hifible
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dimanche 5 juin 2022
Naim Powerline
mardi 1 février 2022
Cardas Clear Beyond and Clear Reflection power
Cardas again! What a strange thing for me. I have never listened for a very long time Cardas cables. My listening experience with Cardas stopped at the time of Golden Reference. Now, after many years I can appreciate what evolution does.
I have already said that in the past I was not really a Cardas fan. Not because they were not good cables, they always have been good, but I felt they were more like fixing cables. For most systems it was a good thing, but when you were putting togheter components that were blending well togheter, I have found Cardas cables were retaining informations, dynamic and rytmic abilities.
You know how it is, most of us are only partially intelligent. We have an experience in time and we project it in the future with a forever stamp on it. It is for this stupid reason that I was not listening to Cardas cables. Even though I have to admit, I have herd few times systems sounding extremely well with a complete Cardas set up. But they had to be completely Cardas cabled.
Now after many years I have to say that Cardas sound has changed, and these changements were all positive. I think now Cardas sound can be more universally appealing.
Let's start with the Reflection. Reflection sound is fluid and slightly raw at the same time. It is a strange feeling! I think it is a question of microinformation. It is not the quitest cable, but within this not complete quiteness and black background it gives a kind of "educated freedom".
This cable is also rithmically capable. In the absolute scale I can only say it is slightly dynamically restricted and the bass is...not the strongest point, but well blended with everything else. I guess if the bass was different it would not sound this fluid any more and maybe it will be more heavy handed and this last thing is something I really dislike. It is similar soundind to the old Golden reference power, but more fluid, less coarse and less upfront.
The Clear Beyond sounds very different.
The first thing we notice are actually two: the dynamic window is more open and its silence is deeper, much deeper.
These two attributes makes for a less propulsive sound and more space for everything to happen. But it gives also the impression to slight alter the time, not the timing! You get the feeling timeis slightly expanded, that music is less constrained. It is a faster then the Reflection but it seams slower for this time thing. A little like a professional F1 driver against a very good driver. When we see the good driver in the circuit we think he goes very fast, its driving comes out as aggressive. Then you see the F1 driver in the same circuit with the same car. It seams he goes slower, that he has more time to express his skills, and his controll over the car and the circuit, he floats, everything is smooth, no compensation in the trajectories, it seams the car goes on invisible rails. At the end this apparent slower perception will be time recorded as a much faster lap!
This is the thing that happens with the Beyond.
One thing that I was absolutely not prepared for was to realise that Cardas Reflection does not blend that well with Clear Beyond. In the past I could have mixed every Cardas and they would have mixed well togheter. The Reflection power blend perfectly with Reflection interconnect and loudspeaker cable, but not so with Clear interconnect. And the opposite is also true.
But the Beyond is a more universal cable then the Reflection. It blended well also with a Naim NAC A5 speaker cables that is very difficult to pair with almost anything. The Beyond is a cable that easily tend to disappear. This is an excellent thing, but if your system has been covered by some pushing from cables to compensate a laziness or whatever adding the Beyond will make it sound the component connected how it should. This is how thing should be. But at the end the result it is going to be less "involving" you are going to think it is the cable while it is not. I have tried many combination and this was clearly shown. For this reason I think the best way to assemble a system is to have very neutral cables and then at the end matching the components. But most of us already have components so we try to get what works best with them in our listening room.
I have the impression that when you go Clear you should get everything in the Clear range. And that the Clear range blends well with other brands too. This is because Clear range is more neutral and leaves very litle signature on its own.
The Reflection is beautiful, but its beauty is more delicate, you have to respect it more, you have to put it in a more sympathetic context. But if you already have a Reflection somewhere, go and "reflect" everything else and you will be an happy guy! The ending result is extremely balanced.
Except for one thing. Don't put a Reflection feeding your power strip feeding other Cardas cables. The sound will suffer. Don't ask me why...
dimanche 2 janvier 2022
Cable confrontation: Naim NAC A5 VS Straight Wire Virtuoso H
Whatch it on you tube and you will have the subtitle to know which cable you are listening to.
vendredi 30 juillet 2021
Cardas Clear Beyond Phono cable
This is such an expensive cable! Yes, but who is going to buy it? Surely no uf you have a $1000 tonearm.
But, for the lucky ones that can own a reference tonearm, is such a cable worthed?
I will put it simple: it is not only worthed but it is a bargain! There are many phono cables in this price range and above, and one thing is sure the Clear Beyond surely belongs to the range above its price.
The most beautiful thing about this cable is its coesive easiness with everything. Everything is expressed without struggle or too much fluidity that can be boring even if at times seducing.
The one thing that is really Beyond is its silence. It does not pick up any noise and it does not have any noise from its own. Just compare it with any other cable and you will easily realise it. There is also no trace of metal conductur signature. You cannot guess either it is silver or copper or whatever.
Its transparency is exceptionally good as its soundstage. But every detail is perfectly integrated in the music message. This is a very uncommon thing to achieve. Generally when you have a very detailed cable, it makes the details sounding like in another dimension in time that is different from the music.
Also their nature can appear to be from another happening. It is difficult to explain, but it is for this reason that details can be too much of a good thing and harsh. It is like a frequency get separated from the whole message. The Clear Beyond achieve the rare thing of being very detailed and musical at the same time as no other cable I have tried so far can.
And it is fast without being dry. And here again the beyond gets "beyond" another paradox in hifi reproduction. When a cable is fast generally is short in reproducing notes decays. And also feels it simplify the musical message somehow. This generally tends the rithm of the music to be perceived more easily. But it can sound a little dry. The Clear Beyond allow a beautifull decay being fast at the same time and never letting the tempo in the second seat. Maybe it is a question of ultimate time control or maybe it is a question of not letting the signal being polluted by noises or by any kind of distortions. Anyway this managing of tempo (PRAT) and decays is unique among cables. Expecially if we add that the reproduction of depth is magnificent. The reproduction of depth most of the times does not go hand in hand with good ritmic capabilities in hifi staff.
All these characteristics allows the instruments timbres to be fully develloped, and also the bad recording to sound bad, but not as bad as with other top cables. Because there is more of everything.
And then its bass... Deep, controlled, fast but breathing at the same time. The bass has space to breath with this cable. The best reproduction of bass of every phono cable I have ever listened to.
And I guess every of all these most of the time reciprocatly exclusive factors brings at the last for me inesplicable characteristic: this cable has wamth. Most of the times this feeling is given by a curtain effects on the high frequencies, or a slightly fattening of the mid bass region. But in the Clear Beyond the high frequencies are extremely well extended and the mid bass region is the best of any other cable I have tried. I feel it achieve this characteristic avoiding faulse harshness and being true transparent. I guess the true transparency allows timbres to be beautifully portraied and the lack of distortions, even the pleasents ones, togheter with the true transparency brings this wamth out. For this reason I will say it is a different kind of warmth of which we audiophiles are used to. It is a kind of natural warmth, results of lack of intrusion of "bad" things.
This was one of the easiest review for me.
I have listened to more expensive phono cables that can do something better then the Clear Beyond does, or at least we are more readily aware of these advantages, maybe because umbalanced from the integrity of their total musical portray, but these "betters" were always less important in comparison of the "betters" the Beyond is capable of. The Beyond generally did better were music count the most.
Without any doubt one of the best cables ever built.
An absolute masterpiece.
I truly compliment Mr. Cardas for this achievement.
PS: if the Clear Beyond interconnects are of this same level, it would be a very bad thing for my economic situation... but I am too tempted to try them out. Maybe I will do like Ulysses or Odysseus, with the syrens. I will listen to them with my bank access guarded by my wife and I will tell her not to be mooved by any of my attempts to convince her to allow me access to money or credit.
mercredi 24 février 2021
Cardas Clear Reflection Interconnect - Get it and forget it
I have always found Cardas cable good, but on prolonged listening I have always felt they were not… enough. Musicality was there, but either I have found them to be too dense or too slow or missing in openess. But I am talking about old Cardas cables. Not even the very classic like Golden Reference and before it the Golden Cross were totally of my liking. I said it again: not totally of my liking. Since I had friends who absolutely loved the Golden Cross and the Golden reference. But despite this, all the time I was listening to a sistem all cabled with Cardas… I just listened to the music. So I have thought they were just balancing each other. But you know how we are : we like changing cables, mixing brands and so on. In the past with Cardas cables this was not a too good idea. It is true that most of cable brands shine when working with same family cables, but some were allowing better then others to change one cable here and another there easier then Cardas cables.
But with the Clear line this changed.
I have always wanted to try the Clear Refelction since they affirm is an improved version of the Golden Reference. And I know the Golden Reference very well. I have sold it many times when I was in the hifi bussiness and I also had it for some time.
I really didn’t know what to aspect from this cable, and I was expecially curious how it would blend with other makers cables.
When I have received it everything looked familiar. The same minimalistic plastic bag. The same smell. Yes there was a special smell on the Golden Reference, and I found it in the Clear reflection.
I cooked it for few days and I started my listening session replacing my installed cable between my passive preamp and my amplifier. I know in this position I like very few cables. I know that passive preamplifier makes things more difficult so I have started from here.
As soon as the first seconds of the music started playing I got one strong feeling : everything it is how it should. Not too much not too less of anything. A balance that does not allow you to appreciate something in particular neither feeling something is not that right. This is extremely rare for me to happen. Most of the time, for the good ones, I have a feeling that tells me that something is so good and that same something is fooling me and in few days it is going to bother me. And this is what generally happen after a delay that goes from a week to a month at the most.
Days went on and I started to putting words and thoughts to what I was listening.
The various elements music is commposed of are blended in an almost perfect balance. I say almost just becaus I don't think perfection exsists. This means the music message makes sense all the time. You are not going to appreciate rithm or instrumental localisation, or timbre and then when you search for something else you feel it is a weak point. You allow yourself to be less critical, and this is a great thing for us that are passionate about sound reproduction! We found ourselves too often to jump and focus on a weakness and this spoils our listening pleasure. This cable gives you the permission to just listen.
This is rare. Very rare. And I think this is Cardas Clear reflection strongest asset.
If I have to decompose the sound of it I would say the high frequency are extremely well rendered. They develop with fluidity and ease and at the same time the attack of the notes is not diminished. In a word: elegant.
I have to say that I am extremely sensitive to one thing: no matter how good a cable is, no matter how beautifull it reproduces acousticals landscapes, localizes instruments and so on, if I feel the rytmic part is weighted, I say this when you have the sensation that it does not come easy, I cannot stay with it too long. When the rithm is followed, like a kind of tedius work instead of a natural flow, I get frustrated in my listening sessions.
With previous Cardas I always felt this timing thing was not as fluid as it should be. The Clear reflection do it in a way I don't have any frustation at all.
As we go in others specific parts the organisation of the different instuments is very good, you can feel they are separate and playing at the same time togheter and the depth is rendered much better then most cables.
The medium zone is a beauty. Fluid, saturated withoud being heavy, and very expressive. The only part that I could say not too good thing about is the bass. Yes, the bass is there but it is not that expressive, not that propulsive. But it is perfectly blended with the rest. I feel that if it was different and I dare to say if it was of a different nature, it would have spoiled the nice blending it has with the rest. But you notice it only in a direct comparison with more expensive cables that, to tell you the truth at the end don't have the same level of musical enjoyment the Reflection is able to convey.
This was not an easy session for me, not for the listening part, but for the critic part. I almost felt guilty about criticizing it, so honest, so fluid, so pleasurable, so without annoying characteristics this cable is.
The Clear Refleftion is extremely well made, extremely well balanced and most of all extremely musical. Another thing is that it is a cable that most people will like. I have listened to it with a friend that has a taste for music reproduction that is opposite to mine and he like it to!
I forgot to say: I have done most of my listening test without changing other cables around, and sometimes changing them but not putting other Cardas around, and I found this cable to be an easy match with anything if components are put togheter in an harmonius way. Then I have started putting some of its family arouund, Clear Reflection power cable, then I have put on the Clear reflection loudpseaker cable. The result is globally better, but not something you have to. It is like its qualities are able to be expressed in an even easier way.
Living with this cable is easy and pleasurable or an easy pleasure. Get it and forget it!
One thing: I have red a review somewhere where the author found that this cable is very calm. Yes it can sometimes sound this way depending on the power cord the components is linking is fed. With the Reflection power cord it is not very calm, it is just very balanced not too rushed not too calm. Actually I feel it is slightly on being fast. But it is true that with not the right power cord it can sound too calm. This is a very interesting thing that I think happens with many other cables. For example with Wireworld Gold Platinum or Platinum with the wrong power cord they can sound a little pushy on the high medium frequencies. But they are not! With cables that are not compressed and that gives you a faulse sense of speed this happens all the time. It is true that if you don't have few cables to play around with, when you buy a cable that is not dynamically compressed or that is very linear, you could end up with a too slow or a too much medium high frequencies showed in your system. If you are not sure about how really is your system, and nobody can be sure except the ones that have tried many combinations, I think it is better to buy lower range cables from good cables companies, like Cardas or Wireworld or the likes.
Weakness: it seams the Clear Reflection could be the perfect cable, but it is not. It would not make any sense for Cardas to make more expensive cables. Yes the Clear Reflection has its own weaknesses but are not the kind of being harsh and sometimes umpleasent to listen to. It never presents such downsides. Its downsides are of not being that open, even though is not closed, not having that dynamic freedom that you can have with other more expensive cables, but these last have to be very good ones. These minor sides appear only when things get real high in your hifi chain.
For example when I have put the Reflection between my preamps and amps combination and I had my turntable phono cable of good mid level, things were extremely enjoyable and no downside was exposed. When I have changed my phono cable with the Cardas Beyond this one let so much more informations to pass through (good informations) that the Reflection limits were showed. But with the lesser phono cable it was taming its few downsides making the combination a joy to listen to.
Considering this, I guess the Reflection is a cable that could be used in all the application when there is some little traces of bad things like not too much body, high frequencies slightly aggressive and so on, but these deficiencies have to be minor, since it is enough transparent to show when they are not that minor. It does not have downsides, just few limits that I would consider small only in an objective context. Considering its asking price it does not have any limit!
samedi 13 février 2021
Kuzma Stabi Ref 2 - the king of consistency (Long article. The sound at the end)
I wanted to have a new turntable. A turntable that I have always wanted to have, but that for economic reasons, what else, I had to wait for. So now, after few years of putting money away and renouncing to many things, I have got it! I have bought it to be one of my references. It is not a new design, it is sturdy, it is easy for the armboard to be changed so to fit with different tonearms. Perfect for me.
The turntable arrived in a cartoon box. I was surpriced that something of this weight, we are talking about 45kg of shipping weight, is shipped in a cartoon box. But it has been out for many years so they must know.
Fortunately the box was in perfect conditon. At the same time it is difficult to throw a box of 45kg all over the places...
I took out the parts to assemble it. The chassis base with the 4 suspension tower in perfect condition, or almost,since few small marks.
This is the base. I have put it in a levelled support.
Then I have taken out the subchassis, a nice and heavy block. Everything is nice and heavy.
And here things got bad.
In the subchassis there are 4 holes with a rod at a center of each that goes inside the supsension tower of the base.
The left holes were damnaged. One by a pretty big shock.
This one...
These are sign of a shock. These are signs of towwer scratching against the holes supposed to receive them. Since the subchassis has to be put into the base over the 4 towers, it is obvious somebody before me mounted it. He has lost control of it and the holes of the subchassis went out of the center of the chassis towers causing marks. But... no marks whatsoever in the towers...
Now we have only and only two possibility, at least in my point of view, I am not Leonardo da Vinci genius, and if there is another one please you that read, feel free to write it down in a message.
The first: somebody at kuzma assembled it, lost the control of the subchassis that got damnaged. He saw the damnage on the towers and he replaced them, just leaving parts with acceptable small damnages, that is not good anyway. But, he didn't check the subchassis out since he had to look under the subchassis and just replaced the towers that were in his sight.
When you have a shock between two components both must have marks! Here no, only the subchassis has marks, the corrispettive towers have no marks at all, only small acceptable marks just in the top of them caused by the rods. But not a scratch. Noo sliding marks, no impact marks. Why I say it must be happened at kuzma? I don't think there is another place where they have spares suspension towers on hands...
M. Kuzma, in one of our exchanges, said that he is not accepting my conclusion. And it is perfectly OK with me. Of course he has his right in doing so. He insists in a transport shock something like a flat shock.
That it was more of a shock during transport... and no signs on the tower? In a shock you have marks in the parts that shock togheter! Here the subchassis got shocked with apparently...no other parts.
So here my second conclusion: inside the box there must have been the visit of some creature with a cisel that did the marks in the subchassis, trying to mimik the impact of the suspension towers.
So I am not accepting M. Kuzma conclusion on my side. And this should be OK too since each one of us has the right to his own conclusion.
This signs on the subchassis must be said that don't impact the mechanical function of the turntable at all, so are more of an estetic issue.
But it does not matter what kind of problem you can have, it matters how it is solved. Problems can just happens, that's it.
I must say that at the end of few mails, M Kuzma proposed me to pack the turntable and to send it back to the factory to be either replaced or the parts to be replaced.
Even though I appreciate the gesture, that was offered very fast, I know companies that try their best to refuse to do it and are many, I was not keen on it. But for my personal reasons. My physical conditions is not that great, many back and cervical operations and metal plates and screws all over my body, so to put the turntable back in the box, to transport it, to wait for the other turntable to come, to unpack it, and so on, I have to ask the favour (payed favor) of being helped by somebody and it is not that nice to ask help many times and wait for it.
So I proposed M.Kuzma an easier solution for me: I would repair the turntable by myself, I have the tools and the experience to do it.
The easiest thing was for me to wait M.Kuzma to send the damnaged parts. At that moment I would at the same time replaced the new parts and demounted the damnaged part and sent them back to Kuzma.
This, for my deep regreet ,was not possible do. ! My only option was first to sent the damnaged parts to Kuzma, that needed to understand what happened, and then he would have sent me the new parts. So I will stay for I don't know how long, with a completely dessambled turntable with parts all over. And I have a wife and this can lead to some problems much worse then a turntable damnage. I had two ex wives I know what I am talking about.
Why M.Kuzma needed to understand what happende before sending me the new parts?
So I proposed not to have parts all over my place for a certain time, wife detest it, and buying this damnaged parts new, but at least at factory price. M.Kuzma did not accept my proposal. So it is better for me having a mess around for I don't know how long just because... I don't even know.
Things are not finished.
I have asked an armboard to be cut for my Moerch DP8 tonearm
The correct spindel to tonearm axe distance was communicated correctly to Kuzma French distributor, and it easy to find in the Moerch website
this distance is 212mm.
With a piece of paper I have just highlighted the space between the hole and the turntable spindle : 215mm
mardi 31 mars 2020
Wireworld Micro cables reference balanced digital Eclipse and Platinum Eclipse 8, or The Importance of Being Earnest.
I ended up being impressed by it. So I was expecting a lot more from its Platinum version,even though Wireworld affirms differences between these cables are mild, and... yes, I was expecting too much and Wireworld statement was right. The Platinum did everything the Eclipse did just a little better. The only thing that actually did that the Eclipse version could not do was portraying the colour of the space around the instruments. In the Eclipse version the space is very silent but has no colors. In every recording is very silent but is very the same. Not so in the Platinum version. This caracteristic brought to a strange phenomenon: the perceived, "immediate" contrast between instruments,was more evident with the Eclipse then with the Platinum. When the musical message is simpler it often happens. But the Platimun has better timbres, it has better layering, it is more relaxed, it is better focused, you have more things going on even though many of them are not musically essentials. So my conclusion in this very short review is that musically they are both on the same level. The emotion they can bring to the listener are more or less the same, but the Platimum gives you more information about something that sometimes can be nice to have. But even thought the Platinum is evidently mildly better then the Eclipse, the Eclipse is the king of balance. With the Eclipse after you get accustumed to it, you don't feel the need you would like something better, with the Platinum this does not happen. And this is not because the Eclipse is more musical and the Platinum does better the hifi tricks. As I said before both have the same degree of musicality. So you say it is better staying with the Eclipse...if you have both and you compare both this won't be possible since the Eclipse is mildly better so when you go back to the Eclipse you feel you have lost something. This something lost is most on the low spectrum. It is more developped in the Platinum and I guess it is for this reason that the Platinum caries more information about space.
Maybe there is a threshold that when reached you just need more of it and you don't even know why. The Platinum reach this treshold, the point when things start getting more real and gives you the desire to have more. The Eclipse does not reach this level of psycological contamination or push. It's just a good boy. It is very strange getting to this conclusion since the two cables are really very close if not for the more bass development of the Platinum and its more grounded sound. Even the resolution is extremely close.