Cables make a HUGE difference in my opinion. Whether digital or analog, you will hear the differnce if you have the resolution in your system to reproduce it. Analog cables vary so much from manufacturer to manufacturer that to reccomend one over another really won't tell you much anyway. DIY is great for cables on the cheap, but that is about it. Spend 30 hours making cat5 cables for speakers, and you get maybe a 100 dollar pair of speaker cables at best. Take the Bolder m-80's vs. diy cat5 venhaus design. The differnce in price was maybe 50 bucks when buying used, and the cables weren't even close when it came to detail, reproduction, speed etc. Now, step up to the 550 dollar Nitro's, and again, a large improvement. What I have found is the difference between 10 and 100 dollar cables is huge, anything above that and you are paying more for perfection than anything else. Really a law of dimishing returns I would say. Spend 200 bucks on IC's you will be very happy, spend 3 grand and you will be more happy, but was it worth the 2800 bucks? Probably not, but you will hear a differnce. I would compare this genre really to the ua-5/v3 debate. Does the v3 sound better? In most cases, I would answer yes. Does it sound 700 dollars better, only you can decide that.
While making your own cables is fun and rewarding, stepping up to something in the 150-200 range will make you much happier. That said, IMHO, the best DIY IC's are the venhaus silver ones at the aforementioned website. Easy to make, and they sound quite good. Can you do better? Let your ears decide.
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