@ grey9hound,what are you talking about?,waite a minute,I'm not that dumb!LOL!Ok,I will take a look,thanks grey9hound.
Interconnect with great dynamics and bass slam ,
I recently purchased some Cardas Golden cross sepaker cables. They replaced my Dh Lab Q10s. I replaced the Q10s because i was getting some upper mid freq brightness.
I have Golden Cross interconnects from preamp to amp and from cd player to pre amp. The sound is very smooth and detailed .The bass and mid bass is not as authorative or as tight. The highs are better - more detailed and smooth.
The problem is the sound is almost too smooth the bass is kind of rounded off now .The sound is less dynamic.
My Question is.
Is there an interconnect that could give me back that great bass and dynamics of that i had with the Q10s, without the harshness i was getting. I think i would like to keep the Golden Cross speaker cables and try changing the ICs. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
I have Golden Cross interconnects from preamp to amp and from cd player to pre amp. The sound is very smooth and detailed .The bass and mid bass is not as authorative or as tight. The highs are better - more detailed and smooth.
The problem is the sound is almost too smooth the bass is kind of rounded off now .The sound is less dynamic.
My Question is.
Is there an interconnect that could give me back that great bass and dynamics of that i had with the Q10s, without the harshness i was getting. I think i would like to keep the Golden Cross speaker cables and try changing the ICs. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
505 responses Add your response
@ Grey9hound,dude!,those are some pretty good speakers!,92 sensetivity! 6ohms!,man-o-man!it is defiantly not the speakers that are the problem!,you need to know what two speaker post are the primary two of the four,you could not have had directional jumpers!on most bi-amp speakers,the post that drive the woofers are the bottom primary post,then you turn the signal going from there, directing to the top post,if they drive the mids and highs,with directional jumpers,if the top post drive the woofers?,reverse the whole scenerio.there is no way that directional jumpers will not work!If I were there i would fix till it was fixed!,LOL!the post that drive the woofers should be the primary post.,you should of heard my system when I turned the jumpers the wrong way!screwed!the sound was terrible,like the description you gave with the way you used the jumpers,or they were not quality jumpers!,oh,jumpers take as long to break-in as speaker cables,mmmmyep!300 hrs should do!cheers! |
Hi Grey9hound,another gentleman in another thread has me being his cable broker LOL!,so I will be yours too,The very wise jmcgrogan2 brought to my attention xlr to rca adapters,there are some well made gold plated adapters in the i/c section of the gon for $30.00!,then at the same time this is your golden chance to be in the tara family,the air 1 series 2 1.5 meters i/c for $480.00, a deal!these are $1,700.00 new!,then there is another air 1 series 2 on the gon for $650.00,if you can find the means you better jump on the awsome deal of $480.00,the i/c called the one is 2 times better than the air 1!,but I believe it is alot better than most cables costing the same retail vs retail!,this air 1 would blow the doors off the analysis plus cable you are not happy with!remember, 300 hrs of break-in before you make your evaluations of this cable!,grey9hound,this is a great opportunity to save alot of money and get some decent bass and slam you are seeking!goodluck on buying this cable,with the adapters,I would! cheers! |
@Audiolabyrnith, I would recommend the The Two for $600 over the two pairs of the Air 1 Series 2 that you mentioned. The Two in that ad comes with the Isolated Floating Ground Station, and since that ad has been running for a month and a half, he could probably get them for $500. |
Wait a minute Audiolabyrinth, you said in a previous post that you do not have experience with Analysis Plus cable? LOL! Will the Tara Labs Air 1 really "blow the doors off" of the solo crystal oval?? Well...I plan to find out!! I have a Tara Labs Air 1 ic on the way! Audiolabyrinth, should I put the Air 1 between my amp and preamp OR from source to preamp? What do you think?? BTW, the AP solo crystal oval interconnect needs 250-300hrs of burn-in before it really does it's thing. My experience with the ic is more like what Geoffkait has experienced in his system. On the other hand, my experience with the solo crystal oval speaker cable (after about 4 months), is similar to Jmcgrogan2's description. Gotta say, I'm exited to hear the Tara interconnect cable after all talk on the forum here! |
Thanks again to all for the recommendations and the help. @Audiolabyrinth. -- I am not going to use jumpers on my speakers. I am going to continue t bi-amp them, unless i get a more powerful amp, which i have not planned on yet . I have considered the Nad M25 in the Future. There is no way i can afford the Tara labs speaker cables, and i really do not want to go the adapter route from XLR to RCA for the ICs either. I want to hear Waxwaves thoughts on the Air1 ICs. please Please waxwaves , post your opinion of them here. |
@ waxwaves,In my experience,putting a good i/c between the pre-amp and amp yields the best sound,I would experiment between the both if I were you,you may like the i/c between the source and pre-amp better?congradulations waxwaves on buying your cable,you already have the patience to know 300 hrs of break-in on eany cable used or new before evaluating them!,the answer to your question,will this tara model blow the doors off that particular analysis plus,well based on the feedback on this thread,yes,why?,you will not have a forward sound!caution!you need to know that this particular model tara will not have the resolution as the model called the 2 and models on up from there of the tara familly,I will tell you it is a fine cable at its full retail price compaired to alot of other brands and models at the same price point!,the good thing here is that the cable you bought like all taras will not be analitical sounding at all!,your particular model will be warm sounding with a round defined bass sound with exceptional body to boot!,and forgiving to brightness in a system.welcome to tara waxwaves,for the money of the model you bought I believe you will have no regrets for its pricepoint!cheers! |
@grey9hound,I am sorry,I was only tring to help,I believe you may be correct,the amp may be the problem,I will tell you it is not the power per channel you have!your speakers are 6oms and most likely dip to 5 or 4and a half oms while playing,my speakers that are 6 oms will dip to 4 oms at times!check and see if the amp is designed for impedences such as the specs I am talking about,there is alot of high priced amps out there that will not drive speakers with low impedences,one way to check is to see if your amp doubles in power from 8oms load to 4 oms load,give me the answer if you do not mind,thanyou grey9hound,cheers! |
@grey9hound,My source is my pre-amp!a cd combo,I can agree with what you are saying,everybodys systems are different,so it depends to what the owner hears where they may place the i/c,I would experiment to hear were the i/c needs to be placed that waxwaves bought and see what yields the best results on his system,compliments on your speakers that you have,they are very attractive!cheers! |
Grey9hound, the Emotiva sounds kinda hot on top in my experience, and not so resolute in the mids. The Emotiva did exibit a nice wide soundstage. Tried several, x-pa2, upa5... but my fav was the UPA-2. I will definately give my opinion of the Tara cable and am extremely pumped to hear it! Audiolabyrinth, thanks again for the great input. What do you think of the Air 2 ics? Have you listened to those too? LOL! Honestly I am Looking forward to trying out the less forward sound of the Taras! Yeah,Good deals are nice!!! Would really like to hear the Quads 63 mentioned previously and learn more about those classics, maybe one day.. I usually use my best ic between amp and preamp for best results, but you never know what you're gonna get til you try... Always interested to hear others theories on this audio question. Maybe a new thread..."favorite interconnect from pre to amp or from source to pre?" Thanks fellows! ... |
Well, I put the Q10 Speaker cables back in on the top . I ran Audyssey again , even though i play music in direct mode,without sub. The Audyssey corrections are not supposed to be applied in this situation, but i believe it actually does. I always tended to have some upper mids to lower highs that were sometimes sharp sounding , especially noticable on certain recordings. I have a feeling that Audysesey contributed to this. When i re-ran it again after putting in the Q10s, I made sure that the mic was slightly tilted toward the front. This time most of the sharpness is GONE. yippee. I will be putting the Golden Cross Speaker cables up for sale as well as the Analysis plus Solo crystal Oval interconnects. Thanks again to everyone for your help. |
@ blueranger,Hi,what model of tara did you compair to the kimber kgac?,is this i/cs we are talking about,speaker cables,a/c cords,what?interesting!,I do know kimber does not have in exsistance a top tier cable that can remotely compair to taras upper end cables,and a compairison to the zero gold i/c and omega gold speaker cables,cabolt a/c power cord is essentially a JOKE!,do not take my word on this,go and hear for your self!,some of the bottom of the line Taras may not better some cables,but Taras best,thats another ball game in its own!cheers,and happy listening to you! |
I could not see any writing. They are about 18 years old and I remember I got them at a discount house something like used cables or 2nds. Maybe I have a fake pair of Taras! They are ivory color with black rubber rca's. They have 1 and 2 to tell which direction but if there was writing it has since rubbed off. |
@ Blueranger,I wouldnt worry about it,The kgac is a nice cable!,Tara's technology just like everybody elses in 18 years is better,really,back then there was a couple of model taras that I did not like the sound of,one such cable that I owned came out before Decade did,the rsc master gen 2,very stiff cable,sounded like crap to me!,the Decade come out and I was In love with Taralabs all over again,LOL!cheers! |
Still here Audiolabyrinth! I will definitely post my impressions of the Tara Air 1 ic for you and Grey9hound, don't worry. I still think the Solo Crystal Oval is a great cable, but I am expecting the Tara to better it. Gonna try it in place of the AP that is now between amp and preamp. I don't know if anybody noticed but, I am using Discovery Essence with Cardas Silver RCAs from sources to pre now. The Essence helped with some of the forward presentation I was getting while using all Solo Crystal Oval ics. I think the Essence is a really good cable too. Perfect ic from source components imo. Sound is just more laid back than the AP. I am really itching to hook up the Taras tho and now I'm wondering about the need for a grounding station? Is this gonna be necessary? Also thought about buying the Air 2 ic to go between DAC-1 and TLC-1... |
The Discovery Essence is a very good cable. I haven't heard it in many years, but I still recall being amazed at how much better it sounded than an expensive Transparent interconnect that it replaced. Probably about 8-10 years ago. If memory serves me right, I kept it for a year or so, which is a long time in my system. :) I wouldn't buy another Tara Labs cable until you see what you think of the first one Waxwaves. Don't get caught up in the hype. I've made that mistake myself far too often. If you like the Tara Labs, THEN consider buying another one. |
@waxwaves,The Air 1 and Air 2 does not use a grounding station!,the ends of the little jumpers plug into each other,go to the net and read on how to use the cable,the current offerings from tara only has what they call the extreme series cables that use an outboard grounding station,the extreme series cables are,the zero edge,the zero onyx,the zero gold.the model called the one and two and 0.8ex has ism on board,other words,a smaller grounding station made onto the cables them selfs and the jumper cables plug into them selfs on them cables too,only one side of the extreme series cables plug into each other and thats the receiving end of the signal.believe me when I say this!,It matters that you plug the jumper lead wires together on the air 1 cable that you bought!,Its the same on all their cables that have the jumpers!,please feel free to ask questions about these cables,I will help!cheers! |
@ waxwaves,The newest version of the air one is the air oneEX,that surpasses the model you have in sound by alot,way more transparent,if you like the cable you bought,I would not get the air 2!,I would go out of my way,to get the air1EX!It is a new designed cable,a different animal of a cable you just got!bar-none,it sets the bench mark at the pricepoint it sells at for all cables!,I would dare say its 2 times better than the cable you have now!,on the other hand for what you paid for the cable you have,you will not find a better cable for the used money you paid,in other words,$500.00 to $500.00 would be the fair comparison!cheers! |
Audiolabyrinth I am here . i was just busy this past weekend. Waxwaves Did you get the cable yet ? When you do , would you try it between the cd player and pre-amp . I think most systems would allow you to hear more differences in that position. I know whenever i have tested ics , i was always able to tell a bigger difference between the Source and the Pre. Differences were not as noticable from pre to amp ,, for me anyway . Thanks |
@ Audiolabyrinth. Thanks for clearing that up sir, I was unsure about the grounding and knew you would have the answer! Really appreciate the help and seemingly endless Tara Labs knowledge! BTW, I read about the Zero Gold and now I want to come to your house for a music listening/beer drinking session! LOL! As far as the newer version of the Air 1 goes...I'm gonna take Jmcgrogan2's advice and use babysteps here. Thank you Jmcgrogan2! I'm sure putting the Air 1 in the system will be an awesome experience on it's own. When I really think about it, I am already enjoying the sound here, especially after implementing the Essence from DAC-1 to TLC-1. So now I'm just having fun. I need to pick the cables I will use in what location, and sell some of the others! @Grey9hound, I will try the Air 1 from DAC-1 to TLC-1 and see what happens 1st. I will let you know what I think asap. Then I'm gonna have to put the Air 1 between amp and pre and give it a listen. My brain is thinking the sound of the DAC and phono amp may both benefit with the cable in this position... if it is indeed such a badass interconnect, we shall see, I mean hear. I got sidetracked with the cables, but it's a lot of fun and my gut tells me I'm gonna be glad I did. My main objective with my system was some SMcAudio amp upgrades! And then maybe a really good power cable for the amp. And then after that...and then after that! |
@ waxwaves,I do not mean to sound like I know everything about Taralabs,I have been buying and useing them most of my life,ever since Taralabs has been in exsistence,I buy new cables direct from the factory is how well they know me,I have tried other cables over the years but always came back to the Tara sound,do not get me wrong here,I like a brand called transparent,a couple of models of nordost,a couple of models of purist audio,there is no best, no such thing as a best cable,I prefer Tara,some may not,to me,Tara works well with most tube and solid state equipment,but not all of them!,waxwaves you are welcome to come to my house and drink a beer anytime!,I do want to make sure you give your Tara cable adequate time to burn in before you make evaluations,300 hrs no matter what!,new are not,this will insure that you do not have bad impressions and get surprised for the better latter,tara cables are a little stuburn when breaking in!,in the end I am confident you will love them,cheers! |
Thanks Audiolabyrinth! For the informative correspondence and the invite! I really am glad that you are here man, we all can really benefit from your experience! I may love the Tara Labs and it may be my kinda sound too. I just had to find out and read that the Air 1 was a good place to start! I'll make sure to give them 300 hours. This system stays on 24-7 playing music unless I am working or sleeping, so it won't take too long. Grey9hound, I will give initial impressions for you immediately as promised! |
Audiolabyrinth I am here . I have been trying to fix a problem with one of my Sony CDP-M555ES cd players . it has started not being able to find the disc location and spins around back and forth searching for the right disc # . It plays fine until after about 30 minutes or so when it starts actind up. I purchased a replacement CDP-M333ES. the only diference from the 555 is it doesn't have video out for the song tilte and artist display , on the TV like the 555. I really did not use it that(menus to tv ) much anyway. i have been re- loading in each disc artist and the title of the disc and the categoryinto the 333es. Very labor intensive , although it does accept a keyboard which helps a lot. It will recognize cd text but id you don't have artist and genre put in you can't play by artist or genre. I really have been thinking about using a pc as a server and running through a pc with jriver media or windows media out to the tv for display. Are any of you guys doin' that ? |
@ grey9hound,wow!you are busy!you can ask the others,I really have a simple two channel system for the main,the second system will be doing what you have said when I am done building it,the two will be for different type of enertainment,the main,pure real sound,cost no object,the other one for movies,good sound,turn table,radio,computer,etc.. you get the picture.,thanks for getting back to me,cheers! |
@ grey9hound,wow,you have been busy,the answer to your question is no,I would like to do some things like that with second system,the main system is 2 channel high-end only,the second system will be a different kind of entertainment system than the main,the second system when I get done will be alot like yours,t.v.flat screen,computer,media server etc...,good to here from you!,I would ask one of the other guys for an answer with your question,cheers! |
Ok fellows the Tara Labs Air 1 ics are here and playing in my system now! The first thing I recognized was a couple of small tears running out of the corner of my eye and down my cheek when I heard them.... LOL...Just kidding, there is no crying in audio! Ok seriously, the Air 1 do sound very very nice in this system! The first thing that I recognized as being different was a nice ripe, round quality to some seriously solid & deep bottom end. Then I realized that I was experiencing better clarity and definition of middle bass frequency stuff that was simply not heard before. The Air 1 is not forward sounding at all, in fact it imparts a much more recessed soundstage when compared to SoloCrystalOval. With the Air 1 in the system, midrange and top end information does sound accurate, tonally correct, and without loss of detailz! The background is also extremely quiet and this is usually a sign of a better cable. The speakers are doing an even more convincing "disappearing act" and the soundstage has stretched out wider! At this point, I already feel pretty confident I will enjoy this cable more than the Solo Crystal Oval. I got some "juicy" sounds oozing out of the Hales Rev 3s and I like it! Thank you Keith! I'll give more impressions after these babies run in for a few hundred hours. So far, the Tara Air 1 gets a BIG thumbs up from me! Grey9hound, these are my first impressions of the Air 1 ics. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this cable to you based on what I have heard thus far!!! But... I must also recommend for you a McCormack amplifier. Probably a DNA-1 so you could keep your biamp thing going(using both sets of binding posts). I used Emotiva amps for 6 or 7 months and the McCormack sound just beat up on the Emo in every way! Definately another level of refinement with DNA- 0.5 Deluxe or the DNA- 1 Deluxe in my system. I have also had a Rev. B+ DNA-1 Deluxe in this system and am still kicking myself for letting it go!!! If you can find one jump on it. Have fun and best of luck to you! |
@ waxwaves,I am very happy for you waxwaves!,you got an awsome deal on top of that!,as time gos on we can elaborate more on the sound of your cable,you need to be specific on your model name,theres a difference,you have the air 1 series 2,not the air1,this is to keep the readers out there to not get confused,Happy listening! |