advertisement


Are there any online retailers who offer speaker cables to try at home ?

PhilCTTE

PhilCTTE

Senior mumbler
I have Nordost Red Dawn speaker cables currently. Focal Kanta 2 stereo and Kanta centre , Anthem MCA325 for LCR and a Primare SPA25 processor . I have a few adjustments to make with Dirac yet but it has a tendency to be a touch bright with some recordings. Generally love the beryllium tweeters for the lovely open top end.
So looking to try to home demo a variation from Audioquest , Atlas hyper range plus other recommendations.
Cheers
 
There maybe, but I wouldn’t recommend using different speaker cables as a tone control.
slight differences in speaker position, toe-in (or lack of) will make more difference to the tonal response than changing cables.
Plus, maybe some recordings are just a touch bright by nature anyway?
If you’re using Dirac, just try using it to cut the upper frequencies you find to be not to your taste.
I like the Audioquest cables, but I wouldn’t say they would add warmth to a bright sounding system.
Only my opinion.
 
Yes been playing about with toe in. Struggling with room size as seating position is just over 3.8 and width of room is 3.8 and on the one side a pillar.
 
I'd echo manicatel's comment here. Don't use cables as tone controls, it rarely leads to satisfaction IME. I think it more likely that the speakers are telling you something you might not want to know about the upstream components. Might be worth trying to get a loan of an alternative to the Anthem, see what happens. AV's not my thing, so I don't know what's out there, or at what price, but if Simaudio Moon have anything, I've heard it work well with Focal.
 
Less toe-in and a bit of Dirac experimentation would be my suggestion.
The Red Dawn is kinda expensive already isn’t it? To get something different would likely cost a lot of £££ & Im just not sure it would be cost effective or give you the results you’re hoping for.
I would always say a home demo is required before handing over serious £££ on cables, so if you do find a supplier willing to do try-before-you-buy, there’s nowt to lose I guess. Futureshop do a 60 day returns policy I think.
 
I'm curious to find out just how much the Nordost cables effect things. Not so much a tone control but perhaps a subtle change to body and top end as I have heard reports that people find Nordost to be thin sounding. I've always loved the openness of them but I've changed speakers 10 months ago processor 2 weeks ago.
 
manicatel said:
Less toe-in and a bit of Dirac experimentation would be my suggestion.
The Red Dawn is kinda expensive already isn’t it? To get something different would likely cost a lot of £££ & Im just not sure it would be cost effective or give you the results you’re hoping for.
I would always say a home demo is required before handing over serious £££ on cables, so if you do find a supplier willing to do try-before-you-buy, there’s nowt to lose I guess. Futureshop do a 60 day returns policy I think.
Click to expand...
I'll keep experimenting with toe-in but trying to maintain stereo imagery with width of room versus seating position.
Certainly will be trying Dirac again ..more reading required on this.
I would prefer a retailer who can loan a couple of sets .
 
PhilCTTE said:
I'm curious to find out just how much the Nordost cables effect things. Not so much a tone control but perhaps a subtle change to body and top end as I have heard reports that people find Nordost to be thin sounding. I've always loved the openness of them but I've changed speakers 10 months ago processor 2 weeks ago.
Click to expand...
Don't know how old your Red Dawn is, or whether it's the current generation, but while there's some truth in that description for Nordost of old, it's much less true nowadays. It'd be worth trying to get a listen to one of the Norse range, if you can stretch to it. They have the openness and free top-end, but more definition in the bass. I have some Blue Heaven around here, and I've used Frey, Heimdall 2 and, now, Tyr 2, and they all get better, but none of them is thin or bright at the top end. I started, years ago, with Valkyrja and I do see where people were coming from when they criticised Nordost back then, but the current generation are very different beasts and I'd expect the Blue Heaven/Red Dawn range to have also reaped the benefits of that development expertise.
 
PhilCTTE said:
I have Nordost Red Dawn speaker cables currently. Focal Kanta 2 stereo and Kanta centre , Anthem MCA325 for LCR and a Primare SPA25 processor . I have a few adjustments to make with Dirac yet but it has a tendency to be a touch bright with some recordings. Generally love the beryllium tweeters for the lovely open top end.
So looking to try to home demo a variation from Audioquest , Atlas hyper range plus other recommendations.
Cheers
Click to expand...

Go for Cardas cable for this. You;ll find their older Cardas Golden Cross and Golden Reference quite affordable these days, or if you want to move into their newer range, their Clear Reflection will be ideal.

I've never used their more budget offerings but they may as well have that similar smooth warm Cardas sound.

I played around with Dirac and speaker positions to no real result, put in a set of Clear Reflections and everything went peachy and its the longest I havent played around with my system now, its just perfect for me and the CR's were the icing on the cake.
 
Another cable brand well worth checking out, albeit not widely available, is Audiomica. Very, very coherent and communicative, and not stupidly expensive. If you can justify the cost of Red Dawn, Audiomica is worth seeking out.
 
Whaleblue said:
Is the elephant in the room in mentioning that Focal speakers are inherently on the bright (tilted up in the treble) side?
Click to expand...
Haha . First heard them on a 18k naim system and was blown away. Very revealing open sound.
Still waiting on John Westlake to provide streaming and dac ..please don't comment . Currently Roon via airplay into Prisma Primare SPA25. A big big step up from my Marantz SR8012
 
Try Van Damme or Mogami to get a feel for what your system is supposed to sound like. Aside from price, I quite like Red Dawn, but neutral it is not.
 
Russ Andrews - "give you a full 60 days to try our products at home, risk-free - and if you're not 100% satisfied with the improvements, you can send them back for a full refund."

I don't know if this extends to trying out multiples or not.
 
I found Audioquest 33/44/88 to be excellent – also to tame excessive treble. And I second the recommendation for futureshop, they also offer
a 96hr burn-in-service for nada. Excellent telephone service as well if you are undecided about what is what.
 
Manufacturers should add tone controls again, especially of the tilt variation.
Have you measured the room? Fill it with stuff first.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.


advertisement


Back
Top