|
Review |
||
|
|
Richard's Review of the Ultimate Silver Dream interconnect cables - April 2010
"Hello Alister
The Ultimate Silver Dreams (USDs) between
my CD player and preamp, bought just before
Christmas, are now well
settled in and I am extremely pleased with them. The following is probably, no
make that certainly, too long but what the heck!
My system consists of a Pink Triangle
Numeral CD player, a Balanced
Audio Technology VK3i valve preamp, a Passlabs Aleph 3 power amp (30
class A watts) and AVI pro 9 monitor speakers (the room is quite modest in
size) on Partington Discovery stands and connected to the Aleph with Goertz M1
flat solid core copper cables. As you can tell most of this is about 10 years
old; I believe in trying to get it right the first time rather than constant
change. The system was put together with the help of John Jeffries of Sounds
of music who took great trouble to make sure I was happy with it. He supplied
the previous interconnects with the system as being suitable for its quality;
they are of course copper and he suggested that the price was about £100 for
each set.
Obviously with these components the system
isn't harsh; it's sound is sweet and musical, rather than dry or grey, with
what I have always thought was excellent tonal timbre. The Aleph is largely
reponsible for the nature of the sound I think; once I heard it I had to have
it. Some might say the sound is (or was) a little rose tinted but not me; I
think the BAT and the Aleph have an accurate full tonality that class AB
transistor amplification often lacks. The arrival of the AVI speakers made the
system more dynamic and replacing the standard mains cabling with a Supplier 6
and Opus and Orbit cables from your rival (on the interconnect and speaker
cable front), the Missing Link, made an obvious improvement.
Recently I have felt the system could be
more transparent and detailed and thought upgrading the interconnects could be
the way to go. However, I was reluctant to splash out the vast sum asked for
many interconnects without any certainty that a real improvement would be
achieved. I saw the review in last December's HiFi World of your Silver Dream
interconnects, noted the reasonable price, had a look at your website and the
rest, as they say, is history.
As the change mainly affects the Numeral I
will say a little more about it. It was chosen after comparison with about
four other machines in the £800 to £1500 bracket partly for its even
presentation, tone and detail but mainly because, unlike many CD players of
that time, it does not impose a mechanical feel on music. It has the happy
knack of giving music the natural flow and structure it should have. I am sure
these days many more CD players achieve this. Of course the late lamented PT
were never absolutely the last word in reliability and the Numeral had to go
back to them on a couple of occasions in its first year or so. On both
occasions, and I think this does PT great credit, it came back sounding better
than it ever had before; they had obviously taken real trouble to set it up
right. Since then it has, touch wood, been completely reliable.
The worry I had when ordering your
interconnects was that their transparency would reveal that the
player wasn't as good as
I thought. I needn't have worried; they have demonstrated beyond any doubt
that the performance of the Numeral was being seriously held back by the
previous interconnects. I was also concerned that the shortcomings in some
older recordings might be revealed too mercilessly; again this hasn't
happened. Sam Cooke's
voice always soars but never so well on my system before - and these
recordings come from the 50s and early 60s.
So what difference do they make? I can't
really improve on what you say on your website or what is said in
Amine
Slimani's review but I will try to summarise the effect on my listening
experience in more general terms. The sound is more dynamic and incisive while
at the same time being more flowing and relaxed. There is much improved fine
detail, depth and tonal timbre and more space around instruments. The sound
also has a delicate lightness of touch while remaining full; this may sound
paradoxical but I don't think it is. I think one of the tests of a true
upgrade is that certain musical passages in well liked music that didn't
attract your attention before, seeming simply to be a minor part of the
musical tapestry, suddenly do attract your attention and seem notable in their
own right; this has happened repeatedly with your cables.
Since writing the above I have replaced
the interconnects between the preamp and power amp with USDs which have now
been in place for about four weeks and I confirm your observation that the
benefits are cumulative. The last paragraph applies again but more so! The
difference with some recordings between pre USD days and now is really quite
astonishing.
I find it difficult to imagine that if I
had replaced any one item in my system with an expensive upgrade it could have
improved my system as much as using your cables has. This makes them
outstanding value for money on any reckoning. I can't say of course how they
sound when compared with Nordost Odins or other eye wateringly expensive
cables but what you have certainly done is produce a product that is capable
of bringing the best out of mid-range and lower high range systems at a
reasonable price. I now feel that I am getting the best that the Numeral, BAT
and Aleph can deliver; that best is very good indeed and the upgradeitis I was
beginning to suffer from has been cured, possibly for good!
If you can find anything worth using in
these rather turgid paragraphs please feel free.
With best wishes,
Richard"
|
