Why can you trust Which Hi-Fi?
Our team of experts reviews products in dedicated testing rooms, to help you make the best choice for your budget. Find out more about how we test.
There are few things we write about that offend a portion of them What is Hi-Fi?read more like cable reviews. For many of these readers, the idea of spending more than the minimum makes no sense as long as the cable meets the required impedance and current carrying requirements. If they are happy with the sound of their system, we see no reason to disagree.
However, in our experience, the quality of the conductor and dielectric, as well as the construction, make a significant difference in how the cable performs. With this in mind, Merlin Cables took a hard look at the affordable speaker cable market and came up with the Tarantula: an understated but carefully considered speaker cable designed to offer best-in-class performance for the money.
Build & draw
Of course, cables are passive components in a hi-fi system. They can’t improve the music signal like that, they make it worse. With a view to reducing this degradation, Merlin specified the Tarantula with a pair of 99.99% pure, 3.5mm OFC (Oxygen-Free Copper) conductors and wrapped them in XLPE (cross-linked polyethylene) to reduce signal loss compared to the PVC used by other methods.
The speaker cables are also responsible for creating structural noise, so it’s good to see that Merlin has taken this seriously and specified the use of cotton and other natural fibers to dampen any such movement.
A smart and soft pearl white coat grips it everywhere, and means the Tarantula is soft enough to fit into corners or curl up behind an equipment rack. A thin cable, less than 9mm in diameter.
Merlin Tarantula tech details
Building 2 x 3.5mm conductors
Operator items 99.99% pure oxygen-free copper
Dielectric XLPE (cross-linked polyethylene)
Although it is possible to use a ‘wireless’ cable, we would always recommend suitable plugs for convenience and long-term stability reasons. Whether you’re using Merlin’s Elite Reference 4mm ‘banana’ or spade terminals, butt-welded, is often the preferred method over soldered-to-fit joints.
The rising cost of raw materials has forced manufacturers to raise their prices in recent years, so Tarantula’s £16/m (about $22 / AU$31 a metre) may seem a little steep for a first-rate cable. But Merlin is adamant that the quality and specification available here is often expensive.
We use a 5m pair of Tarantula cable for two systems. Our main source is Naim’s ND555/555 PS DR music stream, and we use a cable with both an Arcam A5+ integrated amplifier and KEF LS50 Meta standmounts and our reference Burmester 088/911 MkIII pre/power to the ATSCM50 speakers.
Our flagship cable is the Award-winning Chord Company Rumor X speaker cable, which retails at £20 (approx $27/AU$48) a metre.
The sound
Straight from the box, the Merlin cable feels stiff and brittle. That calms down after a few days of use to reveal balanced and detailed performance. The Tarantula is a slightly underpowered player that doesn’t sample the music signal in any obvious way.
As we listen to Prokofiev’s Romeo and Julietregardless of the program we get a lot of detail and an impressive sense of calm. Although there is a good level of finesse on offer, the Merlin doesn’t cut it for us when it comes to delivering dynamic melodies or conveying power in certain sections of the piece.
We hear scale and authority when the music demands it, but also satisfying instrumentation and a tonal balance as close to neutral as we’ve encountered at this price. The good news continues when we listen to Jill Scott’s Beautiful Humanwhere our systems sound clean and pure without turning to harshness. There is a similar stiffness to their presentations and a limited handling of complex rhythms.
When we swapped out the Chord Company Rumor X speaker cable for the Merlin Tarantula, our systems certainly sounded impressive and punchy. The Chord Cable provides Scott’s distinctive voice with greater verve and a more dynamic touch, but it also sounds a little slower and can’t convey the texture of vocals and backing instruments.
Considering the Merlin is cheaper than the Chord, we can say that’s a job well done.
The decision
Tarantula ticks all the boxes in our opinion. While it’s not cheap, it’s still reasonably priced and has the kind of sonic characteristics that will easily fit into a wide variety of applications.
Add convincing build quality to the equation, and it looks like the Merlin has a winner on its hands.
Update published: 2 April 2026
POINTS
- The sound 5
- Build it 5
- Compatibility 5
MORE:
Read our review of Chord Company Rumor X
And think about Audioquest Rocket 11
The best speaker cables: Our 4 experts choose each budget