CX, EX, K, S, Oladra, Antipodes, Owners Unite

[Clive101]

Clive, have you tried the Jcat M12 Gold switch? I have not, but from what I have read on WBF it is an end game solution. Looking at the after dark web site I see they sell audiophile cable lifters for £115 each - that makes me skeptical about anything else they sell

Looking at the cable lifters well made for approx £28.00 each not too bad. I did read somewhere lifting cables made a difference because of touching a surface electromagnetic force of some type.
I am not sure and not done an AB with cables lifters but could make a difference perhaps with a vibrating floor perhaps?
I have not tried the Jcat but tried a few switches a while ago, one degraded SQ.
I tried a Melco S100 (AKA Dela100) a few years ago but the benefit in my system at the time was marginal (perhaps the CX EX had more filtering effect) so just moved on.
I am thinking of sending the AfterDark to another well know member to see if they have a similar view.

 

[kennyb123]

Looking at the cable lifters well made for approx £28.00 each not too bad. I did read somewhere lifting cables made a difference because of touching a surface electromagnetic force of some type.
I am not sure and not done an AB with cables lifters but could make a difference perhaps with a vibrating floor perhaps?

I use some of the now-discontinued Shunyata Dark Field Elevators. I did not notice an improvement when first placing these under my speaker cables. A friend wanted to try them so I sent them off. That's when I noticed that sound quality had degraded as things became a little smeared. It was subtle but it was enough to have me looking forward to receiving them back.

I now use MIT speaker cables that have networks within plastic boxes. My previous pair were from the MIT Oracle series and they had the metal box. Placing these boxes on the original Stillpoints cones brought an improvement that wasn't difficult to hear. Moving up to the Ultra SS improved things even more but that's when diminishing returns kicked in.

My speakers sit on Stillpoints so I do think that as part of the reason I heard further gains from getting the speaker cables off the floor and onto devices that help to drain vibration off of the cables. I think it's a good practice as well to keep power cords and signal cables from touching the floor. It's more of a good hygiene step though I think the more that one sweats the small stuff the more this will matter. There are other things that should be done before this. Like for example, swapping out the AC outlet that feeds one's system. If one is still using a builder-grade outlet, I think you will be stunned by how much even a $50 audiophile outlet can bring.

 

[kennyb123]

Firstly, without question, streaming sounds better than local files on both the K50 and Oladra with the AfterDark switch, I flipped back and forth between Qobuz and the same file on the SSD (Roon gives you the option of different versions).

Wow, that I wasn't expecting.

Even on SSD with the AfterDark there is an improvement.

Wild, huh?

More to follow next week

Thanks for entire report you shared. I'm glad this is all working out well for you.

 

[andrewd01]

Looking at the cable lifters well made for approx £28.00 each not too bad. I did read somewhere lifting cables made a difference because of touching a surface electromagnetic force of some type.
I am not sure and not done an AB with cables lifters but could make a difference perhaps with a vibrating floor perhaps?
I have not tried the Jcat but tried a few switches a while ago, one degraded SQ.
I tried a Melco S100 (AKA Dela100) a few years ago but the benefit in my system at the time was marginal (perhaps the CX EX had more filtering effect) so just moved on.
I am thinking of sending the AfterDark to another well know member to see if they have a similar view.

Yes maybe I was bit harsh about the lifters. I see they are £116 for a box of four - when I first saw them on the web site I thought that was the price for each lifter.

I can understand that there is some technical justification for getting the cables off the floor, but what makes me cringe is when the lifters are made from exotic materials with all sorts of pseudo-scientific claims and a silly price. I have python-like cables myself (Kimber 3035) and have thought about getting some lifters 3D printed to get the cables off the floor. Would probably cost about £30 for a full set of lifters.

 

[andrewd01]

An example of foo cable lifters at £320 each!!

https://www.futureshop.co.uk/furute...e4-0f54a_pe8JYb3eHwh_bzpni5Di0XBoCqEwQAvD_BwE

’NCF is comprised of a special crystalline material that has two “active” properties. First, it generates negative ions that eliminate static and secondly, it converts thermal energy into far-infrared. Furutech then combines this remarkable crystalline material with nano-sized ceramic particles and carbon powder for their additional “Piezo Effect” damping properties. The resulting Nano Crystal Formula is the ultimate electrical and mechanical damping material.’

 

[kennyb123]

An example of foo cable lifters at £320 each!!

https://www.futureshop.co.uk/furute...e4-0f54a_pe8JYb3eHwh_bzpni5Di0XBoCqEwQAvD_BwE

’NCF is comprised of a special crystalline material that has two “active” properties. First, it generates negative ions that eliminate static and secondly, it converts thermal energy into far-infrared. Furutech then combines this remarkable crystalline material with nano-sized ceramic particles and carbon powder for their additional “Piezo Effect” damping properties. The resulting Nano Crystal Formula is the ultimate electrical and mechanical damping material.’

It may sound far fetched but nothing described defies science. It is most certainly possible to create a material that has these properties.

While NCF has many fans, there are some that don’t appreciate the result. The same is true of Synergistic’s UEF compound.

 

[Progisus]

Audiophile fuses are the outer limits of snake oil. Especially when someone attaches them to the wires with tie wraps and no electrical connections. BUT… if it sounds better to the purchaser, mission accomplished.

 

[kennyb123]

Audiophile fuses are the outer limits of snake oil. Especially when someone attaches them to the wires with tie wraps and no electrical connections. BUT… if it sounds better to the purchaser, mission accomplished.

I know that I don’t have enough information to declare them to be at the outer limits of snake oil. Since Synergistic hasn’t disclosed much, I’m not sure any of us can.

Last week I had skimmed through Shunyata’s patent for what became their TAP module. The confirms for me that there is can be merit to manipulating the EM field around a conductor.

https://patents.google.com/patent/US20180183227A1/en?inventor=Caelin+Gabriel

 

[7ryder]

Hi All,

I had a day with the Oladra and the AfterDark Switch (fully loaded, fiber, in from a noisy 20 port poe network switch, ethernet out to server) SJ DC1.

I first tried the K50 with the AfterDark to remind myself of the sound and then switched to the Oladra with the AfterDark.

Firstly, without question, streaming sounds better than local files on both the K50 and Oladra with the AfterDark switch, I flipped back and forth between Qobuz and the same file on the SSD (Roon gives you the option of different versions).
After a while and a little practice, I could tell the difference without an AB. "Once" I was a little disappointed as I could not find a difference only to discover Qobuz had only two versions of the same album and I had no version on SSD!

So, I tried the Oladra without the AfterDark to see how the Oladra would sound, conclusion the AfterDark was an upgrade.

I have yet to switch back to the K50 (next week) to fully compare with the Oladra.

But for the moment the Oladra has more detail but relaxed (not dark, bloated) and more musical than the K50 and I can tolerate poorly recorded tracks with the Oladra whereas with the k50 can find it a little irritating by comparison.

The AfterDark gives better timing, separation, lower noise and cleaner sound ie it seems to unjumble the music but does not add any brightness.
It does this to the K50 and the Oladra. Even on SSD with the AfterDark there is an improvement.

More to follow next week

I have the Pink Faun version of the S100 and experienced the same improvement in my system. Frankly, it made more of an impact than adding the K50 later on.

 

[kennyb123]

Frankly, it made more of an impact than adding the K50 later on.

That’s really saying something.

 

[7ryder]

That’s really saying something.

I had the switch in my system and was demoing an Innuous Statement and, later, the K50. In both cases, taking the switch out of my system down graded the sound more than adding either server. At that time I was using a SGC i7 server. I ended up getting the K50 after my SGC couldn't be upgraded to WIN 11.

 

[F208Frank]

K50 for sale if anyone is interested.

MINT, with receipt from athorized dealer, under 7 months old.

Unboxed, set on desk, never moved since.

PM if interested, prefer local pick up in NY at my residence.

 

[vgmbpty]

Regarding using switches, I used to have fiber with Finisar SFPs going into SOtM SNH10g fully upgraded + Hypsos Power Supply + AfterDark Emperor 2 crown clock + Ether Regen + LPSU + A/D external clock, an ENO Acoustic filter before entering the streamer, all of these were inferior to the sound I get from the fiber and SFP going into the new Melco S10 switch (latest version), streaming Qobuz.

I have yet to compare the current Melco N10 vs the Oladra (Waiting for arrival for testing). However, I can tell you that in spite of having the best internet switch and cables I could afford, still playing a local file from the Melco N10 (latest version) will sound a bit better than streaming the same file from Qobuz in my system (Melco S10, Melco N10, Verity Audio Monsalvat Pre-2, MBL N15 monoblocks, MBL 116 speakers).

These results remained consistent if I used the Melco or an Innuos Zenith to stream from Qobuz. Some network Ph.D. that happens to be an audiophile once told me "The best network is no network". Go figure.

 

[kennyb123]

I have yet to compare the current Melco N10 vs the Oladra (Waiting for arrival for testing). However, I can tell you that in spite of having the best internet switch and cables I could afford, still playing a local file from the Melco N10 (latest version) will sound a bit better than streaming the same file from Qobuz in my system

I have drawn the line at going much further with network optimization in favor of focusing on local playback. I must admit though that I am intentionally trying to avoid knowing what I might be missing out on. My bank account can't handle the truth.

 

[naynay]

Any one playing there PGGB files 768/1024/24bit from there server USB but going through M Scaler to Dave dual BNC? Have not played or messed around with this in a long time so have a bit of brain freeze. When I use Squeeze to play the PGGB files they sound like they are playing in slow motion time? Have I not set something correctly?