cardas hexlink golden 5c speaker cable

In my experience Cardas is too colored, slow and unbalanced; not enough resolution; it distorts badly everything that passes through it. Connectors are okay though.

Jmlab926, I agree with you that the Cardas is warm, slow and less revealing than the Nordost cables. However, i much prefer the Red Dawn V2 to the Blue Heaven.
In my system the Blue Heaven was way too bright and cold... The RedDawn v2 is much more revealing than the Blue Heaven and is far warmer.

I find that in many systems, Cardas is not the first choice when I wear my audiophile analytical cap. Other cables are sometimes a little faster, more detailed on top, etc.

HOWEVER, when I want to enjoy the music, Cardas usually stomps the others. It seems to have a naturalness that conveys the emotion of a piece more beautifully than other cables.

I think that George Cardas optimizes his designs for overall beauty of reproduction rather than speed and detail.

My preference is usually for Cardas Golden Reference over Cardas Golden Cross, unless I'm dealing with an unusually dry sounding system.

A cable I'm experimenting with lately and find fantastic - unfortunately out of production - are the Empirical Audio (Steve Nugent's stuff). This is not Empirical Design, which I've not heard. The EA are a little more detailed and lean than Cardas but still convey the emotion of the music - wonderful.

Another cable that I think offers a good compromise between detail and musicality are the top of the line Discovery, although the bass is not as deep as Cardas Golden Reference.

I have definitely heard some brands of cable which have all the speed and transparency that you could ever ask for but sound dry as a bone and completely un-involving.

System matching with cable is so important!

Art

art so you prefer golden reference to hexlink golden 5c
as the latter is more neutral // less dark??
norman

i owned golden hex 5 c and golden cross. i found neither warm. i sold them because they were not very full sounding in the upper mids. i have heard from others that there is a glare in the midrange produced by these cables, but without listening myself, i can't confirm such opinions.

i am not a fan of cardas cables and would not use them again.

most cable manufacturesrs do not deliberately design their cables to sound "warm", as "warm" is a coloration.

the goal of most designers is minimizing errors in frequency response, and providing as much resolution as possible, at a price point.

if you are looking for "warm" cables, i would listen to older purist audio cables, like the colossus, or the original nbs cables.