Today while restringing my Hwy 1 Strat I discovered that my instrument cable is doing damage to the guitar finish. It's one of those cables that has a rubber wrap around the metal housing for the cable end and that wrapping extends about 3 inches down the cable. Where my cable bends to be wrapped through the strap (I wrap it between the strap folds, not between the body and strap) apparently that rubber has been making contact with the edge of the body and the paint felt sticky.

Argh! I love the nitro but I wish it wasn't so fickle!

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Sorry to hear this, PTM.

I'll learn form this, though - I've already learned about some valuable "do's and dont's" from this forum, so I'll add this to the list.

I don't think it's at a point where it's too horrible. I used a polish cloth and a little Dunlop Formula 65 and it seemed to at least remove the stickiness. At least my guitar is black so a blem in the paint won't show much.

I had no idea about this - but now that I think about it with the trouble some people have with the rubber tubing on some guitar stands it makes sense. I was even being careful to make sure I put the cable through the loop in the strap instead of just tucked between the body and strap over the strap button. Oh well. Off to find a new cable tomorrow. Too bad cause I liked this cable - had it for like 10 years.

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Well PTM (love that abbreviation) I reccommend planet waves cables. Sound good and quiet, are really durable and if you get the one with the circuit breaker jackplug
http://www.soundunlimited.co.uk/product_867_Planet_Waves_10ft_Circuit_Breaker_PW-AG-10.html?PHPSESSID=2f8f513abac215b790ab0024beaeda4e
It enables silent guitar plug in's and if you develop a short you can repair it on a dark stage in under 2minutes with no more than a screwdriver and a pair of wire cutters.
In 4 years i've taken 2/3" off the end of one.

How it reacts to nitro is a different matter. I've never had any issue with it and my hotrod, is all i can tell you.

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No no and no

Cable does affect guitar tone. But "High tech" cable (Monster, for example) is, simply put, a dodge.

The only thing you need for best signal transfer from guitar to amp is low-capacitance cable... cable that offers very little resistance to the signal. A low-cap cable gives you brighter high, less mud, etc.

You can buy cheap low-cap Belden cable and good quality Switchcraft plugs and solder up your own for next to nothing, and they will be as good as the best quality cables you can buy. Or you can buy George L's (I have a bunch of them around here)... they have a soldlerless connection as nikininja describes for quick, no-heat repairs. I also have one of the new Planet Waves cables (got it free buying a 10-pack of XL's... I never would have paid for it) and it seems to sound just fine.

Just don't fall for the $50-cable-with-high-tech-oxygen-starved-braids made of Unobtanium that ensures the low frequencies and high frequencies from your axe reach the amp at the same time and in phase....

I haven't seen this on anything yet... but I think it's because of the nature of "low-capacitance."

Capacitance isn't really the same as the native resistance of the wire (even though I described it as a kind of resistance). In a shielded cable, the wire and the shield end up working like a small capacitor, storing up current from the incoming signal. The cable tends to wait until it is fully "charged" before it releases the signal, and this slows down the response of the cable. This kills highs and reduces transients in audio systems with a lot of fast signals... telephones, guitar cables, etc. (BTW, the longer the cable, the bigger the "capacitor," so the more critical it becomes.)

In an audio cable, there's a point where "low-capacitance" is plenty good enough... any reasonably low-capacitance cable is going to be fast enough for talking or guitar playing, and measuring tiny differences in pF per foot wouldn't be meaningful. Pretty much any cable that is labeled as low-capacitance will be as good as any other.

In high-speed data transfer applications, where the actual data can get garbled by being held in a "charged" cable, engineers are real picky about just HOW low that low-capacitance really is. But for guitar... Planet Waves, George L's, home-made Belden, any low-cap brand... they're all going to be suitable.

I've never wrapped my guitar cable through the strap. Is there any reason for that, than personal preference on how the cable hangs? I've always just let it hand down from the input jack. Although..I've seen others do it.

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"I won't be wronged, I won't be insulted, I won't be laid a hand on. I don't do these things to other people, and I require the same from them."-John Wayne

I must be odd because I have like ten different cables from four makers though I do have my favorites. Well I would have thought most people had several at varies lenths at least.

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The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.

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It's to prevent the cable from accidentally being pulled out of the guitar. So if you trip on your cable you're not instantly unplugged. It's something you get in the habit of doing from gigging.

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Syeklops I've never been one for the 'cable wrap' either. I'm just far too busy worrying about other stuff to think about it. Guess i never formed the habit.
You could always go with this for live stuff, after many years of being a devout cable man i got this.
[url]http://tinyurl.com/kppuf4
[/url]

Really not a bad system. No latency delays until i'm 100 yards away and no unpleasant overly compressed sound that i can hear.

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No no and no

It will be labeled or advertised as such. If you buy bulk Belden, for example, the catalog will label it "Belden shielded low-capacitance cable" or something similar. George L's calls theirs low-capacitance, on Planet Waves they've got this gimmicky "IN=OUT" logo thing trademarked to indicate a low-capacitance cable.

But don't worry about oxygen-free copper and gold-plugs and all that cal. That's for the guys my amplifier building pal always calls "audiophools."

Toast
I think that if your a serious player, you should cough it up and buy good Monster Instrument cables and be done with it. I have been using them for years. I don't care if your out at a gig or playing at home, you won't ever worry about cables again. Through the years I have thrown away tons of "inexpensive" cables. You absolutely get what you pay for. I use Monster Studio Pro 1000 and if anything ever did happen to one (which nothing ever has) they are guaranteed for life. It doesn't matter where you bought it, or what is wrong with it....walk into any music store, hand it to them, and they will hand you a new one....no questions asked.
Noodles