JADE AUDIO Cables

Jafox, do you not have the Stealth Dream pcs in your system any longer? I am seriously thinking of getting some.

As I mentioned earlier, I visited JD over Christmas and compared the Vermeil and Gold on his system. There were aspects of the sound I preferred with the Golds, but the mid bass down was better with the Vermeil. I have a 4.5 m. pair coming once JD has the kinks worked out. I should note that all I listen to is single ended RCAs.

Tbg - I currently own a pair of Stealth Dream (power model) PCs and several Stealth M5000 PCs. When I had only one Dream cable, I danced it around the system to determine the comparative benefits at each component. Some models, the Aesthetix Io and Rives PARC in particular, were significantly transformed with the Dream over the M5000 than the others components. The Aesthetix Callisto was next followed closely by the DAC and amps.

The tonality is very similar between the Dream and M5000, but the Dream brings on more resolution and coverage in the top. However, the significant benefit is very much in parallel to the Jade Gold cable - you get a wealth of spatial cues and silence between the notes that catches you off guard. How a silly power cable can do this just makes no sense. With a return back to the M5000, the reduction in these qualities is immediately noticeable. But 1/2 hour back with the M5000 indicates this is still a mighty good PC as everything is well balanced. If I was running with something other than the Io & Callisto, I suspect the Dream vs. M5000 would not be as significant.

Two nights ago, I removed the Dream PCs from the system and shuffled around the M5000's and a spare pair of FIM Gold PCs to get my ears tuned to not having the Dream PCs in the system. A couple hours later, I replaced the M5000s on the CAT JL-3 amps with the Dream PCs. The benefits were much the same sonic characteristics as with the front-end components, but not to the same degree. The M5000 with the JL-3's really works mighty fine already. So there is clearly a pecking order here and I suspect this would be true with any system but not necessarily at the same links. It's best to put aside all the theories and just try out many combinations through trial and error. All these claims that the "best" cable has to be at the top of the chain, etc. etc, is often not at all the case with my own experiementation.

As I get more and more Dream PCs, I will repeat the process to find the best fit for the cables I have. Perhaps with 3 of these, one on a front-end component and 2 back at the amps will be the way to go. But I know that Stealth recommends a system to be fully loaded with the Dream cable to benefit from its unique grounding/sheilding schemes with the various Dream models. These things are so expensive that I have to hope that at least a couple M5000s will survive to keep down the final cost.

I also have recently been advised to investigate having isolated grounds installed for the dedicated circuits. This is reported to be even more significant of an improvement than the benefits of these PCs. Now I just need to find an electrician to come over and give me an idea of the process involved to do this. This is in the back of my mind before I go off and spend a mint on 3-4 more Dream PCs.

John, thanks for the remarks on the Dream p/c's, I'll have to try some. FWIW, have you heard any Virtual Dynamics Master or Revelation series p/c's? I'm thinking these are the best that I've heard to date. VD also recommends that you cable your whole system with their line. I think that's pretty much a stock manufacturer claim. I'm sure one day JD will be bugging us to buy his speaker cables and power cords. ;^)

I do have isolated grounds on my dedicated circuits. I cannot tell you what the difference would be though, because I had them both installed at the same time. Overall, it was a tremendous improvement, but I couldn't sonically seperate the performance parameters of the two.

John

John - I heard the VD Revelation for a brief time last year when I was getting my Manley DAC updated. This audition was made in another audio system. With the VD Rev PC, the Manley had quite a flat presentation, not at all like I had heard it before.....something was just not right. When the VD Rev cable was replaced by a Dominus Ferox PC, the Manley quite extraordinarily blossomed into a most incredible performance. The 2 PCs were than compared to a top-tier Wadia setup and here the differences were very very subtle with the VD Rev cable bringing on just a tiny bit more detail and extension at the frequency extremes as I recall. Somehow the Dominus and more recently I have learned, the Stealth M5000 and Dream PCs, have magical properties to bring out tube gear strengths that somehow escapes other PCs.

We are getting off topic here guys, but given your experience I wonder if you have tried the Prana and Purist Audio Anniversary wires. I have several friend urging me to forget the Stealth and to get one or the other of these. I have a good deal more confidence in Serguei than I do in the others, but I have also often been surprised with what people can come up with, with JD being a prime example.