replacing the last few feet of it inside the house? That's a poorly thought out effort, IMO.

There are lots of excellent, fairly priced audio cables on the market. The so-called entry level line from Atlas is very reasonable if it's important to you to spend extra money on so-called audiophile cables.

Better yet, and since you're in the U.S., consider supporting a terrific U.S. company such as Blue Jeans Cable. The company makes excellent products - top quality wire, top quality insulation, very good connectors, cold welded connections, correct terminations, very good strain relief at the connectors, correct grounds and shields, and all of Blue Jeans' products tolerate normal use (i.e., repeated plugging and unplugging, moderately tight curves and clearances in back of your equipment, and so on). Good companies like Blue Jeans (U.S.) and a few others cut through all the cable hype to provide excellent products that easily electrically equal and frequently electrically outperform some multi-hundred and multi-thousand dollar cables that are constructed of hype, marketing woo and - unfortunately sometimes - poor terminations and wire that is difficult to work with because it's too heavy, thick and stiff for the application. Keep your money in your pocket and buy sensibly.

There are some competitors to Blue Jeans Cable that have been touted in this forum recently. The competitors may be producing an almost identical product that is equally good (that is to say, excellent). But some forum members are only recommending the competing products based on appearance (in an online store) and price. That's not a basis on which to recommend anything. So until there's a body of end user reporting about the competing products, stick with Blue Jeans as one of the cable makers to consider.

Audioquest has a relatively inexpensive line of cables that are electrically sound and thus will work properly. Unfortunately, construction quality is poor at the price. The cables look nice enough, but the terminations break too easily, IMO, and the strain relief at the connectors is basically absent. The budget cables from Audioquest are basically meant to be plugged in and left alone - they'll stand up to plugging and unplugging only a few times before the activity starts to cause breakages. Because Audioquest's budget pricing is still much higher than (for example) Monoprice cables, you're literally better off with $10-$20 Monoprice products which won't stand up to any more physical use that the Audioquest budget stuff but will cost a lot less and provide the same electrical performance. Typical of Audioquest and Kimber and some competing entry-level products from some of the other so-called audiophile cable makers, the outside of the entry-level connectors (RCA, Coax, Optical, HDMI, speaker connector shrouds) are usually smooth, which also means that the cables can be extremely difficult to unplug when you want to move something or change a piece of equipment.

Atlas products are good too, but their entry-level products are even pricier than the ones from Audioquest and Kimber (mainly because Atlas stuff is coming from the Scotland).

Check out Blue Jeans Cable pricing on the company's web site. That's the standard for fair pricing for excellent quality cable that performs precisely as it should (signal transmission, insulation, shielding, termination, impedance, capacitance, inductance, connection, etc., etc.). Any company that charges more is doing so for fancy looking insulation, fancy looking connectors, the unsupportable marketing woo surrounding claims about exotic sounding copper or silver wire (see above about OF copper), the method used to cast the wire (the electrons that operate at the quantum level to make electricity work just don't care about the grain of the wire or anything else), and so on. That can amount to hundreds or thousands of dollars for audiophile wire that performs identically to the stuff I've recommended. Whatever. If you do decide to get into pricier audiophile cable, stop listening to me/stop reading what I post about audio cables because it will just spoil your fun. Seriously.

 

Thanks Agitater for the very well written and informative write-up. I've used cables that were difficult to connect and disconnect and they eventually resulted in having broken wires. They looked tough but it was only a disguise. And when I took an end apart to fix it, I found some real crappy wire underneath the heavy covering.

I've seen Blue Jeans mentioned many times so I'll take a look at their product line.

Thanks for your suggestions.

 

You're welcome!

 

UPOCC

 

Those are nice cables for a nice price.

 

I have nothing against BJC. My speaker cables came from BJC, matter of fact.

Anyone interested in how the cables I posted are made, feel free to contact the maker. He is very responsive and will answer any questions as far as I can tell. Further, he is up front about the materials used. If you are interested in a specific cable, you can go to the Belden website, for example, and download a PDF data sheet that will tell you all you want to know about the cable material. He even links to these in his listing.

I think what I wrote above is better than endless speculation.

Note that I NEVER said that these cables were better or worse than BJC product.

If you want to debate the merits of cables, wiring, high dollar stuff vs. $5 RCAs from Wal-Mart or RCAs from Best Buy or whatever, start your own thread. That's not what this thread is about.

 

I'm surprised he doesn't offer any Belden 8402 options, love that wire.

 

Blue Jeans Cable & Monoprice

 

Excellent points. I'm going to hit Jim Shearer's eBay store this evening to buy some of his cables and check them out. Let's see what his shipping speed is like too, because I'm setting up a new system for a friend on June 18 and I'll use the Shearer cables if they show up in time.

 

No Canare?

 

As president of the 8402 fan club, I'd say its because only weirdos like us use microphone cable as interconnects; it would generally be counter-intuitive for a cable builder selling stereo ICs. Even my source for them doesn't sell them as pairs, I buy two "singles" and request one have red heat shrink.

 

Blue Jeans Cable offers a Canare option in most of their cable types.

As an aside, it would be nice if they also offered choices of something other then the largest RCA termination they could possibly find, but that's why I don't buy their IC's anymore.