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Matt (my son) has bought various guitar leads over the last few years and the jack plugs have started to get wobbly. I bought a Neutrik jack from Maplins to fix one and it seemed really good, though pricey. It has a built-in cable clamp/strain relief that should be more robust than the springy "strain relief" things that don't actually seem to do much. We'll see.

Anyway, when I saw some reasonably priced Neutrik plugs, both that and the self-muting type,

I bought a few intending to make up some cables, as most of mine date back to the early seventies and are old skinny high-capacitance ones (need to get that vintage sound? I have some crap leads you can buy!). Cables with good quality plugs seemed to be overpriced IMHO. (Planet Waves 6m - >£20!?)

Then I looked at the price of cable and Maplin want £1.29/m for their half-decent cable. The lead I was given as a present a couple of Christmases ago was a Venom Mamba and I've been quite happy with that, though I fancy playing with these self-muting plugs. So I Googled for it and realise that I can actually get a reasonable guitar lead from musicianshop.com or aireguitars.co.uk cheaper than buying the cut cable from Maplin. musicianshop's server is down right now, but here's an example from Google's cache

Venom Python Guitar Lead 6m (20ft)
£5.00 FREE DELIVERY Royal Mail 1st Class
The Python guitar lead is made using 6mm oxygen free cable in navy blue with 1/4" metal jack connectors and spring retainers. WAS £8.99 YOU SAVE £3.99

I can even get a 20ft lead by Stagg that looks like my electric iron's mains lead for £4.99 (plus delivery):
.

As I looked further I realised that I must be looking at the wrong parameter (price). I mean, you want PERFECT SOND, don't you? SO you have to buy a Van Damme lead:

Van Damme Guitar Cable 5m (16ft) Straight To Straight
£20.00 FREE DELIVERY Royal Mail 1st Class
This top quality guitar lead is hand soldered and finished in London, England and comes with a LIFETIME Guarantee. It has Neutrik NP2C mono-jack to Neutrik NP2C mono-jack connectors and gives perfect signal and sound every time. WAS £24.95 YOU SAVE £4.95

PERFECT! No quibbling, PERFECT!
Hang on, maybe Planet Wave are right. After all:

Planet Waves Guitar Lead 6m (20ft)
£24.99 FREE DELIVERY 1st CLASS
As advertised on the back of guitarist magazine this top quality lead is the best. Includes: 24-karat gold-plated plugs, 8 compression springs, indestructible inner-core with copper cylinder and 100% shielding coverage, colour coded rings for cable identification, ultra-fine stranded premium quality insulated copper conductors, double sided polyester foil inner shield, heavy-duty plated copper-braided outer shield and extra-heavy flexible polymer cable jacket.

8 compression springs! Indestructible inner-core! Hell yeah! Obviously they don't need to offer a lifetime guarantee because it's INDESTRUCTIBLE!
But what's this from Fender?

Fender - Gold Series - 12' Acoustic Cable
£15.00 FREE DELIVERY Royal Mail 1st Class
12 foot Instrument Cable with One straight and One Right-Angle 1/4" Connector with 4-Way Differential Cable Architecture for best possible frequency balance and maximum noise isolation using two separate shields.
WAS 19.99 YOU SAVE 4.99

I used to have an acoustic cable once, it was a piece of string and it connected two tin cans. But "4-way differential cable architecture"? What the hell is that?

two different gauge solid conductors augment the midrange & bass to provide a much fuller sound. Specially designed hollow treble conductors give these cables a better, more extended high frequency presentation, with no trace of harshness. These cables have a unique voice that has not been heard before, and use a proprietary technology that is patented. They are specifically designed for acoustic-electric guitar or electric guitar when a more clean sound is desired.

Uh, the Van Damme cable gives you perfect sound but the Fender cable has a unique voice.
So folks, what do you use and how much do you worry about it? If you made it this far.

My guitar cables are Klotz La Grange cable with the Neutrik straight jacks above. This cable is amazing. Its so sexy its almost pornographic. I use Klotz patch cable for my board with Neutrik right angled jacks as well.

I'm a Neutrik fanboy really if anything. I love the quality and engineering. The strain relief system on these jacks is the nicest I've seen. I've also seen a mate accident park over the top of a Neutrik XLR jack with a cherry picker and it was solid as fuck.

I use Venom and Hotline (Leem) cables. They're totally fine and cheap as shit. Since I started using them 10 years ago I haven't replaced them, we rehearse and gig a lot and my drummer CONSTANTLY stands on cables when they're plugged into stuff, straining and bending the fuck out of them. They're all still fine.

All I look for in cables is the following:

1. Can I repair it? i.e. are the jacks unscrewable
2. Is it not ridiculously thin?
3. It cannot be any of those "super cable" companys like Monster, Planet Waves, Van Damme and all that crap.
4. Does it have buzzwords that are complete psychobabble as selling points? Avoid.

The End.

Euan, do you buy Klotz LaGrange as cut cable? If so, where?

Klotz La Grange at Studiospares

They do a 10m Klotz with a silent jack and a normal Neutrik jack.

Tech Specs

Filth.

It really is a glorious cable, coils like butter and always returns to its natural shape so no twists or kinks.

Yeah I always marvel at how well butter coils.

You knows it.

Joey Santiago always stated that he got his tone by always using white cables. The man's a genius. I've got a load of pretty coloured patch leads for my pedals that were dirt cheap/free, one planet waves cable that I nicked from the studio downstairs, some generic ones that I'm not sure how they got into my house, and two 1.5m cables that my colleague made for me out of nice bits - I love these: no messing around coiling etc. - just me > pedalboard > amp and remeber not to duckwalk.

i've got a bunch of regular black cables, i forget who makes 'em. i think it's like someone's name or something.
but my favorite is a green fender california cable i've got. it only cost me about $10 and has outlasted every other cable i've ever owned. obviously due to its color.

My bespoke cables are green - you may be on to something...

this is not some kind of brand snobbery but i really like klotz cables but since i'm more broke than not i buy my cables secondhand now, like whatever cool looking old cable i find, i also have an excalibur cable that's been with me for seven years or so and took some serious abuse, jacks are starting to look real scratchy but it's a great cable


when i used to play bass in a band i only used high quality cables (not the vovox absurd priced cables tho haha) but like the klotz funkmaster and all, now .. playing guitar i honestly find it less important, also because i want stuff to be noisy and hissy, and also because they go through a lot more abuse

i had pw's on my pedalboard, now they're 1€ patch cables, still useklotz speakercables but for the rest it's just whatver cable i find first and looks cool (too)


maybe i need to get an orange footswitch cable tho

heavium wrote:maybe i need to get an orange footswitch cable tho

Yes.

HOT

I'm waiting on the 1/4" version of these babies...

Wow, them cables feature evenly distributed elections on the contacts.

wow... denatured h20, just what my guitar needs...

MEGA CORD TOPIC NOOOES!

I don't have much to say, except if you don't buy the $1 cables and take care of the good cables you have, they should last a while.

Also, bumguitarist would keeps trying to tell me how i'm fucking up my cables by wrapping them like every soundguy i've worked with wraps cables. Specifically when you kinda tie a gentle knot around the whole thing to keep the wrap together (if you don't have a tie!). I've been doing it like that for like 4 years and haven't had any problems, meanwhile I think I've found 3-4 of his XLR cables fucked up AT GIGS. I'm gonna take a pictar of one.....


EDIT: lol

Did you say knot?

I tie my cables a guy at the BBC taught me how to do with a twist of the wrist and rub of my thumb. When you let go of the cable it uncoils if self.

euan wrote:Did you say knot?

I tie my cables a guy at the BBC taught me how to do with a twist of the wrist and rub of my thumb. When you let go of the cable it uncoils if self.

It's not really a strong knot or anything just a gentle little thing to keep your cord together, this is after the wrist-thumb thing when it's all wrapped up. If you don't have a string or velcro wrap, this works.