Cable Asylum: Reality strikes VERY HARD....... by Thorsten

Hi,

Now, I do not wish to spoil any enjoyment of very expensive cables for anyone, but I think we have to face some facts here, lets put them into context....

> both companies' cables are made from similar wire..that of solid
> 99.999999 Oxygen Free Copper.

Truth be told, and having worked for a good while peripherally in metallurgy, I SERIOUSLY doubt that ANY form of wire drawn drom ABSOLUTELY PURE METAL (not that such exists - just try buying a sample of genine 4 nines [99.9999%] silver or copper for laboratory purposes and read the handling instructions that prescribe handling ONLY and EXPLICITLY within a chemically inert gas atmosphrere like pure nitrogen) can get six nines of ANY metal, never mind copper.

Due to the affinity copper shows to oxygen, the industry defines HCOFC (High Conductivity Oxygen Free Copper) as 99.97% Copper. This can be guaranteed drawing wire in normal air. The surface will be slightly more oxidised,the center less. Silver is more inert, so I will accept the ready, reasonably priced availability of two nines silver, but copper (or Iron) - NEVER. Even two nines silver wire made RELIABLY and on an industrial scale would in my relative laymans view likely require drawing the wire in a chemically inert protective atmosphere and immediate annalealing AND coating against atmospheric contaminats to ensure even a two nines (99.99% purity) rating under industrial conditions.

Now I'm not calling any company claiming higher purity liers, but I would like to see some form of aknowlegned testing to substantiate ANY claims of higher than discussed purities.

BTW, metal purity has less to do with the sound than the X-Tal structure, but lets not go there.

> the Nordost has 78u silver coating,polished,the HMS with 70u
> silver coating,polished.

Blahr blahr blahr. All highly intreaguing if you slink off to the gents with the spec sheet of your Amp (I rather take FHM Mag with Columbias 2nd finest X-Port). I'll save myself further comments on all other technical claims, 'cause the proof of any pudding is not in the ingredients, but in the eating.

> all ics were rca/rca terminated.

While Terminated is a not exactly inaccurate term, I think crippled would be more adequate to the purpose, but lets not go there.

> the CDs chosen for evaluation purposes

CD'S!!!???? You GOT TO BE JOKING.

> ...i don't think i have had more fun in a long time...

Try something with three letters staring with an S and ending on X....

> this was truely a pleasure....reason,these are systems without
> any obvious weakness,imo,with my system (see below).

This I can live with, as I count, despite severe personal problems with their sonic presentation both NO (very recent repeated listening) and HMS (based on listening many years ago) among the REAL cable companies (grudingly I'll even let Kimber in there), as opposed to scalpers. Others are (grudgingly) JPS, (happily) DNM, Townsend (unwillingly), Synergistic (barely but for the active shielding) and Tara. Any ommisions are either due to a lack of personal experience (in case of the really esotheric stuff) or due to massive performance failure.

Lacking recent HMS exposure and any exposure to the top line NO stuff I have to keep relatively quiet in the context, but without undue disrespect, even near 100% Air dielectric cables improve with biased screens to such a degree that (IMHO) a HMS cable with biased screen as interconnect may very well make obsolte anything else around now. But luckily, some tricks are too hard for "real" manufacturers after all.

> both of these cable systems are amoung a handfull that can be
> called 'the best of the best',imo.the surprise here is that the
> HMS system performed equally,in every way,to the valhalla
> system,and does so at a price more affordable to most
> audiophiles.

Not to make bones here. The HMS has a much higher content of materiel and engineering and is IMNSHO severely overpriced, I shall not comment on the rest. The current cable industry has very much lost the plot. In most application a truely 600 Ohm terminated transformer balanced connection (please note the qualifications) using the cheapest starquad PVC insulated multistranded oxidised copper microphone cable will give a performance equal or better to many a massively expensive RCA connections. Not that such a connection would not benefit from better cabeling, it's just so superior to start with....

There is no reason not to apply what is in essence a balanced system with a screen and groundfault/noise current return seperate from the signal circuit to RCA connectiosn, other than the need for a seperated out chassis connection on the cable (pin1 on XLR's).

> CALLOWAY'S ASSOCIATED EQUIPTMENT

Interresting system. Not one I would enjoy, BWTFDIK..... BTW, do you have any ANALOGUE sources?

Ciao T