Open Door
26-02-2019, 21:33
Hope in the right section. A revelation for me May be for others too.
I’ve not tried the cotton, silk or oil type dialectic DIY cables that are making a resurgence these days. Seems there are plenty about now to choose from, often with one having to make their own twist as these are sold in single runs. I’ve always gone with the Teflon or other plastic options, be it off the real or pre-terminated.
There is so much hype around cables. Could a DIY option that saves that much cash be worth it? Well Parts Connexion in Canada (PcX) have just brought one out for the lazier DIY’er like me. They worked with Jupiter to bring a cable in twin form and pre-weaved. So all one needs is plugs and some basic tools and your off. I bought some to try.
Below are some photos of my process – very easy to work with. Light in weight and flexible – could this be bad I thought? But the cotton covers feel different and better to the touch than man made materials.
PcX’s blub is (copied and paste from their website): ‘’CONNEX The NATURAL ONE Interconnect Cable (Balanced, Shielded, Tinned Copper Cotton Conductors)
Given the amazing success with the various natural fiber dielectric/copper stranded hook-up wires we sell, PcX embarked on a project to design and manufacture an easy to assemble, pre-configured Interconnect Cable, using these same materials. Emulating the time consuming hand-assembled interconnect recipe we developed over the last several years, PcX spec’d a basic formula, then worked with Chris Young (of JUPITER) to refine it into a manufacturable product - CONNEX’s first “natural fiber dielectric” Interconnect Cable – The NATURAL ONE !
• 2 x 22 awg conductors (colour coded)
• Twisted winding geometry
• Stranded dead soft annealed copper strands (7/30awg), tin-plated
• Each conductor, double insulated with a cotton braid as the dielectric
• 36awg tinned copper braided shield (to be connected when a shielded or balanced XLR cable is needed)
• Rayon/Nylon weaved outer jacket (black with red tracer)’’
Link: https://www.partsconnexion.com/CONNEXI-85162.html
What was the audible result? Some say cables make no difference, well if that were true, then with for the cost of this cable you can’t lose . I am a believer that cables can make a difference, not always an improvement. I know of dealers you after selling a system will bring various types or brands of cable to the install set up to tune the system to the customer’s liking in their room – some dealers.
So I piped in two sets of ‘The Natural One’ from PcX. Once set from my dac to preamp and an XLR from the pre to power amp. At 1st the presentation was warmer, richer and tonally a tad darker than the cables I was using before and was set on keeping. I thought that maybe some transparency was lost but the cable was for sure more ‘musical’ and not ‘hifi’ or polished in presentation. I liked what I heard but it was not preferred.
So I left them to burn in for a few days before critically listening. I then went through some favourite albums and loved what I was hearing. Music was easy to listen too, but that is also what I thought of my system in general. Lots of texture and great on strings. Depth was deep but was it always that way? Ones hifi memory can be dangerous or am I hearing what I want to hear?
I had no expectations of what to get from such a cable having not heard a similar type before. However, I do like the sound a tin-plated copper power cable brings to the party – was this the case again? (Don’t judge me!).
Well, after some time I thought I’d swap out the cables as quick as I could and put in my old ones. Now I was really expecting my old cables to be better – I had convinced myself of that. I was expecting an uplift in transparency particularly. But I was shocked! ‘The Natural’ was better to my utter surprise. After some listening, I could not wait to put ‘The Natural’s’ back in. They brought a richer and smoother tone, more musicality and great sound stage depth. It does sound different – which I preferred in my system. That may not be the case for everyone.
The end result is I’m buying more to try elsewhere in my system as well as to look closer at the wider options in other styles of this sort of cable.
DIY and ‘The Natural’ cable from PcX and Jupiter are a winner in my books. Recommend a try and a toe dipping in such cable forms – not what I was expecting :)[/SIZE]
http://i65.tinypic.com/fyir1c.jpg
http://i64.tinypic.com/14tsrwg.jpg
http://i67.tinypic.com/29glbvc.jpg
http://i68.tinypic.com/2d98qs6.jpg
http://i67.tinypic.com/1zr293n.jpg
I’ve not tried the cotton, silk or oil type dialectic DIY cables that are making a resurgence these days. Seems there are plenty about now to choose from, often with one having to make their own twist as these are sold in single runs. I’ve always gone with the Teflon or other plastic options, be it off the real or pre-terminated.
There is so much hype around cables. Could a DIY option that saves that much cash be worth it? Well Parts Connexion in Canada (PcX) have just brought one out for the lazier DIY’er like me. They worked with Jupiter to bring a cable in twin form and pre-weaved. So all one needs is plugs and some basic tools and your off. I bought some to try.
Below are some photos of my process – very easy to work with. Light in weight and flexible – could this be bad I thought? But the cotton covers feel different and better to the touch than man made materials.
PcX’s blub is (copied and paste from their website): ‘’CONNEX The NATURAL ONE Interconnect Cable (Balanced, Shielded, Tinned Copper Cotton Conductors)
Given the amazing success with the various natural fiber dielectric/copper stranded hook-up wires we sell, PcX embarked on a project to design and manufacture an easy to assemble, pre-configured Interconnect Cable, using these same materials. Emulating the time consuming hand-assembled interconnect recipe we developed over the last several years, PcX spec’d a basic formula, then worked with Chris Young (of JUPITER) to refine it into a manufacturable product - CONNEX’s first “natural fiber dielectric” Interconnect Cable – The NATURAL ONE !
• 2 x 22 awg conductors (colour coded)
• Twisted winding geometry
• Stranded dead soft annealed copper strands (7/30awg), tin-plated
• Each conductor, double insulated with a cotton braid as the dielectric
• 36awg tinned copper braided shield (to be connected when a shielded or balanced XLR cable is needed)
• Rayon/Nylon weaved outer jacket (black with red tracer)’’
Link: https://www.partsconnexion.com/CONNEXI-85162.html
What was the audible result? Some say cables make no difference, well if that were true, then with for the cost of this cable you can’t lose . I am a believer that cables can make a difference, not always an improvement. I know of dealers you after selling a system will bring various types or brands of cable to the install set up to tune the system to the customer’s liking in their room – some dealers.
So I piped in two sets of ‘The Natural One’ from PcX. Once set from my dac to preamp and an XLR from the pre to power amp. At 1st the presentation was warmer, richer and tonally a tad darker than the cables I was using before and was set on keeping. I thought that maybe some transparency was lost but the cable was for sure more ‘musical’ and not ‘hifi’ or polished in presentation. I liked what I heard but it was not preferred.
So I left them to burn in for a few days before critically listening. I then went through some favourite albums and loved what I was hearing. Music was easy to listen too, but that is also what I thought of my system in general. Lots of texture and great on strings. Depth was deep but was it always that way? Ones hifi memory can be dangerous or am I hearing what I want to hear?
I had no expectations of what to get from such a cable having not heard a similar type before. However, I do like the sound a tin-plated copper power cable brings to the party – was this the case again? (Don’t judge me!).
Well, after some time I thought I’d swap out the cables as quick as I could and put in my old ones. Now I was really expecting my old cables to be better – I had convinced myself of that. I was expecting an uplift in transparency particularly. But I was shocked! ‘The Natural’ was better to my utter surprise. After some listening, I could not wait to put ‘The Natural’s’ back in. They brought a richer and smoother tone, more musicality and great sound stage depth. It does sound different – which I preferred in my system. That may not be the case for everyone.
The end result is I’m buying more to try elsewhere in my system as well as to look closer at the wider options in other styles of this sort of cable.
DIY and ‘The Natural’ cable from PcX and Jupiter are a winner in my books. Recommend a try and a toe dipping in such cable forms – not what I was expecting :)[/SIZE]
http://i65.tinypic.com/fyir1c.jpg
http://i64.tinypic.com/14tsrwg.jpg
http://i67.tinypic.com/29glbvc.jpg
http://i68.tinypic.com/2d98qs6.jpg
http://i67.tinypic.com/1zr293n.jpg