If you want to try a shielded cable, low capacitance, still relatively flexible (30 mm bending radius) despite the large diameter (6.1 mm) and quite cheap, there would be the RG 59/B/U, 67 pF/m., around 6 euros for a 5 meter piece.
https://cdn-reichelt.de/documents/datenblatt/C600/RG59BU.pdf
In Europe I would buy it from Reichelt, but I suppose you can find it quite easily from your usual suppliers.
https://cdn-reichelt.de/documents/datenblatt/C600/RG59BU.pdf
In Europe I would buy it from Reichelt, but I suppose you can find it quite easily from your usual suppliers.
Just a personal oppinion:
The mentioned cable has a "staku" inner conductor. This is steel with a copper layer on top. Noting I would use in HIFI. MHz high frequency doesn't care for the high Ohm resistance of steel, very low voltage audio signals do. Never use it for a record player / pre-amp connection. You probaply picked the wrong product from the REICHELT side.
Many years ago, when computers used ethernet cards (anyone remember Novel Netware?) with coaxial cable and networks became common even in private or small enterprises, these where made in high quality. You could get silver plated inner multi strand copper conductor, aluminum foil shield plus a 100% cover of silver plated, woven copper shielding, covered with soft, high flexible plastic for ridiculous low price, if you took 50 or 100 meter of it. I used mayn spools of this stuff for car audio, active multi amp installations and for home HIFI. It lasted for ever, one of my (now!) vintage car installations is 30 years old and still 100% fine. Today you have to search for such quality, as cheap, steel (STAKU) and aluminum outer shield have taken over. Often you can't even solder the shield!
The same goes for antenna coax cable. Most low priced products use steel conductors inside.
The mentioned cable has a "staku" inner conductor. This is steel with a copper layer on top. Noting I would use in HIFI. MHz high frequency doesn't care for the high Ohm resistance of steel, very low voltage audio signals do. Never use it for a record player / pre-amp connection. You probaply picked the wrong product from the REICHELT side.
Many years ago, when computers used ethernet cards (anyone remember Novel Netware?) with coaxial cable and networks became common even in private or small enterprises, these where made in high quality. You could get silver plated inner multi strand copper conductor, aluminum foil shield plus a 100% cover of silver plated, woven copper shielding, covered with soft, high flexible plastic for ridiculous low price, if you took 50 or 100 meter of it. I used mayn spools of this stuff for car audio, active multi amp installations and for home HIFI. It lasted for ever, one of my (now!) vintage car installations is 30 years old and still 100% fine. Today you have to search for such quality, as cheap, steel (STAKU) and aluminum outer shield have taken over. Often you can't even solder the shield!
The same goes for antenna coax cable. Most low priced products use steel conductors inside.
Yes Turbowatch2,
I totally agree.
I gave a wrong suggestion, I apologize.
I was going to buy this cable, just as a low capacitance cable, but I didn't see that the center conductor is not just copper. Thanks for the report.
I totally agree.
I gave a wrong suggestion, I apologize.
I was going to buy this cable, just as a low capacitance cable, but I didn't see that the center conductor is not just copper. Thanks for the report.
So now include "wire" in the Vintage and NOS category. Sometimes I laugh at myself "Why do I have bins with just old wires in them?" The old defunct, unrepairable HiFi equipment yields a harvest of the "good" stuff. How many such items I let skip through my hands, full of at least "wire".
Not many consumer grade devices have excellent wiring either so another reason must be made up to defend having piles of stuff 😉
Truth be told, quite often I have wiring of the not so old kind already having sticky isolation (disintegration). The very old kind usually is still OK. Probably the greener stuff is the shorter it lives.
Truth be told, quite often I have wiring of the not so old kind already having sticky isolation (disintegration). The very old kind usually is still OK. Probably the greener stuff is the shorter it lives.
Last edited:
If the arrows are indicating signal direction (source to load) then they are correct. Ideally, the shield should be connected at the low impedance end, which is usually the source. This is especially important with tonearm cables to prevent hum, but in practice I've observed that it makes little difference with line sources. YMMV.