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I opened both MIT and Transparent netwks

I have opened both MIT and Transparent networks to see what was in them. In both cases, it was very similar. In both, I found an inductor, capacitor, and a resistor. They were connected between the signal and ground in a novel way. Both were encased in an epoxy or glue that I had to break to see what was in it. The wire in both networks appeared to be just simple copper wire, and the soldering work was sloppy and ugly. It made me very upset. However, I do think that both MIT and Transparent make very good cables- the MIT's excel in bloom and soundstaging while the Transparents allow a deep silence between notes- a very low noise floor. BTW, I have also cut open a transparent reference digital interconnect, audioquest corals, NBS, and Cardas twinlinks and hexlinks. The Cardas had amazing workmanship and wonderful soldering in even their cheapest cable.

Troy
tarichar

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tarichar OP
19 posts
 
Regarding the Transparent cables, the soldering inside the network box was poor. The soldering at the terminations were generally excellent. I cut them open a few years ago but I think I still have them around. The values on the capacitor were rubbed off. The inductor seemed to be handwound and thus had no values on it.

Troy
tarichar's avatar
tarichar OP
19 posts
 
I thought people would be interested in knowing what was in the boxes- I had come across several posts in the past in which people had asked about the contents of the networks. I have a BS in Electrical engineering and was always very interested in EM theory and signal conduction, and this is why I have studied various interconnects.

Regarding the Opus, I'm sure you could open it up and then put it back together. If you mess it up, see if it could be fixed under warranty. The Opus network most likely cosists of the same RLC network, just different values and higher tolerance parts.

Troy
tarichar's avatar
tarichar OP
19 posts
 
Over the last 10 years, I have opened the Transparent Super, Ultra, and the Musiclink. interconnects, and the reference digital cable (no network on this).

For MIT I opened the Terminator 3, MI 330 Series 2, and T3i digital cables(this one only had one element- a resistor or an inductor- I can't remember).

I don't remember which model NBS I opened. It consisted of 2 covered bundles of copper wire, one for neg and one for positive. Each bundle had 2 isolated covered wires, twisted around each other. Each bundle was twisted as well. A foil shield with a drain wire. I have also heard that NBS uses Belden wire, but this does not preclude them from getting excellent results. It is said that you are paying for the ingenuity of Walter Fields and his proprietary geometry, not the cost of the cables- at least on the higher priced models. I am pretty sure, that they don't use Belden for their higher priced cables.

I have also opened various Harmonic Tech cables- these are really constructed very well, however the spade to conductor weld which is crimped and then welded is poor due to the large diameter wires.

Troy
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