@V-fi
Are you considering trying the speaker from them to see what kind of synergy can be had?
I could also share my experience of both in the near future, but I’ll don’t have any kther comparable cables. Just some decent silver plated copper.
Veritas Cables a new brand that I found
Always been a big fan of smaller cable makers. I've had great luck in my system with brands like Audio Art, Cabledyne (RIP), Audio Sensibility, and Triode Wire Labs. These and others I'm surely forgetting seem to offer so much bang for the buck compared to the more mainstream brands. Not exactly cheap but usually a great value for what you get. It's noteworthy that most of these are most easily found by cruising Audiogon, US Audio Mart, Audiocircle, etc and if you only ever read Stereophile/TAS you'll probably never be exposed to all these great options.
As with most people around here I've also had my fair share of Audioquest, Kimber, Shunyata, Cardas, Wireworld, MIT, and the rest of the big names. Some of those were very enjoyable but I have a hard time when I think about how big their marketing budgets are. And when my local dealer will always give me a deal for a very substantial discount, it makes me realize how inflated the regular pricing is. Not to mention I notice that many of these don't really get good until you move fairly high up the line, with their entry and mid priced options often being pretty uninspiring.
A few weeks ago I was browsing the various classifieds as I often do and stumbled across a name that was new to me. Turns out that's because they are new, period. Veritas Cables calls themselves a boutique hifi cable company specializing in small batch creations. That sounds reminiscent of early Black Cat Cable which they actually reference as an inspiration. This immediately caught my attention as I used to work with Chris Sommovigo at one point and loved his approach to building cables. The company had 3 items listed at the time: RCA interconnects, a power cable, and an ethernet cable. I liked what I saw but was actually in the market for an XLR interconnect, so I checked out their website (still under construction) which indicated more cables were coming soon. I figured it was worth an email inquiry to see what the time frame might be.
I got a quick response stating that they had just completed a batch of XLR cables and while most were spoken for via local word of mouth sales, they did have one extra set they could sell me. The price was well within my target and actually much more affordable than the others I had been looking at (Audio Art Copper Cryo, Morrow Audio MA6, Silnote Anniversary being the main contenders). So I took a chance on it, although with their in home trial terms it wasn't a huge gamble. They sent over an invoice with paypal and due to Veritas being in California like me the cable arrived very quickly.
When the company told me they don't use any fancy packaging, they weren't kidding. It was more like buying a second hand cable off a forum with no original packaging. But I've never cared about any of that stuff and would rather have that money go towards the actual product. In that sense I was not disappointed. Veritas calls this their Magnus cable and it shares design cues with the rest of their line I had seen listed on USAmart and the Veritas website. Specifically that means the use of a metallic silver braided jacket instead of the usual plastic or fabric sleeving most other cables have. This is the same approach used by Ed Bowman with his Cabledyne brand which I miss dearly. Back in the day my entire system was Cabledyne Reference Silver, then upgraded to their Vanguard line and was happy with that for quite a while. So I am very pleased to reintroduce a similar looking cable. That said the Veritas Magnus is somewhat thicker yet more flexible than the Cabledyne models which makes it easier to deal with.
Veritas doesn't come right out and list exactly what the internal composition is on their designs. When I asked directly they were happy to answer so it's not a complete secret, but I guess more of a marketing choice. Discussing this with them also reminded me of chatting with Ed Bowman, where there is clearly a lot of knowledge but also a desire to simplify things for a dumb end user like me. I tend to agree with their philosophy that says silver doesn't always have to sound bright and copper isn't always warm. Designers can do a lot based on geometry and purity and shielding and a dozen other factors to where a silver cable might actually be warmer and smoother than a copper cable. Or a copper cable might be more focused on speed and treble extension. Honestly I don't care as much about the specifics as I do about the end result, just give me an excellent performing cable no matter what it's made of.
In any case to my eyes the Veritas Magnus looks every bit as well made as the other options I had been considering. Those range from $630 for the Audio Art, to $1250 for the Morrow, to $1500 for the Silnote, all for 1.5m XLR versions just to give you a general idea. Meanwhile the Magnus was $389 which is almost what I would call entry level territory with the price of cables being what it is these days.
So far I've been using the Magnus to connect my Eversolo DMP-A8 to a variety of tube and SS headphone amplifiers in the $2-5k range, then feeding the amazing Raal Requisite CA-1a ribbon headphones via the Raal transformer box. It's a pretty simple system and this is the only interconnect involved, making it easier to spot the contributions versus a system with separate transport, DAC, preamp, and amplifier and of course cables running between each of them.
The sound I heard was shockingly open, clean, detailed, and smooth. Huge staging with impressive depth and even height on the right recordings. Very convincing tone on violins, guitars, and vocals both male and female. The Raal headphones are pretty ruthless and reveal all sorts of upstream shortcomings, but I got the feeling I was bouncing up against the limits of the DMP-A8 D/A conversion rather than the cable/amp/headphones. I'll test this out soon when I switch to my bigger system with a better/more expensive DAC, and I'll report my findings when I have some thoughts on that.
Checking my cable collection for things with a vaguely similar price as the Magnus. I rounded up a Harmonic Tech Truth Link, Analysis Plus Copper Micro, Anticables 3.1, and Moon Audio Black Dragon, all of which sold for somewhere in the sub $500 space (I think) at some point in the last decade. It was no contest, the Veritas Magnus outclassed them all by a significant margin. These are all decent cables with something to offer which is why I keep them around in my stash, but compared to the Veritas they all sounded either dull, thin, slow, compressed, or some combination of those traits. I also note that each of them looks and feels like more of a budget product (which I guess they are) where the Veritas Magnus seems like it belongs in an entirely higher class despite the price not reflecting that.
My next goal is to compare it to some others in my arsenal priced around the $1K range. So far, from memory I would say it feels very competitive even in that class, but I want to be more specific about it so no comments for now. The crazy thing is that Veritas told me they have another XLR option (didn't catch the name or other specifics) positioned higher than the Magnus, for what is likely still a pretty reasonable price considering their approach to the market. All of those were spoken for at the time but did ask to be notified when the next batch is ready so we can discuss that. I had been considering the Infigo Audio Sparkle or maybe even Sparkle Signature XLR down the road but I might detour to the Veritas instead, just for the sake of adventure. But that depends on the pricing and specifics they give me, if and when we have that discussion. I'm also curious about their power cables or maybe a USB down the line. Sometimes when cable companies try to do everything, they bite off more than they can chew, or seem to excel with digital rather than analog or vice versa. So it would be interesting to see if Veritas can do the full line of cables to this same high caliber.
In closing I'll say (and it's probably obvious) that I'm extremely impressed with this product so far. It's the most dramatic result I've had from a cable in quite some time, and I appreciate that it didn't involve spending thousands of dollars. The folks at Veritas really seem to be on the right track in terms of quality and value. Which is not to be confused with being very good at marketing a product, which honestly they don't really seem to be, nor do they seem to even care all that much at the moment. They definitely have some improvement to do when it comes to optimizing their operation, but they told me their focus is on organic growth and quality over quantity. That seems like a noble approach so I can't fault them for it. Their website also could really use more specifics but at least they answer emails quickly and are easy to deal with that way.
I'll be back in the next week or so with additional updates. Maybe some downsides will present themselves. But so far it's been a totally positive experience. Next up is my bigger system with more expensive components and cables, we'll see how the Magnus holds up in that context.
Showing 40 responses by samureyex
The cables arrived a day early. Pleasant surprise. The system consists of my much beloved Martin Logan Summit-X, along with BMC Ultradac and BMC CS3 amp from Germany. I've had 1 hour in, will have plenty more tonight but so far, I feel it needs some significant burn-in. It might be because the cables were literally cold. |
From talking to Veritas via emails, they said the Argentum IC has fantastic synergy with their speaker cables. The speaker cable is of a slightly different makeup than the Aegentum, I have a hunch this could strengthens the Argentum's traits. I am receiving the Argentum tomorrow, and the speaker cables in a "few weeks". Wish I could contribute more to the topic of burn-in. Happy listening Veritas fellas. |
I have the Argentum X cable which is the xlr cable and it is pure silver occ. Does not sound like a silver cable at all. It sounds supremely balanced and open. I cannot speak more until I have a better speaker cable (the Aperta is coming).
Regarding the Aperta which is the speaker cable, it is a combination of copper/silver. Veritas Cable has said publicly that they don't believe in material having a certain definite sound signature. |
Note to self and maybe to others. I will note down on the sound of Veritas cables and how they may or may not change every 10 hours and see when they stop changing.
Also, Veritas has publicly stated their Argentum has fantastic synergy with the Aperta speaker cable. It’d be great to hear more on how each cable perform individual and also as a pair. Powerful force above, please give me the strength to wait out for my Aperta cables. |
@mbolek eager to hear your experience. As for me I have clocked in 10 hours today. Keep in mind the burn-in is for both the Aperta and the Argentum. The Argentum (XLR) is +6 hrs of burn-in. Still waiting for improvements in some aspects but I can say the combo is exceptional at soundstage depth and macro dynamics. Not a lot of bass. |
@v-fi I’m very relieved to hear your comment about the bass. I’m not a basshead, far from it. But when I had the cables in, it sounded like someone took the bass knob and turned it down by 70%. I imagine this is the doing of both the Argentum and Aperta. At hour 10 and the bass is still far from what it should be. But I’m eager to hear how it changes over time. The Summit X as you probably know, has 4 10-inch woofers in total and has 4 internal amps powering those woofers. I turned the bass knobs on the speakers to +4 and it didn’t increase much which is unusual. +0 has sounded the best to me in the past. It can go from -10 to +10 so a swing of 20. |
@lak 👍👍👍 Bass suddenly comes to life at hr 12. It's crazy. From -70% bass to proper bass. Wonderful extension for mids and highs. Female vocals are wonderful and airy. The negatives, borderline bright, actually it's pretty bright, lots of treble glare. Female vocals a bit sibilant on a few tracks. Sibilance is something my system never had. Separation is still not good especially on pop songs, treble glare. Keep in mind these are all early impressions of burn-in and prone to change. Bass is great. I'm terrible at describing bass. All the usual words apply, fast, punchy, textured, nuanced. |
Hr 14. It’s sounding amazing. Almost all negatives have disappeared. Tone and timbre are exceptional. The sound has this sweetness and delicacy in instruments and female voices. Veritas described the sound as "exposed". I believe it sounds somewhere between pure and unrestrained. It’s not bright but the highs are fully "exposed" and it is splendid. Turning up the volume to 90db, the sound remains fully composed. Not a hint of harshness and stridency. I tried to find songs where it would be unforgiving. Couldn’t find many. Songs like "Kiss My (uh oh) - Anne-Marie" during the chorus are where it can be fatiguing after a bit. I don’t get the sense that Argentum and Aperta together are track dependant, they feel more like system dependent. Something like a Bright focal is probably not a good match. A warm or neutral system needing more details and clarity, these are probably it. |
Good lord these 2 cables are blowing my mind. The first 12 hours I highly doubted myself. Asking what have I done with $1,100. Now they are extremely detailed and balanced sounding. Mids and highs I can only describe as ethereal and seductive. Expressive, highly detailed, greatly nuanced. These are the best $1,100 I’ve ever spent. Even a better purchase than the Isoacoustic Gaia which I love. Slapping myself in disbelief. |
27 hours on the pair of cables. Some more updates. These cables have excellent dynamic range for the mids and treble, lots of layering and details. Soft notes and vocal can be exquisitively soft and vice versa. The combination of these 2 cables also result in quite a forgiving sound. Mids and highs do not sound boosted in the slightest. It is also nicely smooth. I listened to many very poorly recorded tracks on soundcloud to reach this conclusion. They are not dark or sit to the warm side, so if these criterias are required for a forgiving sound, these are not it. |
@v-fi Thanks!! These cables have had wild changes since hr 1. Wild improvements to be more accurate. I’m curious to hear what’s in store at hr 50. |
@lak thanks for the PM earlier today. I couldn't directly reply. To the guys that break-in their cables by music listening, have you noticed the cables shift from sounding a little dull to perfectly right and then back and forth? |
@westcoastaudiophile really? Not the speakers or the eardrums? |
@tump350 nice! I have virtually the same hours as you. 1 thing I’m really surprised is how un-ruthless the Argentum and Aperta combo is. It doesn’t pull out the nasties of poorly recorded tracks. I wonder how well their power cables perform. |
45 hours of listening time on the Veritas cables. Not confident enough to say what kind of change had happened since my last update around 28 hours. Overall, I find these cables to have unusually good depth. Exceptional clarity but also forgiven. No sign of harshness. Fantastic musicality as well. What I mean by "musicality" is the smoothness and the sweetness of vocals and instruments that stems from the very clear and open upper midrange - treble range. I'm not good at describing bass but I can say it's not lean and sufficient in depth and quantity. |
@tubeguy80 holidays got the best of me too |
Take a new Veritas speaker cable and the Argentum X and put them in the system, you will have no bass for 12 hours. It’s a very clear indication of cable break in. But let’s ignore the bass for a second. Throughout my experience with new cables, almost all of them exhibit this etchy, echoey sound in the vocals. A small update. 53 hours on the Veritas cables. Not much to report since the last update. Nothing I'd reliably report anyway. |
54 hrs on the Veritas combo reporting in. My overall impression of these cables: They are intensively detailed, transparent, and musical (sweet and smooth). Sounds very balanced, treble and vocals are highly expressive and open. Best way to describe the sound is multiple veils of treble has been removed. This gives the impression of the treble being boosted but it’s not. Not in my system. The soundstage depth is also quite good, I believe this is due to the overly open treble and mids. Oh and the bass is juicy and bold (I’m so terrible at describing bass). Forget your past experience with silver and anemic bass. 54 hrs is still early in the overall break-in phase. I’d like to hear more dynamics and transparency, 2 things that could always be improved. I also wish for instruments to separate and be defined even better. System: Martin Logan Summit X speakers. BMC Ultradac, BMC CS3 amplifier. |
To further elaborate on why I say these highly detailed cables are not bright, I use a few tracks that are mastered hot. Rockabye by Anne Marie. Just smooth, and airy. And balanced. My heart will go on remix by Laback. Same, smooth and airy. Faded by Alan walker. This is the one track that always make me run for the door in most system, especially at the 1:00 mark. Here it is airy and smooth, still quite hot in the treble but enjoyable and not glaring. These cables make my system sounds very hi-fi without any of the drawbacks, which is something I've always chased after. |
Hour 67. Vocal is the star of the show but man... The dynamic range is absolutely incredible as well. From the mids to the highs, the shift can be quite stunning. I hope the cables can sound 5-10% smoother. That'd be perfection. I'd also like the cables to have better note decay. My system is capable of presenting previous notes cleanly. It can prevent new notes from overpowering/washing out the old ones. The cables are not performing at a high level in this regard. I hope it can improve as the burn-in progresses. Fingers crossed. |
I don't have a lot of cables. Still saving money for a streamer such as the Hifi Rose 130. Only compared it to a $80 silver plated cable, and a $200 Chinese "sterling silver" cable. I hear you on your descriptions. The background is not pitch black (I've always contributed this to the very unrestrained treble). Doesn't sound super relaxed either which again I contribute to the treble. I believe these traits are also why the cable needs improvement on notes decay and note to note distinction. I'll keep on reporting back as I clock more hours with burn-in. I have to say lately I find the cables (Veritas Argentum + Veritas Aperta speaker cable) to be highly transparent. It can sound highly smooth and relaxed with some tracks, bass monster and super energetic on other tracks. Its superb vocal rendition, along with the soundstage depth and dynamic range make each tracks sound unique and different. |
The sterling silver cable is a special one. A bit on the thinner side. Very relaxed, very smooth. Black background. Separation of every note and detail is at a level that defies belief. Thanks to the immense separation, everything else gets to shine. More micro/macro details, more micro/macro dynamics. Ease and effortless is the sound signature. A "less is more" kind of cable. It will keep these traits from tracks to tracks, which is its strength and also its weakness. But it also makes poorly mastered tracks a joy to listen to. |
@nwres They are certainly quite revealing and highly transparent. Did you notice the complete lack of bass the first 12 hours as I did? |
@tubeguy80 I just reached the 100 hour milestone. Will do some serious listening and update if anything noticeably changes. The last 30 hours or so have been mostly background music. |
I’m around 105 hours. Been busy so haven’t had a chance to properly sit down and listen. Will try to do another overview the next 1-2 days. But I’m here to report an abnormaly. On 2 different occasions I have lost sound with the Aperta speaker cable (same cable, left speaker). The cable was in tight when I lost my sound. I know it was in tight because I tried to check if they were in tight and they were and the sound didn’t come back, reinserting immediately fixed the problem. As I stated, this has happened twice. |
@nwres The morning of my last post talking about how it had happened twice, it happened for the third time that morning. I believe it has to do with how that specific banana plug work, I believe it has a mechanic that pushes outward for a tight fit? It has never happened to me before decades in this hobby, but then again I’ve never used a connector like this, not a big deal, jist reporting if anyone had similar experience. 110 hrs on 2 cables (Aperta, Argentum X). Not much else to update vs the 50 hr checkpoint, treble might possibly be a teeny bit more relaxed, hard to say. The bass has awakened quite a bit though. Very tight punchy bass and plentiful in quantity. How have you guys find the cables to sound in your system now? |
@nwres "how do you know it's the Aperta" My amp has vu meters and when there was no sound, the vu meters were playing as normal, indicating proper signal. As the problem had happened 3 times, I find, a little wiggle on the black cable of the Aperta silves the problem. It is strange indeed. People that have tried the Praeto cord, what would you say its strengths are?
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@darrinm "instruments aren’t as well separated" I know what you mean and I heard these too but slowly and surely it gets better. The Apertas (along with Argentum X) also have quite substantial bass quantity as more hrs are put in. Semi update. My BMC amp has run into an error. Expecting to fix it with a new module. Hope all things go well. For the time being I’m stuck around 115 hrs on the cables. |
@v-fi The clear and obvious decision is to contact Veritas and hear their recommendation. They have been pretty spot-on in the words they use to describe the sound. |
