I’m not trying to reopen the contentious issue about whether or not cables make a difference. I am a bit of a sceptic as I’ve tried to compare AudioQuest, Shunyata, Kimber cable and Chord recently and could discern not much difference whatsoever despite repeating these tests over a 2 week period. But then I tired some XLR cables at fairly significant price difference and heard quite obvious improvements of the higher quality cables.

However, 3 years ago I was sold speaker cables that the dealer claimed were the best he had ever heard. I was unhappy with the sound so tried out a Shunyata Cobra cable. The improvement was profound in every single aspect of music reproduction. Even volume was higher, high frequency was smooth as opposed to thin and harsh, mid range and voices were infinitely improved and bass was tighter, much more punch and much much more controlled. Unfortunately I cannot remember the name of the cable the guy sold me. I cannot exaggerate the vast improvement of the Shunyata cable - it was instantly extremely obvious, required no careful listening and was audible from other rooms in the house. It was as if I had upgraded my entire system to stuff 5 times or more the price.

My question is - what on earth could’ve been wrong with the initial cables? Would it be a simple case of extremely high resistance in the cable itself? What other properties of that cable could have been so poor as to have such a profoundly detrimental affect on the sound? I think it was thin wire - about 24 AWG - could that have made such a difference at a length of 3 meters?