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Initial disappointment with 1st set of “expensive’ IC’s...

I’ve been slow working my way to equipping my rig with all Cardas as I’ve been fan of their quality/sound signature an for a long time. I just received 2 sets of Clear Light IC’s which I’m using DAC to Pre and Pre to Amp. up until now all other Cardas cables that I have were obtained used and sounded great from day 1. The Clear Light however are brand new..when I sat down to give them a listen I was surprised not to hear any improvement...I was actually disappointed to hear what I can describe as a fatter bass and subdued upper end. My prior IC’s were Shirokazu Yazaki Belden 8402. I admittedly do not have golden ears but the difference was obvious. I’m interested to hear what other Cardas owners have to say about how their cables sounded when 1st installed. 
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Showing 2 responses by jerkface

jerkface
73 posts
 
I'm just going to leave this here.

https://www.audioholics.com/audio-video-cables/audio-cable-break-in-science-or-psychological
jerkface
73 posts
 
There is no such thing as diminishing returns.

You have two paths, as an unlimited spender (all evidence I've seen from your posts point to this being your reality).  Either you accept the idea of diminishing returns, where the difference between a $1 cable and a $100 cable is far greater than the difference between a $1K cable and a $50K cable, or at some point you have to admit to yourself that this is all placebo effect. 

Burn-in on cables is nonsense.  Period.  The only thing copper does over time is corrode.  It doesn't get better, it gets worse.  What does happen, however, is your brain acclimates to the specific tonality of what it's hearing out of your system.  No matter how subtle the initial difference between one wire and another, the longer you listen to the replacement, the more accustomed to its response you get.  And when you make a major investment in something expecting results, "burn-in" makes you more comfortable with your purchase as whatever differences you detected the first time you heard it become imprinted in how you perceive your system.  You WANT it to sound better, therefore as you become more comfortable with how it DOES sound, you convince yourself that, indeed, it sounds better. 

The only thing that burns in is your ears.  The difference between cables should be obvious the moment you swap one for another.  I've said elsewhere on this forum that I've done blind listening tests, and I can certainly detect those differences.  Without burn-in.  

And I've also said elsewhere on this forum that the biggest bitch about cables is that every manufacturer trades off one problem for a different problem, so the "best" cable for any given situation is going to depend on a LOT of factors, biggest one being length, because length changes priorities in the R/C/I puzzle. 
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