Transparent , Kubala , Luminous , or RS Poiema

I read alot of comments about dropping in a cable here or a pc there and right away WOW, it blows such and such away. I would caution anyone, especially someone new to the hobby to be careful about such claims, immediate impact is easy to ascertain but is it right for you when the "newness" wears off.

I agree, caution is imperative before making such a conclusion. And yet there have been a few times where a cable immediately and so handily outperformed one I had been using for so 5 years. The NBS statement to Purist Dominus transition was such a time. Trying the NBS cables hours later or days later was the same. And going back to the NBS, which I held onto for many months after loading my system with Dominus, was futile. In some cases, such as this, it is inevitable at first listen. Btw, the result was the same with K-S Emotion cables over the NBS; overall I preferred the Dominus in my system. It was not synergy, but rather my preferences of one product's strengths/weaknesses to another. A local audiophile friend would have chosen the K-S and I understand exactly why. But we both concluded upon first listen to either the K-S or Purist, that the NBS was far far behind both of these.

There have been many times where just in a matter of minutes, I know that a product will NOT work. This can be a tube that has a fatiguing edginess (in the mids or trebles), a cable that squelches dynamic contrasts, a line stage that truncates the harmonic overtones, etc. For such flaws, dismissing a product quickly is easy. No amount of fiddling around is going to resolve such issues when I can go back to what I had before and be done. Even when the "new" product brings on some refinements of its own, if the result is fatigue or less involvement, out it goes.

The challenge is when we try something new and then we sit there struggling to hear a difference. The only way to come to a conclusion is to play for a few days with one and then go back to the other. I have not found that I need more than this amount of time to know if one allows me to escape into the music more than the other. If they are truly a draw, which so far has only been the case for me with a couple pairs of different tubes and some tonearms, I go with the less-expensive one and sell off the other. Now if you are looking to completely overhaul your system with cables, that's a different story. With all the combinations, even within one manufacturer's line, that's a lot of time. There is one other factor, product burn-in, that we have to take into account before we perform a shootout.

cable shootouts are fun but require alot of time, effort, crawling around and bending over!

Oh so true and I am happy to know I am close to being done with all this. Removing and replacing cables over and over is not a good thing anyway.

After much time spent auditioning my MIT Oracles and many other cables mentioned here I have fallen for the Krell Cast system...it is a quantum leap in music reproduction. My last demo session was spent with my daughter...she heard the superiority of the cast cable immediately. She said, the 2nd one (cast) makes the band sound like they are right in front of me...enogh said!

I take it back...don't hate me! I listened all day to complex orchestral music and it was amazing how much better the MIT's were on the amp side. On the front end side the cast still rules..process continues.

Does your daughter still approve of the Krell cast? Better check with her before you make the change.

As a matter of fact she was correct on the 505 to 202 connection..cast is far superior! On the amp end is where I made the call and am using MIT Oracle V1.1..it wasn't even close. In fact, before the music started playing on my Bernstein/Schuman disc, I could here more of a sense of the hall and the live audience..tension was in the silence. Don't even think for a moment that your lame attempt at sarcasm makes up for your shallow wit. What sort of music and poor probable picnic player do you favor? By the way, I've owned or had on loan more cables than most of the audiofeils posting here. My pursuit of the absolute has taken many paths, comparable only to those reviewers we all read on a monthly basis. If my self effacing nature has eluded you, be sure my fellow auio officianado, I am more discriminating than most can afford to be. Good day:)

Bottom line, cast on the new evo front end works. Cast on the back end does not. Insert your favorite cable where you will. Of course you need a great pair of speakers, proper setup, power cords and music that can allow one to here improvements.