Coaxial Cables

[Valery]

Hello guys! What do you think about this cable https://www.av.com/Cables/QED-Performance-Digital-Coaxial-Custom-Made-Audio-Cable-1m/4MZN
Is it good? Or if its not what kind of coaxial cables do you use? Thanks!

 

[aversaurus]

Don't get them started.its fine as a cable but you don't need to spend that much on one

 

[Valery]

Don't get them started.its fine as a cable but you don't need to spend that much on one

Hey, isn`t it better than analog? My amplifier has a better DAC than my CD player so thats why I wanted to try it. That is what my dealer told me

 

[nopiano]

Hey, isn`t it better than analog? My amplifier has a better DAC than my CD player so thats why I wanted to try it. That is what my dealer told me

Cables that carry digital signals seem less affected by ‘quality’ than analogue ones which are carrying music. QED is a decent brand offering good value.

I use Van Damme 75ohm cable for CD to DAC and they were under £20 custom made at https://www.designacable.com/

 

[Symples]

I found that a normal phono interconnect worked just as well as a dedicated digital coaxial cable.

I would recommend any decent (sheilded) coaxial cable.

Don't spend too much.


This'll do
Help me decide on this product: Amazon Basics Digital Audio Coaxial Cable - 2.44 meters https://amzn.eu/d/dWF9koi

Or if you really must...
Help me decide on this product: Chord Clearway Digital Interconnect Cable RCA to RCA 3.0m https://amzn.eu/d/eFPwkyM

 

[aversaurus]

Do you have optical or just coaxial?

 

[Gray]

Is it good? Or if its not what kind of coaxial cables do you use?

Nothing wrong with that QED cable - apart from being quite a bit more expensive than you need to spend.

I'm another user of Van Damme 75 ohm stuff (I soldered some low cost, high quality RCA plugs onto a length).

Think about how often you might move (or even touch) the cable once installed - because 75 ohm CT100 standard satellite cable + RCA plugs would do as good a job as any for an even lower price for fixed install - and it's as well screened as it gets 👍

 

[podknocker]

I think spending more than £10 on a coax cable is unnecessary. You need decent build quality and flexibility, so you can adjust the cable, when connecting. Some cables appear to have a sturdy build, but are very stiff and tricky to tuck away etc. I would always go for coaxial over optical. I hate Toslink connections, as they are a weird shape and difficult to align, without doing damaged to the cable and the socket. You then find it's all worn away and no longer locates. This was a real pain for me when I had a Toshiba TV with a vertical optical socket, hidden away and very difficult to see. The twist and weight of the cable would make it fall out and in the end I had to use super glue. Not ideal. If I buy a new TV, I will always look for a horizontal optical out. I don't know if it's still the same, but on many older LG TVs, the optical out had a star shaped hole, where you could connect the cable at any position, without fear of forcing it and doing any damage. Toslink connections are really bad in my opinion. With coaxial cables, you get a nice amount of friction, or 'bite' between the male and female collars and there is little chance of this coming loose. RCA, all the way!

 

[Mark Dunlop]

Hi Valery
You *could* spend £180 on a coaxial cable if you had £180. Alternatively, you could buy 1m of Belden or Van Damme 75 ohm coaxial cable for less than £3 and a pair of RCA plugs for approx £10 (somebody has already mentioned designacable.com) and make a splendid coaxial cable yourself for the price of a Chinese takeaway. You can even buy one ready-made for £24:
Van Damme COAXIAL RCA to RCA Lead. 75ohm Plasma Coax Cable. CCTV Video SPDIF (designacable.com)
Think of the cds you could buy with the £160 you've saved
m.d.

 

[Valery]

Do you have optical or just coaxial?

I have both.

 

[aversaurus]

Have you tried the optical connection?

 

[Valery]

Have you tried the optical connection?

Never.

 

[Symples]

I've got a question.

How the hell do you lose a 1m digital cable that you bought last week?

 

[podknocker]

1m now a 0m. Sorry.

 

[Symples]

I've got a question.

How the hell do you lose a 1m digital cable that you bought last week?

I give up.
30 minutes of looking and I cannot find it.
Ridiculous

 

[DCarmi]

How the hell do you lose a 1m digital cable that you bought last week?

In my case it was someone tidying up and putting the optical cable in with the kids Xbox stuff. Still I now have an emergency spare!

 

[Symples]

Found it at last.
It was under a speaker I had moved.

 

[hifi]

Hello guys! What do you think about this cable https://www.av.com/Cables/QED-Performance-Digital-Coaxial-Custom-Made-Audio-Cable-1m/4MZN
Is it good? Or if its not what kind of coaxial cables do you use? Thanks!

I was getting interference on my TV couldnt work out what it was i was getting pixal break down on certain channells. My coaxial cable run about 7M from the wall socket too the Samsung TV i bought a £15 cable from Amazon 75ohm and this resolved the issue and the picture is much sharper ! no interference at all.
So my point is some cables do make a diffrence !

 

[aversaurus]

The strangest difference I notice is if you use coaxial and the try optical I notice a change in sound I know it's not possible but it's a thing

 

[nopiano]

The strangest difference I notice is if you use coaxial and the try optical I notice a change in sound I know it's not possible but it's a thing

I’m sure it is a thing, because even if the cable has no ‘sound’ then the devices that convert electrical signals to optical, and back again probably aren’t perfect.

 

[Vincent Kars]

I’m sure it is a thing, because even if the cable has no ‘sound’ then the devices that convert electrical signals to optical, and back again probably aren’t perfect.

Indeed, this has nothing to do with cables but with the SPDIF protocol. It does 2 things, sending the bits (no difference between optical and coax) but the send rate of the bus is also the sample rate. If the sender has a lousy clock, you will have a ton of input jitter. Older Toslink implementations can be rather jittery.

Another explanation is a sighted test. It is very hard not to hear a difference when you see something change. Having somebody else swapping cables on you in a unsighted test might make a lot of difference.