Q. Is it worth spending money on new headphone cables?

Published in SOS November 2011

Everyone keeps going on about how great the Cardas cables make headphones sound. Is there any truth about cables ever making things sound better in any situation? If you are paying $400 and above for a set of headphones, why — apart from on the basis of price — would the makers compromise? That would defeat the objective, right?Via SOS web site

SOS Technical Editor Hugh Robjohns replies: 

If you really want my advice, I’d say spend your money on something more beneficial to your musical endeavours. I´ve no personal experience of the Cardas cables, but I have extensive experience of after-market cables in a wide range of applications and I remain a skeptic.

At the level of headphone you are talking about (high-end Sennheiser and AKG, for example) I think it fair to say that the manufacturers have fitted what they believe to be entirely adequate cables. I’ve certainly never felt the need to change the cables on my AKG K702s or Sennheiser HD650s, anyway.

While some people may wish to spend money on expensive cables for their (already good-quality) headphones, it’s probably wiser to invest elsewhere. In the case of a decent pair — such as these AKG headphones — the manufacturer will almost certainly have fitted cables of the appropriate quality anyway.

Headphone amps certainly can make a very significant difference to perceived headphone quality, though, and I would say that money spent here is usually worthwhile and easily noticeable. Headphone cables? 

I don’t think so. But I’m sure there’ll be plenty of people who have purchased expensive after-market cables and are only too happy to say how they have nothing but praise for them.

My engineering head tells me that if a different cable makes a clear difference then either the (old or new) cable, or the headphone amp, is operating outside of the intended design parameters. If the cable meets specifications for resistance, capacitance, and inductance, then it should work as intended. If it doesn’t, then it won’t work, and it may affect the performance of the headphone amplifier.