All Cables Are Not Created Equal

Many manufacturers pack hookup cables in the carton with consumer electronic audio video equipment. These inexpensive cables are commonly referred to as "courtesy cables." They are included by the manufacturer as a courtesy to the purchaser in the case that the unit was purchased from a retailer who did not place a high degree of importance on the interconnect cables. It can be compared to the spare tire included on many rental cars. They are "courtesy tires" meant to get you to a repair station not to go 50,000 miles.

Courtesy cables can be detrimental to today's high-performance audio and video systems in many ways. The major problem they can introduce into the system is an intermittent signal path usually caused by a poor connection at the connector. The connectors on "courtesy cables" are molded-on plastic. The internal connection of the center conductor to the center pin of the connector is usually crimped. The crimping process is not always consistent which can leave the connector in a semi-connected state. Slight movements of the connector can cause the audio or video to cut in and out or worse cause a catastrophic failure of an amplifier or speaker system. The plastic used in molding provides no shielding of the signal at the connector. This leads to the second major problem with "courtesy cables", poor shielding. Proper shielding comes in two forms; copper braided and aluminum/Mylar. Copper braiding protects against high frequency, i.e., radio frequency (RF) or higher interference. "Courtesy cables" usually have very little shielding. Most have no copper braiding only a few strands of spiraled copper surrounding the center insulator. Some only use aluminum/Mylar and no copper. These low-cost designs will get the signal from point A to point B with the penalty of higher noise. With an audio signal increased noise results in a loss of detail or blurring of the music. For a video signal increased noise can be seen as a loss of picture detail, grainy picture, poor color saturation.

One of the benefits of purchasing audio/video equipment from a specialty audio video dealer (one who is a member of PARA, Professional Audio Video Retailers Association or CEDIA, Custom Electronic Design and Installation Association) is that when a piece of equipment is purchased the salesperson will open the cartons with the customer and discard the "courtesy cables." It will then be strongly recommended that the customer purchase interconnect cables that will match the performance of the equipment. The industry standard is 10% of the value of the hardware should be invested in cables.

To make sure you are getting all the performance you paid for let your professional audio/video salesperson recommend the best cables for your audio/video system.

For a look at some of the best cables for your audio/video system go to www.tributariescable.com

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