I'm pretty sure that in this audiophile world that has forever been ridden with absolutes and crazy spending, I'm one of the biggest skeptic about cables. Having stuck to my trusty Dell usb-b cable since forever, I have yet to see an expensive USB cable or reasonably-priced USB purifiers that can help make a change.
Of course that's digital, and analog is another matter. I have actually seen some custom cables greatly change the headphones' sound. But then other question pops up: is that an actual improvement, or just a change in sound? If it really improves the quality, then why shouldn't I just straight up upgrade to another pair? Buying new would be much more refreshing and make much more sense economically.
IME, cables and purifiers rarely make hearable improvements, if at all.
Then there're those RCA cables like the Cable+ Pro. How do I think about those. Well, you guessed correctly: I've stuck to 2 pair of no-name Canare cables since forever. I've tried some thick (make 2 meters of those and you've got yourself an indoor snake), rare metal-ridden RCA cables onto my hundreds dollar DACs and headphone/hi-fi amps. Zero improvement.
Sure you'd easily tell when it's a pair of Canare or Chinese no-names (that got shipped for free with cheap amps). Yet the rules remain: there're the sub-standard, then there're the standard ones. The standard ones, no matter how expensive, only give you that much.
I literally went "Ptfff, big talks".
So, to be honest, when Burson offered me a chance to review the Cable+ Pro, I wasn't quite as excited as when they sent the Burson V5. That was a perfect small part to maximize the potential of my beloved hybrid tube amp. This, this is just a pair of cables (I thought). It should just be the same as the snakes my friend lent me. Should be the same as my Canares.
Anyway Burson was really quick to send the Cable+ Pro to me, just 2 weeks after I got home from a trip to the US. I received it on a Tuesday, didn't bother to plug it in right away. Just another cable products in this audiophile world that's full of absolutes, after all.
Came in a nice box.
Then I plugged it in on Friday's night. I was blown away, almost literally. MAKE SURE TO REDUCE THE VOLUME ON YOUR AMP AFTER CONNECTING THE CABLE+ PRO. Thankfully my Denon speaker amp wasn't playing at 11, so just a tiny bit of startle when I turn it on with the Cable+ Pro connected. Working in software services, I'm all too used to alarms and surprises.
A cable with a charger? How strange...
Now the sound. Here's the context: I have a Denon 780D + Klipsch KG4 sets. I always felt that the configuration was too dry and stale. As the amp and the speakers were given to me by my father, they always stay. The DACs had to go: the m9xx, the Hugo, the iDSD... all of them served my headphones and my Little Dot I+ really well, but they didn't play well with Denon. No matter what purifiers/expensive cables they got souped up with.
Even my current DAC, the Aune S16 with Slow filter leaves something to be desired. It smooth out my speakers the most, but I was seriously considering adding a sub or a tube preamp.
On Friday's night, happened the magic that's called "Cable+ Pro". After almost got blown away literally, I was blown away psychologically. The sound on my Denon+Klipsch got much much clearer, fuller and transparent. Words are beyond me, as this is not what happens when you change your amp, your DAC or anything that you would normally categorize in "it matters". This is just the replacement of the RCA-RCA cables from something already OK into something that, well, matters.
It's like I had owned 80% of my Aune+Denon+Klipsch. Now I own a full 100% of them.
Everything change when the Bursonization attacked.
Let me try putting the change in our typical "deal in absolutes" audiophilespeak. Have you ever heard Wonderwall? Of course you have, Oasis on the radio, or your nerd friend trying to impress someone after learning the guitar for a few weeks. So I put Wonderwall from Tidal on and for the first time ever, it really sound like Noel Gallagher is in the room with me and me wife. He was here, playing the guitar for us. That guitar tone now has that natural bite that I'd been longing for.
Then something more classical. "Love is Blue" by Paul Mauriat. Whatever they're playing at the start of the song, it's got sparks now! That instrument sparks like my childhood Noel lights!
Something more radical. "Smoke" by Amorphis. Your distorted electric guitar now has layers.
Something more sensational. "Self-Control" by Laura Branigan, God rests her soul. Your 80s synth bass now has timbre while that bling-bling keyboards/guitar chops is sending you back to Vice City.
Another huge reason for us lazy, stoic people to never go cord-cutting.
Moving onto another set, a pair of JBL XE5. These were the first proper hi-fi speakers that I bought for myself. Denon+JBL should have been more lively than what'd got previously, but that was just not the case. The JBLs were a bit underpowered and boring, even though the Denon had enough power to drive practically anything.
Now with the Cable+ Pro, it's got bass. JBL now sound like JBL. The boomy JBL attacks. "All about that bass" is on. I can now happily dance erratically looking at my wife's butt!
So this was on the website, but not in the box. Before singing more praises about the Cable+ Pro, a few (minor) criticisms. After all it's just a mutant cable, but I think Burson should have included a very brief user manual to note that:
- It is directional. There's small marking on the impedance-matching unit, but I think not everyone would see it at first. Take my father, who doesn't speak English, for example: to him it's just a typical pair of cables.
- You really should turn down the volume on your speaker set before making any changes to it. This is like "audio 101", but once again, who would have thought that way about a pair of cables?
Another small thing is that the Cable+ Pro requires another power plug to function. Obviously this could be a problem for some people. Anyway what I did was plugging it into the same strip as the Aune S16 and Little Dot I+.
Lastly, be aware that it runs a tad hot. That said, I live in an over-populated arch-type tropical city, so nothing ever runs cool. Just make sure to 1, not put the impedance-matching unit too near to your overheating amps and 2, turn it off after your listening session.
I just bursonized my headphone experiences!
Ok now more praises with the heavenly combo: Aune S16 -- Cable* Pro --> Little Dot I+ with Burson V5 installed. I actually wrote a review for the amp and almost thought that there was no room for (sensible) improvement in my S16 I+ V5 combo anymore. But after the mind-blowing experiences with the Denon, I had heaven-high expectation for the new combo.
Surely it had to go that way: I have never felt so drawn into music that much. IT WAS A WHOLE NEW EXPERIENCE, I crap you not! First it was about the soundstage: for me it was more or less a constant, though I can tell when it's a bit more open and a bit more intimate. Yet with the RS2e plugged into the very combo that I've used for the past few months, it feels like at one moment Barbara Streisand is in front of me, singing directly to me under the dim lights of a bar. Then suddenly the whole bar (let's say it's twice as big as Mos Eisley) lit up and I see the chorus people all around, standing next to the wall. They sang to me. Never had I been *that* into music. It felt surreal.
With my other headphones, the Alessandro MS2e and the Audio Technica ATH-AD2000, the improvement was not as impressive. Or maybe, I've set my expectations much higher and the "first time experience" effects have worn off. Nevertheless, I can still tell that it has made something already perfect much perfecter.
Well, I never knew it could be *this* good.
Only major cons: No Burson kangaroo logo.Which is my decisive conclusion about the Cable+ Pro: you'd never know that a pair of Canare cables with a charger can bring about this much enjoyment. As I had said many times to many people: I never seriously considered spending a lot on cables, purifiers, transports and other "peripheral stuffs" in audio. They rarely improved my beloved-for-life equipments, and when they did, the cost just doesn't justify the value. In my experiences, the only "peripheral stuffs" that could introduce the same amount of improvement have always costed too much: the Nordost power cable sold at around $350, the iFi iUSB3.0 Micro sold at $400... I like my music, but with a baby coming, I just can't keep buying $400 stuffs to improve a $600 DAC.
But at $200, I think the Cable+ Pro is a substantial improvement – the very value you'd expect from these Australian fellows. It is also the first cable product that turn me into a believer, that talking about cables it's not just 0 (you get very bad quality) or 1 (you get the normal, ok, standard experience no matter what the price). There's now a 10 for cables, one that truly changes what you hear - for the better, and without "rare metal" snake oil!
Of course that's digital, and analog is another matter. I have actually seen some custom cables greatly change the headphones' sound. But then other question pops up: is that an actual improvement, or just a change in sound? If it really improves the quality, then why shouldn't I just straight up upgrade to another pair? Buying new would be much more refreshing and make much more sense economically.
IME, cables and purifiers rarely make hearable improvements, if at all.
Then there're those RCA cables like the Cable+ Pro. How do I think about those. Well, you guessed correctly: I've stuck to 2 pair of no-name Canare cables since forever. I've tried some thick (make 2 meters of those and you've got yourself an indoor snake), rare metal-ridden RCA cables onto my hundreds dollar DACs and headphone/hi-fi amps. Zero improvement.
Sure you'd easily tell when it's a pair of Canare or Chinese no-names (that got shipped for free with cheap amps). Yet the rules remain: there're the sub-standard, then there're the standard ones. The standard ones, no matter how expensive, only give you that much.
I literally went "Ptfff, big talks".
So, to be honest, when Burson offered me a chance to review the Cable+ Pro, I wasn't quite as excited as when they sent the Burson V5. That was a perfect small part to maximize the potential of my beloved hybrid tube amp. This, this is just a pair of cables (I thought). It should just be the same as the snakes my friend lent me. Should be the same as my Canares.
Anyway Burson was really quick to send the Cable+ Pro to me, just 2 weeks after I got home from a trip to the US. I received it on a Tuesday, didn't bother to plug it in right away. Just another cable products in this audiophile world that's full of absolutes, after all.
Came in a nice box.
Then I plugged it in on Friday's night. I was blown away, almost literally. MAKE SURE TO REDUCE THE VOLUME ON YOUR AMP AFTER CONNECTING THE CABLE+ PRO. Thankfully my Denon speaker amp wasn't playing at 11, so just a tiny bit of startle when I turn it on with the Cable+ Pro connected. Working in software services, I'm all too used to alarms and surprises.
A cable with a charger? How strange...
Now the sound. Here's the context: I have a Denon 780D + Klipsch KG4 sets. I always felt that the configuration was too dry and stale. As the amp and the speakers were given to me by my father, they always stay. The DACs had to go: the m9xx, the Hugo, the iDSD... all of them served my headphones and my Little Dot I+ really well, but they didn't play well with Denon. No matter what purifiers/expensive cables they got souped up with.
Even my current DAC, the Aune S16 with Slow filter leaves something to be desired. It smooth out my speakers the most, but I was seriously considering adding a sub or a tube preamp.
On Friday's night, happened the magic that's called "Cable+ Pro". After almost got blown away literally, I was blown away psychologically. The sound on my Denon+Klipsch got much much clearer, fuller and transparent. Words are beyond me, as this is not what happens when you change your amp, your DAC or anything that you would normally categorize in "it matters". This is just the replacement of the RCA-RCA cables from something already OK into something that, well, matters.
It's like I had owned 80% of my Aune+Denon+Klipsch. Now I own a full 100% of them.
Everything change when the Bursonization attacked.
Let me try putting the change in our typical "deal in absolutes" audiophilespeak. Have you ever heard Wonderwall? Of course you have, Oasis on the radio, or your nerd friend trying to impress someone after learning the guitar for a few weeks. So I put Wonderwall from Tidal on and for the first time ever, it really sound like Noel Gallagher is in the room with me and me wife. He was here, playing the guitar for us. That guitar tone now has that natural bite that I'd been longing for.
Then something more classical. "Love is Blue" by Paul Mauriat. Whatever they're playing at the start of the song, it's got sparks now! That instrument sparks like my childhood Noel lights!
Something more radical. "Smoke" by Amorphis. Your distorted electric guitar now has layers.
Something more sensational. "Self-Control" by Laura Branigan, God rests her soul. Your 80s synth bass now has timbre while that bling-bling keyboards/guitar chops is sending you back to Vice City.
Another huge reason for us lazy, stoic people to never go cord-cutting.
Moving onto another set, a pair of JBL XE5. These were the first proper hi-fi speakers that I bought for myself. Denon+JBL should have been more lively than what'd got previously, but that was just not the case. The JBLs were a bit underpowered and boring, even though the Denon had enough power to drive practically anything.
Now with the Cable+ Pro, it's got bass. JBL now sound like JBL. The boomy JBL attacks. "All about that bass" is on. I can now happily dance erratically looking at my wife's butt!
So this was on the website, but not in the box.
- It is directional. There's small marking on the impedance-matching unit, but I think not everyone would see it at first. Take my father, who doesn't speak English, for example: to him it's just a typical pair of cables.
- You really should turn down the volume on your speaker set before making any changes to it. This is like "audio 101", but once again, who would have thought that way about a pair of cables?
Another small thing is that the Cable+ Pro requires another power plug to function. Obviously this could be a problem for some people. Anyway what I did was plugging it into the same strip as the Aune S16 and Little Dot I+.
Lastly, be aware that it runs a tad hot. That said, I live in an over-populated arch-type tropical city, so nothing ever runs cool. Just make sure to 1, not put the impedance-matching unit too near to your overheating amps and 2, turn it off after your listening session.
I just bursonized my headphone experiences!
Ok now more praises with the heavenly combo: Aune S16 -- Cable* Pro --> Little Dot I+ with Burson V5 installed. I actually wrote a review for the amp and almost thought that there was no room for (sensible) improvement in my S16 I+ V5 combo anymore. But after the mind-blowing experiences with the Denon, I had heaven-high expectation for the new combo.
Surely it had to go that way: I have never felt so drawn into music that much. IT WAS A WHOLE NEW EXPERIENCE, I crap you not! First it was about the soundstage: for me it was more or less a constant, though I can tell when it's a bit more open and a bit more intimate. Yet with the RS2e plugged into the very combo that I've used for the past few months, it feels like at one moment Barbara Streisand is in front of me, singing directly to me under the dim lights of a bar. Then suddenly the whole bar (let's say it's twice as big as Mos Eisley) lit up and I see the chorus people all around, standing next to the wall. They sang to me. Never had I been *that* into music. It felt surreal.
This was kinda like the IMAX The Dark Knight of music.
With my other headphones, the Alessandro MS2e and the Audio Technica ATH-AD2000, the improvement was not as impressive. Or maybe, I've set my expectations much higher and the "first time experience" effects have worn off. Nevertheless, I can still tell that it has made something already perfect much perfecter.
Well, I never knew it could be *this* good.
Only major cons: No Burson kangaroo logo.
But at $200, I think the Cable+ Pro is a substantial improvement – the very value you'd expect from these Australian fellows. It is also the first cable product that turn me into a believer, that talking about cables it's not just 0 (you get very bad quality) or 1 (you get the normal, ok, standard experience no matter what the price). There's now a 10 for cables, one that truly changes what you hear - for the better, and without "rare metal" snake oil!