This friend of mine tried every high cables available, almost. All of them were heavily advertised and promoted, high prices too. I turned to boutique brands. A painful revelation, my first cord wasn't good enough, ouch! The first cord is of paramount of importance, the chain reaction shows its shortcoming.
I turned to google search for my cord, plenty of research. Wired the payment and patiently waiting for its arrival. The new cord has the utmost emphasis on shielding, the maker couldn't stop stressing how non-shielding weighting down the performance. Judging by his plug and IEC AC power connector selection, I believe that he's crazy as in an audiophile context. Because audiophiles listen while engineers read specs, take for example the earlier German audio products, you know it lacks musicality. The common "engineer" approach is getting the best parts available and assembling them together, and tada, you got the best product. Present nice measurements and technical white paper, tada. Me say, thank very much, see you next time.
Suffice to say, there are engineer family audiophiles who "worship" technologies, and ended up with a sound, let's just say not living up to the asking price. In engineering school of thought, there is no bad engineering but whether for the betterment or not, the user is the better judge. Stuck up is the what it is, most engineers know what is good for you. They simply know. Guess what, even the Swiss audio products too never show many measurements.
My cord finally arrived, no garden hose, no fancy packaging either. It ain't cheap, the maker knows exactly how much his cord worth (in sound). My friend smirked, "Are you nut? It costs almost an equipment." I know. Money coming out from my pocket, I sure feel the pain. The pain will go away. We must always tackle the weakest link, mustn't we?
Specifically stated, it is meant for 10A application ha. Not ideal for power amp. Ok, CD player it is. Run for 200 hours before I pen down my notes. First note, the silent background caught my attention without pawning away the details, some say the notorious infinitesimal electrical buzz. Ahem, you got my attention now. I am not sure if it was me, the sound gets purer. Dense and solid.
Whew, the soundstage grows in spatial volume! The separation too is corresponding to the expansion. This cord starts to worth its money, not bad eh? And for goodness sake, this is the second model from the bottom. How on earth would the top model get to sound? Not that my present cord is of any inferior but it loses a little of every single department, and it becomes significant when all add up. Particularly in this soundstage, the new cord is miles ahead of my present cord. We know that the lateral and height expansion are of herculean task and yet highly desirable. Now, let's brush aside the idea of raising the height of speakers, because doing so will cause the bass to lose its splendidity or you may add a sub to compensate the bass. How do you get the enormous soundstage? SAVR doesn't give you that. Schumann Resonator doesn't give you that either. Panoramic soundstage is a very attractive proposition, a virtue to die for for the sound has leaped out from the box. Everybody loves big sound. Big sound without big room, that's really something special.
The third virtue, I must give that to the bass control. Seriously, the bass was not as plumptious but the bass has enough volume and great tenacity to discern double bass notes. These translate to texture. Other cords may have overdo the double bass that bring about dull and cloudy notes. I'm not sure if this is system dependent, my bass nose dives more effortlessly without a hint of reluctance. As such, the music maintain the groovy-ness minus the grouchiness. The fact is I don't really care much for drum reproduction because the tendency of wanting a bigger bass could have screwed the overall balance of sound, the audio commandment you should abide. I must have my system must be able to show forth the double bass notes truthfully.
Have I unlocked an impasse? I like think I did. With the new cord, I'm not missing FMR. I could not have enough of the transparency. As a tone control cord, it is not. What it really matter is it does not stand in the way of the music, cheer! Worth very penny.
