Quality guitar leads

[Mr Blues]

I brought a Klotz Titanium guitar lead the other day. It wasn’t cheap but a very well made cable . I believe it’s made in the USA.

It cost me £60. UK Stirling. Has a nice clean signal. No distortion. Defiantly worth the money.

Dave

[shufflebeat]

Originally Posted by Mr Blues

I brought a Klotz Titanium guitar lead the other day. It wasn’t cheap but a very well made cable . I believe it’s made in the USA.

It cost me £60. UK Stirling. Has a nice clean signal. No distortion. Defiantly worth the money.

Dave

I have a roll of Klotz cable, a bag of Neutrik jacks and a temp controlled soldering iron, likewise.

[pieterh]

Originally Posted by shufflebeat

I have a roll of Klotz cable, a bag of Neutrik jacks and a temp controlled soldering iron, likewise.

It’s definitely an excellent combination! We use Klotz microphone cable; with the exception of maybe Belden it’s the best out there.

Neutrik set the standard for contacts as well, though Rean (a brand they own but is made in China I think) is no great shakes.

[perttime]

Has anybody used these UK built cables?
http://www.award-session.com/cleartone_cables.php

They say: "Neutrik connectors on Van damme cable"

[HogsNRoses]

For another German product try Sommer LLX. Sommer makes lots of types of cable, but LLX is perhaps the lowest capacitance and most neutral cable available. It’s rugged and handles well, and best of all isn’t very expensive.

For a stereo instrument cable, try Sommer SC Galileo.

[stringbound]

Klotz is a german brand. The company is based in Munich.

Originally Posted by Mr Blues

I brought a Klotz Titanium guitar lead the other day. It wasn’t cheap but a very well made cable . I believe it’s made in the USA.

It cost me £60. UK Stirling. Has a nice clean signal. No distortion. Defiantly worth the money.

Dave

[pieterh]

Originally Posted by HogsNRoses

For another German product try Sommer LLX. Sommer makes lots of types of cable, but LLX is perhaps the lowest capacitance and most neutral cable available. It’s rugged and handles well, and best of all isn’t very expensive.

For a stereo instrument cable, try Sommer SC Galileo.

Sommer make great cable; I have quite a few examples at home. I had the crappy Rean plugs on them but changed them for real Neutrik which are excellent!

[cmac]

Originally Posted by Mr Blues

I brought a Klotz Titanium guitar lead the other day. It wasn’t cheap but a very well made cable . I believe it’s made in the USA.

It cost me £60. UK Stirling. Has a nice clean signal. No distortion. Defiantly worth the money.

Dave

Cables can't really distort the signal though. Any bit of wire will carry the signal quite happily.

Looking at the Klotz website, the features listed are:

• ultra-dynamic, quick response, superb attention to detail and authentic transient response
• no distortion, delivers superbly balanced sound
• no phasing, ultra-low signal compression
• additional insulation layer eliminates microphonics
• unique patented cable design
• for guitar and bass aficionados on stage and in the studio
• optimized capacitance of 75 pF/m
• In brief: infinite tone - perfect silence

That's all just snake oil. You'll get exactly the same audio performance out of a £5 Stagg cable.

Where you pay the money is in getting a cable that can be stood on, thrown around, coiled, uncoiled, packed in and out of boxes day after day, and continue working without any problems. Maybe the Klotz cables are supreme when it comes to mechanical reliability but they don't seem to make that a selling point.

[HogsNRoses]

Originally Posted by cmac

That's all just snake oil. You'll get exactly the same audio performance out of a £5 Stagg cable.

Where you pay the money is in getting a cable that can be stood on, thrown around, coiled, uncoiled, packed in and out of boxes day after day, and continue working without any problems. Maybe the Klotz cables are supreme when it comes to mechanical reliability but they don't seem to make that a selling point.

I agree to a certain extent, but with a high impedance source such as an electric guitar, the capacitance comes into play, making a treble cut in the audio range. At whatever frequency the treble cut is (depends on cable and length), you will also get a 45 degree shift in phase. The Klotz has quite a bit less capacitance than Mogami, putting the treble cut and phase shift outside of the audio range for any reasonable length.

Acoustic guitars generally have an onboard pre-amp with a low impedance output, so the treble cut is outside of the audible range with any cable.

I agree with you that the handling, ruggedness, and price are important in addition to capacitance. Another couple factors to consider are shielding and how good the connectors are.

[cmac]

Originally Posted by HogsNRoses

I agree to a certain extent, but with a high impedance source such as an electric guitar, the capacitance comes into play, making a treble cut in the audio range. At whatever frequency the treble cut is (depends on cable and length), you will also get a 45 degree shift in phase. The Klotz has quite a bit less capacitance than Mogami, putting the treble cut and phase shift outside of the audio range for any reasonable length.

Acoustic guitars generally have an onboard pre-amp with a low impedance output, so the treble cut is outside of the audible range with any cable.

I agree with you that the handling, ruggedness, and price are important in addition to capacitance. Another couple factors to consider are shielding and how good the connectors are.

I did think about excluding the capacitance from my snake-oil label, and probably should have done to be fair. But while 75pf/m is a nice low figure, Sommer (78pf) and Van Damme (90pf) cables retail for about 1/3rd of the Klotz price. So the (in my view) absurd price of those cables are all about the marketing nonsense.

[captain_jack]

For that price I would hope they were good!

In general, how do people feel about cheap cables? I imagine the absolute cheapest ones might not be great, but do you really have to spend a ton to get a good cable?

[buzzardwhiskey]

I used to throw a stink-eye toward the idea of cables sounding better. Then I did some subjective testing. What I heard was not particularly subtle.

Why some are better is not my forte. I like Mogami and Livewire Elite.

[pieterh]

Originally Posted by captain_jack

For that price I would hope they were good!

In general, how do people feel about cheap cables? I imagine the absolute cheapest ones might not be great, but do you really have to spend a ton to get a good cable?

I would say that the cheapest cables are going to be noticeably bad but once you get up to decent professional cable you probably won’t hear much if any difference.

Where it DOES make a difference is in the quality of contacts, soldering and strain relief. As earlier posts say (including mine) Sommer cable is pretty darn good - but make sure you get proper contacts on there (or do it yourself if your soldering skills are ok). I had Sommer cables that were ok; I changed the crappy Rean contacts for serious quality Neutrik (including the silent system jack) and now they are my go to cables.

I also use Planet Waves and Klotz at home and we use mainly Klotz microphone cable at work (bought in bulk and made up to length by us using Neutrik contacts).

[SpruceTop]

Any cable from a reputable maker, i.e., Klotz, Mogami, Canare, Whirlwind etc., would be good as long as it has quality connectors on it.