It’s funny how this debate still rages. I wrote about this a few years ago and also participated in forum discussions surrounding the benefits of low-capacitance cables. The divide back then was as wide as our political climate today! So many people claimed to be able to hear a difference, and I was never convinced.
Even when presented with actual evidence that there was no sonic difference between different cables (except for super-high capacitance cables which will impede high-frequenceies), those in favor of low-cap cables were undeterred. And that’s fine. Whatever floats your boat.
For me, the issue was the price that was being charged for low-cap cables. I wouldn’t dream of paying a couple of hundred bucks for a 25′ length of cable just because it was advertised as low-cap. However, that said, I would pay – and have paid – more for a well-constructed cable because at least for me, durability and material quality are ultra-important.
Years ago, when I recorded my first album, I purchase a set of Mogami Gold XLR cables. I still have them and use them. They’re just damn good cables that are incredibly well-built with a low signal-to-noise ratio. That they’re lower capacitance didn’t really figure into my buying decision. I wanted good connectors and a high-quality cable to ensure I’d get as much signal from my mic into my DAW. In that case, it makes a huge difference. But low-cap? I dind’t give a shit then, and I still don’t give a shit.
The reason I’m circling back to this is that I needed some gigging cables. Amazingly enough, even with the severe lockdown rules in Silicon Valley, I’ve been back at church to do my weekly service. Before the lockdown, I was using these great Pig Hog XLRs, but I think someone swiped them or I may have left them at a retreat venue up in the mountains – oh well, consider it a donation to the retreat center. And now that I’m back at the church on a regular basis, I needed to invest in a new set.
I decided to try something a bit different from the Pig Hog cables and have gone with Hosa HMIC Pro cables with REAN connectors. I like them because the connectors are metal. I had a set of Monster cables, but their connectors are plastic. They break.
In my search, I harkened back to the great low-cap debate and looked around for discussions on it. Yup, it’s still raging…
Guitar Gear 
The problem with tests like the one you cited is they’re not done right. Connecting a coil in series with a cable and a signal source is a different scenario.
When a cable and therefore its capacitance are added to the circuit of a passive instrument, it needs to be addressed as a Zobel network, which is rarely the case on the tests I see around.
You’d be better off just adding an equivalent cap to the output jack (in parallel to the rest of the circuit), but for that you either need to know the real specs of the cable, or have a very sensitive capacitance meter, and then subtract the capacitance value of the actual cable you’re using to carry the test, which should of course be lower than the rest.
Something along these lines is what many guitarists do to the transmitting side of their wireless rigs to simulate their wired frequency response. Then, there’s those who do it on the receiving side, assuming it’s the same, but again, Zobel filters don’t work like that.
My point is, there’s a lot of misconception out there, and whether you can hear a difference or not comes down to many factors, one of which is indeed cable capacitance, but it’s a small fraction of the equation which will have varying impact on the whole thing depending on the rest.
Juan, great explanation! And you summed it up perfectly. Thanks for stopping by!