LAT International

In some cases, cables make or break a system. Some cables can be quite idiosyncratic in that they can synergize wonderfully with some components while on others can sound no different than $1.79 patch cords from Radio Shack. Thankfully, some manufacturers have managed to design cables that work with a wide range of components. LAT International is one of those companies.

Despite not being a household name in the audiophile industry, LAT International has been around since 1989. While a lot of audiophiles are chasing the latest greatest cable technology as evidenced by the hundreds of cables on the Audiogon, LAT has been working on perfecting their designs. The owner has been around cable for a good chunk of his life. Before founding LAT International, Lou Tumolo spent nine years as Vice-president of Operations at Eastern International, a wire and cable manufacturing company which manufactured a large selection of various types of cable. While working there, using his technical background, he gained significant knowledge and experience in the design and manufacture of wire and cable.

As with many manufacturers in the audio industry, Lou’s passion has been in high-end audio. In 1989 he decided to take the plunge and go out on his own and establish a high-end audio wire and cable company where he could develop and test his pent-up ideas on developing top performing wire and cable. Lou said he had been very fortunate in that his products have developed a loyal following. LAT has sold a lot of cable in the past 17 years, but one will have a hard time finding LAT cable for sale on Audiogon; this scarcity is perhaps a testament to their value and performance.

LAT offers interconnects, speaker cables, power cables, tonearm cables and hook-up wire as well as a variety of contact cleaners, CD cleaners and treatments that I have used to excellent effect. LAT also offers a variety of terminations to their cables. Their custom connectors are milled from solid billet and not stamped from sheet metal. Unlike a large number of other cables companies who market their cables with each price point being in multiples of 100% regardless of additional costs, LAT’s prices reflect actual production costs instead of slick marketing. Their interconnects have 4 levels ranging from $99.00 to $339.00 per 1 meter pair for the IC-300. Five models of speaker cables, including, bi-wire models, are offered by LAT ranging from $280.00 (the $175.00 model is being discontinued) to $469.00 per 6 foot pair.