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Thanks for the kind words Jason.
Asking me to choose the musicI selected the opening few minutes of Channel Classic's extremely dynamic, R2D4 DSD-native SACD of Mahler's Symphony No.2, conducted by Ivan Fischerthe men began with a true hodge-podge mix of cabling from a number of deservedly respected companies. These included Transparent, PS Audio, and Van den Hul. They also added an Audience power conditioner to the mix.
Frankly, the components were so excellent that the Mahler sounded pretty good even with the mix of cabling. I couldn't make sense of a rapid descending zig-zig-zig pattern in the double basses, but everything else sounded like really good hi-fi.
After each round of listening, the cables were slowly changed. First, we heard Nordost's entry-level power cables. Then Nordost Blue Heaven cabling entered the picture. Then came Nordost's new Sort Kones, which are resonance control devices designed to provide a route for a component's sonically damaging internal vibrations to exit a component's chassis. (Microphonics, I was told, are more damaging inside solid-state equipment than tube gear). Somewhere along the line, Roy removed the Audience conditioner, replacing it with one Quantum device, then a full complement of two Quantum QX4s and one QX2. Finally, the Nordost Blue Heaven was replaced by Nordost higher level mono-filament cabling, in this case, Tyr.
The difference each successive change made in the sound of this Simaudio amplification and Raidho Ayra loudspeaker system was striking. Each time, timbres became more distinct, soundstage width increased, and images took on palpable three-dimensionality. Most important, the images began to cohere, and that formerly confusing zig-zag in the double basses made musical sense. Once the two Quantum QX4s and single QX2 were switched on, I was able to hear around and behind images, getting an uncanny sense of acoustic space.
The real shocker was the complexity of sound and color that emerged once the final switch was made to Tyr mono-filament cabling. I can only imagine how good the system would have sounded like had Nordost Odin been introduced instead.
Pictured, left to right, are Lars Kristensen, Michael Borresen of Raidho loudspeakers, and Roy Gregory.
Not exactly scientific, are we? This proves that each particular model of Nordost product was superior to an unspecified model of an unspecified brand. This does not test the theory at all. An actual test would have been to replace all of the cabling with the same brand and line of one of the existing "hodge-podge" cables, e.g. all Transparent, or all PS Audio.Furthermore, changing the exchange of the Blue Heaven model for Tyr, actually goes against this theory:" A single inferior link puts the whole thing at risk; one superior link, on the other hand, can be a waste—quite possibly a very expensive one." -Art Dudley (Listening 84)I think the magazine would be better served by drawing a line between journalism and passing along ad copy.
Actually, Nathan, it does not prove that Blue Heaven was superior to all the other cables that were previously in the system. In fact, I doubt Blue Heaven is. And, for the record, Nordost never claimed that it is. The purpose of the experiment was to demonstrate that systems sound best when the wiring is internally consistent. In this case, even the speaker was wired with Nordost. The Foundation Theory is not limited to Nordost. Not by any means. The theory suggests, for example, that if you have a speaker wired with Wireworld), an all-Wireworld system would sound better than a system that mixed the exact same level of Wireworld with cables from other manufacturers (including Nordost).