Cable Reviews

Let me take you by the hand, and together we'll jump off an audio cliff. I promise a soft landing, though there might be some turbulence on the way down.

Ted Denney at Synergistic Research has come a very long way in a very short time. In the past I've enjoyed and commented on his Resolution Reference interconnect and speaker cable. Great stuff, but I'm picky. Then, not too long ago, boxes of his new, top-of-the-line Designers' Reference interconnect began raining down upon us (liveried, I might add, in an extremely vivid shade of green!).

Nirvana Audio's cables have long been fixtures in my audio system: first the SL interconnects and speaker cables, and, after their debut in 1998, the S-X Ltd. interconnect. In 2002, after a long development process, designer Stephen Creamer introduced the companion S-X Ltd. speaker cable ($2780/2.5m pair, add $50/pair for biwire configuration). He explored a wide range of options, including dramatically different structures and materials, but always returned to the elements he'd used before—and ended up with a design that combined elements of his two existing speaker cables, the SL and the entry-level Royale. At its core, the S-X Ltd. has the Royale's two conductors, each a symmetrical Litz element consisting of 285 isolated strands of high-purity copper of several different gauges. In the S-X Ltd., the conductors are spaced slightly apart to minimize capacitance, wound into a twisted pair, and wrapped in FEP insulation.

The possible approaches to any technical problem range from trial and error to first-principles physics. Then there's the "purist" approach—the simplest, most direct way to meet the challenge. Often, the purist approach doesn't pan out because of such phrases as "we need 60 tons of molten gold" or "can we cool the entire building to absolute zero?" But in the world of high-end cables, the purist approach is viable, and is exactly where you find Jeffrey Smith.

Introduced in 2003, Siltech's G5 Classic series of cables evolved from their highly regarded Generation 3. The G3 series introduced a new metallurgy in which small amounts of gold were incorporated into the silver used as conductors. The G5 Classics use a proprietary geometry called X-balanced Micro Technology, which, according to Siltech, makes the G5s the quietest cables, with the lowest distortion, to be found. Kapton, Peek, and Teflon insulation is used, and the cables are designed to minimize the pickup of RF and EM interference, with low inductance, low capacitance, and low resistance as design goals.

One of the highlights of any Consumer Electronics Show, I have found, is Nordost Corporation's demonstration of their cables. Using a relatively modest system and non-audiophile source material, they run through a simple, straightforward sequence, climbing up through their product line, culminating with their new, just-introduced model. At each step, the system sounds distinctly better—clearer, cleaner, with more body and tonal purity—than with the previous model. There's no hype, artifice, or magic, just a clear demonstration of the progress that Nordost is making as they refine their designs.