Jena Labs Symphony vs. Valkyre IC's


could someone detail the sonic differences between the Jena Labs Symphony and Valkyre IC's?
mejames
hello Frank yes 6 foot is plenty I was thinking about that possibility also. Justin
I would be interested in hearing more comparisons between the Symphony and Valkyre as well. I think Jtinn and Tireguy have the most experience with the two cables around here.
I've compared and listened to the trio plus, fugue, symphony, valkyre and pathfinder in a few different systems over the last few years. I previously thought the symphonies offered the greatest "value" in there line up- maybe they do- but not long ago I realized that value is not the right way of explaining it. I've also said in the past that as you move up the line you get more, that's kind of ambiguous and in a way inaccurate. Having personally owned symphony and pathfinder interconnects I feel I have a great understanding of just how much better they get as you move up.

When I purchased the pathfinders I was not anticipating on liking them much, I didn't think they were going to be much better then my symphonies. As soon as I put them in the improvement was dramatic, the biggest change was the air and three dimensionality of instruments, vocals or any other presence on the recording. Everything had gained its own "space" on the soundstage unlike anything I have ever experienced in my room before. A flute sounded light and delicate but true to what a flute sounded in the space a flute belonged. Dynamics increased signicantly which probably added to the air, space and all of the other new found improvements. Soundstage gained not only width and depth but accuracy(this is how you can, in a half assed way, say that it is "more" of the house sound), the back ground became a little blacker with greater contrast, speed and attack also became much better. So now the question is how can you compare a cable that is $1100 to one that is $6000? It hardly seems fair, but if your bank account will permit it and you want the next level, the improvements are there and well worth the price of admission- to this listener any way.

As to symphony vs. valkyre, I've only compared them directly once and in a system I was not too familiar with at the time. It was hard to draw a conclusion, the changes were clearly not night and day, but subtle. From my experiences as an audiophile these subtle changes are why we are in the hobby. When your listening to a piece of music that you've enjoyed 100 times in the past, and this time your a dozen little steps closer to connecting with the music- the money spent means very little. These subtle changes are also the things that make a system enjoyable day in and day out, reducing listener fatigue, allowing you to enjoy more music more of the time. Instead of throwing a lot of meaningless adjectives around, I thought, for a change, I would try to rationalize it as I saw it.
It's comments like that that always tempts me to upgrade from the Symphony's. But when you really look at it, the Valkyre's are about 3 times the price and the Pathfinder's are 6X the price. Costs-no-object, I have no doubt that the Pathfinders or even the Dreamdancers are the way to go. But I think the Symphonys are at a level where it wouldn't be a weak link in a SOTA system. I have no reason to doubt that the Symphony is where the sweetspot is.

But it's not such a big issue. Upgrading from Symphony's is going to be easy. Since the cables are made pretty much the same way (except more wires), you can upgrade one IC at a time. But for the difference in price between the Symphonys and Pathfinders, I would bet using the money on 2 top of the line powercords would be a better upgrade. But I would imagine that someone with everything in place wouldn't be able to live knowing that there's something better out there.