Sakura Systems OTA Cable Kit


Has anyone tried this "minimalist" cable kit? After receiving a recommendation from someone with similar musical values to myself, and whose ears I trust, I could not resist ordering one. I will report on how they sound in a few weeks, but am interested in others' opinions too.

For those that have not heard about them look at www.sakurasystems.com for an interesting read. The cable sounds as if it is very close to the specification of the conductors in Belden Cat5. So I may have spent around 100 times what the kit is worth. We shall see.

If you have not heard this cable, please don't bother posting your opinions of how it MUST sound here. Nor am I that interested in hearing how stupid I must be to order this kit - it's my money and you are free to make different decisions with yours. Sorry for this condition, but I am bored with those that have nothing positive to offer on this site, and post their opinions based on deductive logic rather than actual experience.
redkiwi
I just finished using some smaller pieces of OTA as jumpers from some female rca's (to PCB) that I replaced on an amp that Dekay very kindly sent me. If anyone out there has any leftover wire that they would consider selling, please e-mail me. I'm thinking of enough to do a half-metre interconnect, and if I'm not mistaken, I would need about 2 metres (or 6 feet) to do that. I'm also thinking of a little experiment with an ungrounded power cord which would require about another 8 or 10 feet, but that is not critical. So if anyone has either 6 feet or 14-16 feet that they'd sell me, please let me know. Just bare wire, no connectors required.
Hi Sead:

Now that you brought it up, I may experiment with separate entrance and return holes/channels on the outer (neutral) portion of the RCA connectors. These will, of course be DIY "jobs", but the "loop", again haphazard in this application, (as it may or may not occur depending on the position of the wire) is something that does not "jive" with the reduced metal mass philosophy of the overall design, as this would add up to approx. 33% more metal mass to the connector (granted that a "loop" does occur), plus the uncertainty of the effect of the "loop" itself. I have noticed a substantial difference in the sound by how the cable is attached to the speakers/amp in that looping the wire around a binding post does some strange things to the LF response (a smaller contact area, sans loop, is my much preferred method). I now wonder if eliminating the possibility of a loop occurring (in any instance) in the IC's would also have beneficial results?

I do not quite understand your comments on the "outer ring" suggestion as this is by far the greatest stress point on the middle post of the RCA's (both when installing and uninstalling the RCA). The outer ring (plus...sans the second hole in the post) would significantly reinforce this specific area and would only be compromised by the tightness of the fit (on the post) and the single strand of 26 gage "bare" wire which would be forced under and held by the ring. These compromises are in comparison to engineering the concepts into a "one piece" unit. Maybe what I am envisioning is not made very clear by my wording as this is a difficult area for me?

I realize that the people who do not have these materials @ hand do not have a clue as to what we are talking about, so will end this discussion here.

Please feel free to email me directly with further thoughts/info and if we come up with anything that makes sense it can then be added to the thread. Now that you have sparked my interest, I will certainly play around with this as time and energy permits.

Unfortunately I just sold my SET amp, which was my favorite "window into the music" and super for testing gear (now using a push/pull amp in pinch). But fortunately I today purchased a vintage stereo SET console (complete with light weight paper drivers) that I hope to "part out" and have up and running in the next couple of months, granted that I can figure it out with the help of a few "web friends". It was $20 if I can get it out of the shop by tomorrow morning, so it is time to hit the hay right now.

As always, I look forward to further dialog.

Best regards,

David
Hello Sead, here is my small contribution to the OTA cable discussion.
I definitely prefer the Storatos speaker connection with the bananas in the setup. My impressions, after a number of trials with and without them in the system, were that the bananas reduce distortion and harshness, while giving more air and naturalness to the sound. Everything seems smoother but more open and relaxing.
Using of bananas is very simple but you should be careful when plugging in the banana in the speaker binding post: do that slowly without rotating the plug.

Best wishes to everyone

Ivo
Thanks for the info Ivos. Never knew they existed until Sead mentioned them. I will have to think of something to use to try this out (I'm in the USA).