Cable Asylum: Re: DIY Cables vs. Commercial Cable by Thorsten

Hi,

I'm not familiar with the Amplification, but with the CD Player and Speakers as well as the cables. The Speakers are already somewhat tizzy sounding. The Nordost Speaker Cable is clearly "nordic cool" in sound and the Belden 89259 due to it's stranded nature and rather oxidised copper (the heat from teflon application) also tends to be rather tizzy and bright. Add to that the Marantz CD-Player in which the Analogue stage suffers from severe levels of TIM and you have a recipy for a system that unless the amplification is very laid back and "dark" sounding will be quite grating.

The first thing you can do is to add (as suggested below) the Digital Antidote, but I would even before that see modifications on the CDPlayers analogue stage as ESSENTIAL.

Also try some "Imager" foam rings from AIG on the FB-1 Tweeters. Try some Zobel RC Circuits (100 Ohm in series with 100nF) across the speakers terminals. Also, if you can/want to open up the Speaker, check if there is a resistor in the X-over that is parallel to the Tweeter, if not place one of around 22 - 33 Ohm Value directly across the tweeters connections.

Lastly, ANY tweeter that I have come across with these "phasemodifies" (the shield or whatever in front of the tweeter) sound excessively tizzy. Cutting this obstruction away has not yet failed to lead to major improvements in sound.

Try replacing the interconnect between CD-Player and Preamp but also between Pre and Amp with DNM or similar DIY. Maybe the best choice would be something like the Mapleshade Clearview IC's.

These are easy to DIY, just get thin copper magnet wire and twist two strands together tightly. I suggest a sparing but notable application of C37 Lackquer on the twisted pair. Instead of the very loose sleeving Mapleshade uses you can use PE or PTFE tubing of a diameter that fits well into the RCA Plugs and place the twisted pair in there.

For the SPeaker-Cable try changing the usual connection nordost uses to what I call "interleaved" connection, meaning one wire (+), the next one (-), the next one (+) instead of the two groups Nordost uses.

Ciao T