W hile gold is known to be desirable for its rarity and its ability to resist tarnishing, it is also used for audio and video connections because of its electrical properties. How does gold come to be used, and how does it enhance the audio signal? You can pay for your education, or you can pay for your ignorance.
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Interestingly, Kittel's Introduction to Solid State Physics, 5th Edition, p. 170 gives the electrical conductivities of silver (6.21) and copper (5.88) as higher than that for gold (4.55). Since silver and copper are definitely less expensive, why gold? All metals are conductors, but this is not the only significant electrical trait. What about the contact resistance, the resistance at a point of contact between two surfaces? The CRC Handbook of Chemistry & Physics, 62nd Edition, page F-22 indicates no significant differences in the hardnesses of copper, silver, and gold. It is evidently the same characteristic of gold which makes it appealing for jewelry that is responsible for its use as a contact metal. Namely, gold resists tarnish, which means that it doesn't have the insulating oxide layer other metals have on their surface. So how does reduced contact resistance improve bass response for audio signals, if at all?
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Consider the following illustration: Imagine two countries between which travel is prohibited. Also imagine that to facilitate transactions between them, they have agreed to jointly build a warehouse on the border between them. Half of the warehouse is on one side of the border, and the other half is on the other side, with a wall along the borderline to divide the warehouse in two. Imagine that they each can transfer boxes to their side of the warehouse through a door on their side. For every box brought into the warehouse on one side, a box is taken out of the other side, and vice versa. In this illustration, trading can occur as if there were no wall as long as it goes back and forth (not in one direction only). Similarly, electrical signals can pass through a barrier as long as they go back and forth. Bass in audio is like a very large shipment of boxes, and gets cut off. Contact resistance is the unwillingness of people to build big enough warehouses for larger trading shipments.
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