Dr.Mavashi
neonderthalotonalogist
I play heavy staff, gain. Have not upgraded my cables in a long time, but Lord, the prices on Mogami .......
There are different levels of Mogami. Not all Mogami is worth the price. Mogami golds are good, they haven't failed on me. The Mogami Platimums are a waste of money. Those, while good for a while, weren't rugged enough to last long and failed on me. But at least they are serviceable/repairable, since you can back off the strain relief and get at the connections to fix it.
I assume we're discussing mainly patch cables, since this is "The Pedal Board." Some of the best sounding patch cables I've used were just middle of the road stock ProCo Excellines or HOSA CPE cables. Other elite brands, like George L's that everyone raves about for clarity, just sound paper thin and weak to me and aren't worth the money - it seems they get clarity be removing low end, which is absolutely not what I need.
To some extent, better cables are more reliable. I know we've all had more expensive cables that have failed, but it is less likely to happen.
+1 This. I have my expensive cables in the practice space and keep the Amazon cables for home use. I have some Amazon cables in the "band" gig bag for emergency backups.
But I've found that going really cheap on cables has always been a false economy for me - they just break. Usually at an inconvenient time.
They do make a difference.How much a difference is a $60 cable going to make to my sound when I currently have an EQ, Tubescreamer, and noise gate combine for that cost?
They do make a difference.
But it depends on how picky you are. I for starters obssessed over the (pretty subtle) difference between the TS808, OD808, TS9, and OD9. In the end, I ended up liking the TC Mocambo the most, LOL.
But my point is output impedance, signal strenght, and whatnot aren't any difference in cheapie pedals. Especially when they're clones. So good cables make as much of a difference as if you're running all Klons.
I don't spend crazy money on cables. Maybe $30 on a 15 foot cable, and it will last me many years of playing and recording. Currently I am using a few .make your own' Bill Lawrence cables that are about 20 years old, as well as a few newer Pig Hog cables.
Well, the other thing that they tend to neglect, is that frequencies in a mix, are cumulative.My point was more so that if I were interested in developing a perfect instrument tone, cables wouldn't be the first place I would look. Unless your cable is a mile long, there's nothing the little bit of resistance and negligible capacitance can do to my tone that I can't change. The only thing that matters to me is that my cable has good solder joints on the ends.
Also, unrelated, but one of the biggest goofball thing guitar players do is assume that things that unintentionally effect their signal are bad. Guys will pick a rosewood fretboard because they want a "darker more rounded sound" but cringe when a cord does that for them.
I've been using the pig hog metal cables for about a year now, good sound quality, very durable and they don't get tangled up like regular cables do. Lucky you being a pig hog artist you don't got nothing to worry about cable wise...