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Has It Really Been Ten Years Since...

Posted by Luminator (A) on March 18, 2008 at 10:13:29

...I got gunned down for sticking $$$$ interconnects on cheap equipment? You should have seen how upset the audiophile community was, when I used the $625 XLO Signature 1.1 interconnect on the $99 original Sony Playstation. But I reported the truth. And that truth was that the XLO Sig 1.1 unlocked the Playstation's sonic potential. All along, using patch cords, the PS1's sound was shrug-your-shoulders okay. But my brother and his teenaged friends were unprepared for just how friggin' awesome the video gaming experience would become, when the sound was detailed, sharp, focused, fast, and punchy.

I then raised the audiophiles' ire by replacing the XLO Sig 1.1 with Kimber KS-1030, Tara Labs The One, and XLO's Limited Edition. Even with the "lowly" PS1 as a source, the differences in each interconnect were apparent.

Well, today, the Tara Labs The One and XLO LE seem downright cheap, compared to some other cables we use. But recently, my audio buds returned my old cables from the 90s. So I decided to revisit some of them.

If you've been following my blog [click on link below], you already have seen my reviews of, among other things, the XLO Reference Types 1, 2, and 4. And now I've added some information on the very product that started this madness, the XLO Signature 1.1.

The big difference, this time around, is that we now have high-end audio's MVP, the Cable Cooker. In the mid-90s, when XLO Sig 1.1 was all the rage, the Cable Cooker had not yet been invented. Well, it turns out that the Sig 1.1 is even better than we previously thought. You see, I've Cooked several pairs, and compared them to un-Cooked samples. The Cooked Sig 1.1 is more free of a static-y hiss, a garbled and harsh grain. This allows the music to more naturally bloom. The images are less 2-dimensional, less like sticking Post-Its on the board. There's less haze between the images, so you can "see" through the sound field more easily. And it doesn't matter whether I'm using the cheap Sony PS1 or the expensive EAR Acute. The Cooked Sig 1.1 has the better ability to get out of the way, and preserve whatever signal it is asked to transport.

In some ways, a Cooked XLO Sig 1.1 sounds cleaner and more resolving than an un-cooked Nordost Valhalla, which costs 5x that of Sig 1.1. So this is an important development. Those old cables of yours may be significantly better than you ever imagined. It's just that, in order to unlock their potential, you have to get (or use) a Cable Cooker. Hell, even if you have something affordable, such as Kimber Timbre, you can eliminate most of that fizzy distortion, simply by Cooking the cable.

Everybody's rushing out to Cook the latest and greatest cables. But before you acquire Nordost Odin*, or whatever juices your lizard, Cook your old cables first. You may discover that those old cables are more than adequate, and you no longer "need" expensive new cables.

-Lummy The Seahorse

*I use and love Nordost Odin. A requirement of Odin is that dealers must treat it with Nordost's VIDAR burn-in device. For the record, I have taken Odin, and put it on the Cable Cooker. Indeed, the Cable Cooker is even more effective than the VIDAR. If your Odin seems slightly diffuse, ghostly, or out-of-phase, those characteristics will go away, if you stick your Odin on a Cable Cooker for a day or two.

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Edits: 03/18/08

This post is made possible by the generous support of people like you and our sponsors:

Kimber Kable

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