Truly amazed

[Reid Malenfant]

I'm rather confused as I'm sure others are.

No kidding, i have a few of the OP (Effem) cables sitting here though & one day i'll get round to using them, soon hopefully

Obviously i can't comment now, but given there cheapness it really was a no brainer as pieces of crap could cost more

[Effem]

Ooooooer missus, I didn't realise such confusion could arise

As far as I was aware the audio cables came in 2 variants, one was of a decent diameter covered in a white shroud and a cheaper variant with a smaller diameter covered in a grey shroud. Both are called RCA audio cables and I thought the "Silver Series" referred only to the white covered type, but it seems even that simple notion isn't quite correct I have 2 pairs of the white covered ones and none of the grey type.

[Welder]

Belkin Silver Series RCA audio, twin shield, grey.
Imo where cables get interesting is when differing materials, diameters and cable shapes get used, hollow tube, multi and solid core mixes, build geometry, etc.
Whether such hybrid cables add something to what should be a neutral component is a matter of debate and test but, for me at least, it is easier to rationalise why such cables may sound different.

My custom interconnects have are simpler version of different diameter twisted conductors pairs in an air gapped dielectric and also have a mylar foil and braided screen. I only have one set of analogue interconnects in my system. This makes “cable tuning” a lot easier and cheaper than in a system where a series of components are joined together.
.
If your speakers have matched drivers an interesting cable test is to use a reference cable in one channel and the test cable in the other and play both tones and music. I find it is easier to pick out differences this way than trying to remember how something sounded while I swap cable about

There are a couple of things that are worth considering if you’re thinking about these cables.
Reluctance to carve up an expensive set of cables is understandable but at these prices experimentation is cheap and informative

If your speakers are capable of producing tight controlled bass, then initially you may find these cables reduce bass impact but what I lost in impact I gained in tone, depth and detail. I think the overall the sound of these cables is probably nearer to the recording than the others I have used, including my favorite custom cables. The cables’ overall sound is, neutral and detailed without getting sweet and doesn’t tend to exaggerate differences in recording quality or mask the limitations of the rest of the system.
Sat directly between my speakers for example, these cables don’t mask the tendency my system have to throw certain frequencies (notably some cymbals and cow bells) on particular recordings too far behind the sound stage or hide the limitations of my amp in deciding where to present instruments in very complex pieces of music.

Given my amps strengths verge on enthusiastic in the mid range frequencies and my treble drivers tend towards accurate but not particularly extended treble (I can’t hear past 16kHz anyway), the loss of bass impact, for my listening preferences, needed to be addressed

I attenuated treble by 1.5 db and added a further attenuation of midrange drivers 1.5db with an L pad using non inductive resistors on the drivers rather than in the crossovers and then adjusted the amps output impedance to match cable/speaker. What works for you will depend on how well you know your system and how it performs in your listening environment.

Conventional wisdom has it the shorter the cable the better; doesn’t seem to work like that in my system where 1m length gave a better sound than a 0.4m. I can’t explain it any better than this; it seems that a shorter cable increased impact but reduced tone and it’s the tone I most enjoy with these

While I’m destroying my objectivist reputation I want to mention connectors
Every cable I have measured has a marked difference in electrical characteristics between signal and ground. The only connectors I can think of that have attempted to address this problem are Eichman Bullit RCA connectors with apparently great success. Audiophiles seem to love large pieces of shiny metal and while they may look impressive I’m not convinced they are good for sonic performance.
I built a set of 1m cables (semi balanced) using a set of Nuetrik connectors which have a fairly minimal amount of metal and instead of using the supplied connector shroud/case I wound PTFE tape, first around the individual solder joints, and then around the whole internal body and finally slid a cable support ferule of a suitable diameter over the PTFE packed internals. While a bit fragile and far from pretty I prefer the sound of this cable over the others I made.
You may roll around laughing now if you wish

Imo good HiFi is about getting the components in the system to work together to produce a sound that is not only as accurate as possible, but more importantly, a sound is enjoyable to listen to. Every change I’ve made to my system seems to require a change elsewhere to maintain that balance and these cables were no exception

Unfortunately the speaker tweaks put a noticeable hump in bass response and aggravated the low frequency standing wave problem I get in the room.
I recently salvaged a few continental quilts that had been thrown out. My sofa is in direct line and approximately the same width as my speaker placement so I stuffed them into the base and back of the sofa with a layer of acoustic foam glued onto the back frame making a vertical absorption panel of sorts. This seems to have soaked up the worst of the hump (miked at 2.9m, my listening position) while not sucking the dynamics out.
That’s about as audiophile, informative and anal as I get on a forum. You don’t want to know what happens when I change a major component.

I prefer the Belkin cables to the Chord Crimson Plus set I have, the Atlas Equator I borrowed and all but my reference custom set which I’m still trying to decide upon but atm it sounds like the Belkin will stay.
My feeling is both these cables (even in their stock form) will easily outperform any coaxial style cable. Given they are less than £1.50 per foot it gets very hard to see how some cable manufacturers can justify charging £20+ per foot for some very basic configurations and materials

I look at it like this: you can establish the sound you like and strive through experimentation to get it, or, follow the herd and buy the stuff that others rave about and learn to like that.

I feel I should point out here that in no way do I take this audio business seriously


(Now where did I put that lump hammer, just need to tweak the amp output caps a bit )

[magiccarpetride]

Ooooooer missus, I didn't realise such confusion could arise

As far as I was aware the audio cables came in 2 variants, one was of a decent diameter covered in a white shroud and a cheaper variant with a smaller diameter covered in a grey shroud. Both are called RCA audio cables and I thought the "Silver Series" referred only to the white covered type, but it seems even that simple notion isn't quite correct I have 2 pairs of the white covered ones and none of the grey type.

This is simply beyond belief, but although I've ordered two pairs of these cables back in December 20, I still haven't received them. The vendor is not responding to my enquiries, so I'm thinking about pulling the plug on the order.

However, I'm dying to hear these cables, so I was wondering if some of you would be interested in selling yours to me (in case you have some spare, or have moved on to something better)?

[anthonyTD]

I was wondering how everyone else got on with these Belkin cables.
I bought 3 sets; one from Frank’s original link, silver series 1.2m AV, quad shielded.
The others I bought (Ali’s link) are the RCA Audio Silver Series (1.2m & 2.4m) double shielded, a full mylar foil and outer braid polyethylene dielectric and similar hybrid conductors.
They are not the same cables!

The two cables types sound different; annoying isn’t it
I prefer the RCA audio cables (not AV) in my system. The quad shielded AV cables may suit the softer, faster and more coloured sound of a valve/analogue setup better.

I dissected a pair of the 2.4 RCA audio cables (I only want a 0.4m pairs, so it was going to happen anyway) and re-plugged one end. I’m not sure why, but I expected to find a semi balanced construction but these are completely unbalanced. I was wondering if the AV quad shielded were also unbalanced (AnthonyTD?) I don’t really want to hack these up.

I made two sets of cables from out of the 2.4 metre RCA set.
I used these connectors to replace one end for each pair I made.
http://www.thatcable.com/acatalog/in...onnectors.html

I used solder with silver content on all joints. I made both sets 0.4 metres in length but one set semi balanced. The idea is that with the screen connected at source any RFI crap the shield picks up isn’t transferred to the amp and on to the speakers. Anyone else tried this and if so what do you think; any noticeable difference in sound?

hi John,
the cables i disected were the white pure AV series, they had a red and white pair inside with 4 or 5 individualy insulated cores one being a solid core the others being of the sprial or helics [spelling ?] wound type, the screen was made up of a foil and a very sparse brading which was only connected at the source end!
hope this helps.

Anthony,TD...

[Welder]

Hi AnthonyTD

Thanks for the info.

These cables are starting to annoy me. I dissected my white AV set and what I found seems to be slightly different to your description.
For a start my AV quad shielded set are fully balanced (I made an error in my description of the RCA grey set as these are also fully balanced)
The differences between the two sets (AV white, RCA grey) that I have are the extra shielding around the individual conductor pairs. The conductor arrangement is the same, 4 individually transparent coated spiral wires, one spiral pair coated, one larger diameter plain solid coated wire and one uncoated rectangular twisted strip but the braid outer shielding in the AV white set is much sparser than on the RCA grey set which has a very dense tinned copper braided shield. Both sets have the Mylar foil (?) shield.

Anyone want to try to give me a rational explanation as to why what amounts to just extra shielding on one set makes these cables sound different given the shielding on both sets would seem more than adequate to completely reject any RFI?

Just in case anyone else is thinking about messing about with these cables be warned, they are a total pin in the arse to work with

[anthonyTD]

I totaly agree about them being a pain in the arse to work with.
i cant recal there being a seperate foil screen on each of the red and white cores but i will recheck that and confirm, also inside each of the spiral wound cores is a strand of what looks to be some form of plastic or nylon, which is around the thickness of a human hair!

Anthony,TD...

[magiccarpetride]

This is simply beyond belief, but although I've ordered two pairs of these cables back in December 20, I still haven't received them. The vendor is not responding to my enquiries, so I'm thinking about pulling the plug on the order.

However, I'm dying to hear these cables, so I was wondering if some of you would be interested in selling yours to me (in case you have some spare, or have moved on to something better)?

I don't fcuking believe this! The cables finally arrived yesterday, but they delivered ONLY one pair! Where the hell is the other pair? No one seems to know, no one seems to care. It says clearly on my order that I've paid for two packages. Oh, the humanity!

So my question now is: should I even bother trying to listen to one pair only? If yes, should I install the interconnects between the DAC and the pre-amp, or would it be better to place them between the pre-amp and the power amp? Or does it even matter?

Please help, I'm getting very frustrated...

[Reid Malenfant]

Stuff the new cable between the DAC & pre amp Garbage in - garbage out & all that, i guess it makes some kid of sense to use it on the front end

[magiccarpetride]

Stuff the new cable between the DAC & pre amp Garbage in - garbage out & all that, i guess it makes some kid of sense to use it on the front end

Thanks Mark, makes sense to me as well. I'm just so disappointed to be forced to conduct this half-assed evaluation of these 'truly amazing' cables. Oh well...