A highly textured [001]<100> Cu substrate was covered with a layer of Ag, approximately 100nm thick, by sputtering. It is shown that under specific conditions, the Ag layer grows epitaxial on the Cu substrate, and should provide a good template for the growths of a YBCO layer with a high fraction of low angle grain boundaries, as well as to ensure a sufficient chemical barrier between the substrate and the YBCO layer. This combination of substrate and buffer layer is compared with the traditional CeO2 ceramic buffer layer, deposited on [001]<100> Ni by PLD. Due to an increase in surface roughness of Ni and the difference in thermal expansion coefficients between Ni and CeO2, it is concluded that the Ag/Cu combination has superior qualities than the traditional combination of ceramic buffer layers (CeO2, YSZ, MgO) and Ni, used in the fabrication of YBCO coated conductors.