[solstice15]

My first Eltech cable arrived yesterday! Raphael. Got it to pair with EE Raven after reading impressions (although not Raven specific) here I suspected it would be a good pairing and it is

Compared to the stock PWAudio cable I hear greater note weight and some sweetness in the mids, already superb stage/imaging are maintained. Enhances without transforming, just what I was looking for. Great ergonomically as I tend to prefer thinner cables and the stock is a bit chunky.

OTL on the way for Jewel next week. I heard that pairing at canjam earlier this year and it's haunted me ever since. Previously had a mental ~$1k limit for cables, after hearing that I knew I'd be breaking it. And this was comparing to PW august fun (1960s mkii) which had lived on my Jewel for a year up to that point and will finally be replaced, not the diabolically bad Jewel stock cable. I tried a who's who of available cables that weekend and none left a greater impression.

On an unrelated note, I stopped by the Eletech booth a year earlier, prior to my Jewel stock cable induced cable epiphany. Eric asked if I wanted to hear anything and ignoring all of the cables I pointed at a Susvara (with inferno) I appreciated him letting me have a listen even though he must've known I had zero interest in what he was selling

 

[Sifo]

My first Eltech cable arrived yesterday! Raphael. Got it to pair with EE Raven after reading impressions (although not Raven specific) here I suspected it would be a good pairing and it is

Compared to the stock PWAudio cable I hear greater note weight and some sweetness in the mids, already superb stage/imaging are maintained. Enhances without transforming, just what I was looking for. Great ergonomically as I tend to prefer thinner cables and the stock is a bit chunky.

OTL on the way for Jewel next week. I heard that pairing at canjam earlier this year and it's haunted me ever since. Previously had a mental ~$1k limit for cables, after hearing that I knew I'd be breaking it. And this was comparing to PW august fun (1960s mkii) which had lived on my Jewel for a year up to that point and will finally be replaced, not the diabolically bad Jewel stock cable. I tried a who's who of available cables that weekend and none left a greater impression.

On an unrelated note, I stopped by the Eletech booth a year earlier, prior to my Jewel stock cable induced cable epiphany. Eric asked if I wanted to hear anything and ignoring all of the cables I pointed at a Susvara (with inferno) I appreciated him letting me have a listen even though he must've known I had zero interest in what he was selling

Enjoy your new goodies. In my experience as a guest of Eletech and also from assisting in manning the booth with Eric, his main desire is to connect with other enthusiasts. He wants your feedback on the products but is certainly not trying to or expecting to sell you anything in the moment, so I wouldn't worry about that. He makes products that he in believes in and look where that's lead you And yes, OTL is a fun pairing with Jewel for sure

 

[theveterans]

My first Eletech headphone cable has arrived! Been using the stock Susvara for about 3 weeks already and finally have the Inferno to complete my Susvara setup. I'll write up a more detailed thoughts once the cable is ready. Initial impressions so far is that it's tighter and more restrained or "faster" sounding compared to the burned-in stock Susvara cable. I can already immediately tell the imaging and staging difference against the stock cable and so far to me both versions are excellent. I'll write a much more thorough impression when the cable has gone through about 50-100 hours of settling in

The cable build and feel is 1000x better than the black nylon sleeved stock cable Kudos to Eric Chong and Wang for crafting such beautiful cable and wonderful unboxing experience!

 

[theveterans]

It's about 12 hours of playback now. Soundstage and layering has opened up and is now matching or exceeding the Hifiman stock cable on some tracks (the monocrystalline copper and monocrystalline silver version which can be seen on the ugly medical tube but not on the latest version which is now black nylon sleeved). From the moment of 0 hours of burn-in Inferno sounds faster than stock Hifiman cable and this trait hasn't change at all as of this writing. Because of this tighter sound, macrodynamics can be perceived as slightly less than stock Hifiman cable, but the stock cable dynamics aren't really refined: they're less controlled sounding which is reminiscent of an inferior Aliexpress IEM cable but the stock Hifiman cable somehow still hits hard and slams hard. Because of this stock cable signature, it helps in masking the shortcomings and extract better sound perception on budget amplifiers while adding the Inferno can actually be detrimental since it's more transparent to the shortcomings of the upstream components.

Also, tonality is now clearer to me: Inferno cleans up midbass bloat and reveals texture better than stock cable while it also cleans up the upper treble resonance that can be mistaken as "airy" sounding, but to me they're unwanted resonances that sounds more fatiguing over time. Vocals sibilance is also reduced significantly with Inferno so now I don't wince as much when compared to stock Hifiman cable.

More to come after about a week of listening

 

[warrenpchi]

@theveterans, I'm asking out of curiosity, but what made you choose the Inferno over the Purgatorio, if anything?

 

[theveterans]

@theveterans, I'm asking out of curiosity, but what made you choose the Inferno over the Purgatorio, if anything?

When I went to Canjam SoCal, I didn’t bring my Susvara since I made an assumption that Eric won’t probably have flown from SG with a poweful desktop amp there that can utilize the Susvara to the fullest. Being familiar with the stock hifiman cable already, I know I wanted a cable to not only to get rid of the still cheap looking stock cable relative to Susvara, but I also want to get rid of the excess lower to upper treble energy that I perceive with stock cable as a bit grating and unrefined. The only way to fix this problem is that if I disable oversampling and run NOS but now I have lost the fine details and larger soundstage that OS typically provides. I made an assumption that the inferno cable should fix the treble issue being a pure OCC woven copper with shielding added.

I did bring my Mini Closed headphone to compare between the Purgatorio and Inferno and using Erick’s Lotoo Paw Gold Touch, Purgatorio revealed superior technical performance where it made the Mini’s bass hit harder and punchier compared to the thicker and more physical and more trailing decay from Inferno. Also, due to subdued treble from Mini Closed, Purgatorio increased the treble perception while being more refined and as such tilting the signature to be “neutral smooth” while Inferno was warm neutral with lower treble emphasis. Vocals are more fleshed out of the Purgatorio for Mini Closed while it’s thicker sounding for Inferno

As for choosing Inferno over Purgatorio for Susvara, I ultimately wanted to keep the Susvara’s tonality and choosing an OCC copper material is generally but not absolute a safer choice since OCC silver requires to be extremely high quality as to not cause any major tonality change such as developing a hard sound sensation or less texture or less depth in the sound. It’s a lot of risk for me to blind purchase the Purgatorio and have more sins of commission (drier sounding for example) than stock cable with Susvara. Lots of Susvara owners highly recommend a cable with a mixture of copper and silver strands because of hifiman stock cable sound signature being a hybrid cable. If there was a loaner of both Purgatorio and Inferno, I would know for sure which ones to buy for best compatibility with my audio chain

 

[warrenpchi]

Ah, I see. FWIW, I think you made the right choice there, as I myself am a huge fan of well-made high-quality copper cables. However, I have yet to hear the Purgatorio, so I'm just curious as to what differences led you to your ultimate choice.

 

[Ultrainferno]

The "Sonnet of Adam", now on Headfonia!

 

[gLer]

Hey guys, my review of Eletech's artisinal Raphael is now online here.



This was my first experience of an Eletech cable, so I hope I've done it justice. Enjoy!​

 

[Auricon]

Hey guys, my review of Eletech's artisinal Raphael is now online here.



This was my first experience of an Eletech cable, so I hope I've done it justice. Enjoy!​

For anyone having issues with @gLer's link its:
https://theheadphonelist.com/eletech-raphael-cable-artistry/

.957426 was appended to the link leading to 403 Forbidden page error

And as always, enjoyable read and photos my friend!

 

[gLer]

For anyone having issues with @gLer's link its:
https://theheadphonelist.com/eletech-raphael-cable-artistry/

.957426 was appended to the link leading to 403 Forbidden page error

And as always, enjoyable read and photos my friend!

Dang, thanks mate. Fixed!

 

[theveterans]

My Eletech inferno is now starting to settle down. Seriously this is the first time I've encountered an OCC Copper behave more like an OCC silver cable where it cleans up the lower mids and upper bass so they actually sound leaner than stock Hifiman cable at those frequencies. Vocals are more palpable and breathier and more microdetails are heard from cello and upper bass instruments. Inferno tightens up everything from top to bottom and extends the subbass all the way down to the abyss. It gives more dynamic impact to the sound while providing a more nuanced and concert-hall like soundstage while the imaging is very focused. It does not take away anything from Susvara (hey that sounds like a pure silver cable sound signature isn't it?). The giveaway though that it's still a copper cable is that it does lack the airiest octave which to me is actually fatigue inducing so that's not a negative for my personal preferences! Kudos to Eric and Wang for creating this unique copper cable! I'm thoroughly impressed!

 

[Eric Chong]

My Eletech inferno is now starting to settle down. Seriously this is the first time I've encountered an OCC Copper behave more like an OCC silver cable where it cleans up the lower mids and upper bass so they actually sound leaner than stock Hifiman cable at those frequencies. Vocals are more palpable and breathier and more microdetails are heard from cello and upper bass instruments. Inferno tightens up everything from top to bottom and extends the subbass all the way down to the abyss. It gives more dynamic impact to the sound while providing a more nuanced and concert-hall like soundstage while the imaging is very focused. It does not take away anything from Susvara (hey that sounds like a pure silver cable sound signature isn't it?). The giveaway though that it's still a copper cable is that it does lack the airiest octave which to me is actually fatigue inducing so that's not a negative for my personal preferences! Kudos to Eric and Wang for creating this unique copper cable! I'm thoroughly impressed!

The team is happy that you're enjoying the Inferno immensely! It should further open up with more burning in, the Inferno (& Purgatorio) as i mentioned many times before does need tons and tons of burn in .. ugh

 

[theveterans]

The team is happy that you're enjoying the Inferno immensely! It should further open up with more burning in, the Inferno (& Purgatorio) as i mentioned many times before does need tons and tons of burn in .. ugh

Definitely! I didn't do any special tracks for the burn-in phase but rather stress test it with THX reference loudness levels of DTS/Dolby Atmos Blu-Ray movies with similar to movie theater SPL levels during action scenes (I'm guessing over 100+ dB SPLs) during the early burn-in phase. Susvara's bass sounds bottomless deep with ear shaking rumble with movies like Meg 2 and Interstellar and lots of disaster type movies at over 100 dB SPLs. It helped a lot to make the burn-in more noticeable. I'll definitely put up some final words once I hit about 150 - 200 hours of playback time

 

[theveterans]

Just briefly went back to stock cable to hear the change again since the last I heard the difference was just 1-2 hours of burn-in time. How cow, the gap is way more than I remember and yeah the stock Hifiman susvara cable sounds "low res with haze" now compared to the hyper clear, fast sounding and imaging focused Inferno. It's not even 150 hours of playback time yet but approximately 100 hours as of this writing