Those cheap Y cables!

[Kelvin]

Most of my music is stored on my computer. I used to run one of those cheap Y cables (1/8" mini-jack to RCA) from my PC to my receiver. At that time, It didn't matter that my music sounded bad and distorted, all that mattered was rockin' out.

Now, as I'm obtaining more and more equipment to compare, I have reached the stage where cables actually matter. I recently swapped out that cheap 6 foot Y cable for a Y splitter and and a 3 foot shielded RCA cable.

My first reaction was and my second reaction was :tears: DEAR LORD! I spent all that time listening to distorted music when I could have ponied up $20 for some cables that made such a huge difference!

Now here's my real purpose for this thread. What cables do you use as an interconnect from PC to Reciever/Amp/Preamp?

I'm not ready to buy a DAC yet but I'd like to have a good cable so that I can properly compare my equipment. I've read a little bit about the DIY Canare Star Quad cables (http://audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=61442). Would it be a good idea to make one of these up but put a 1/8" mini-jack on one end? Is the mini-jack a bottleneck in anyway?

 

[Avocado Dream]

Hi Kelvin, I use the cheap Radio Shack one, Evolution I think they call it, cost about 8 dollars and sounds great to me.

Sounds like the shielding in your second cable made the difference, in my experience, cable differences are usually subtle if any, but that's as far as I'll go here, lots of cable opinions in thinking out loud.

I think in PC audio that there is a lot more RF flying around so that cable needs may differ slightly, just my opinion though.

Also an opinion on the bottleneck issue, it's an analog out and I don't think it would bottleneck in the same way as if it were carrying data, so long as the connection is good, I think it would be fine.

- Dave