Patrick82
Banned
- Joined
- Mar 1, 2003
- Posts
- 3,745
- Likes
- 17
I have used Nordost Valkyrja speaker cable for my headphones for almost 2 years now. It was supposed to be the last thing to upgrade in my system, but ever since the Odin was released I was yearning for it and kept writing about it in my logs every day. The only reason I wanted Odin was because it has Dual Mono-Filaments instead of Single; two threads around the cable is better than one, and I was willing to pay many times more for that extra thread.
The Odin speaker cable didn't have the proper design to be able to use it for headphones, but the Odin interconnect was perfect. The problem was that I wasn't sure the Odin would sound better because it has deeper silver plating than Valkyrja (85 vs 60 microns), so it would cut off the bass details from the music and make it sound colder and thinner. And since the conductor was one gauge thinner (23 vs 22 awg), it would remove bass from that as well, but it would give crazy speed! And who doesn't like speed?
But it made me a little uncomfortable to slice open the $20k Odin to find out if the bass sacrifice was acceptable enough, so I decided to live in ignorance and keep using the Valkyrja for my headphones.
Then I started building my 4th audio system around a dCS Ring DAC and I found out that Valhalla power cord wasn't needed anymore to veil out the empty blackness from the missing information of normal DACs, so I started using stock power cables wrapped in ERS Paper instead. Now I had extra Valhalla power cords left over and didn't know what to do with them so I wrapped them around my body.
While building up the neutral sound of my 4th system I had to remove the Valhalla interconnect as well. I replaced it with 7cm Valkyrja and got better sound, but it was very flat and boring. Since I didn't use Valhalla for analog signals anymore, I could bypass the amp and pre-amp. I plugged my headphones to the XLR outputs of the DAC and everything got warmer and bassier, I didn't like it but it sounded more neutral so I had to keep it. But I kept complaining of too much warmth every day, I don't like warmth, it is too sweaty and uncomfortable. So then I installed a 3rd transport and tweaked it to get a cold sound signature, but it still wasn't enough.
I missed the Valhalla a lot, she is my wife and now she was gone from my system. I wanted her back, I didn't care if I got less detail, I needed her, I love her so much. But before putting back the amp and analog interconnects, I decided to try one last tweak...
For a long time I have thought about using Valhalla power cord for my headphones because it has Dual Mono-Filaments unlike the Valhalla speaker cable and analog interconnect which only have Single Mono-Filaments. But since the power cord is 16awg it was going to give too much bass compared to the 22awg analog cables. I wasn't expecting it to sound better at all but I tried it anyway, because what else will I do all day than mutilate audio gear? So I cut the Valkyrja speaker cable near the Y section and soldered the Valhalla power cord there. It's very heavy, uncomfortable and dangerous, but audiophilia isn't for sissy girls anyway. To get better sound you need to be extreme, if the system blows up from a short-circuit, you just fast for a new one. In my system, the Valhalla matters the most anyway, I can be without my audio gear, but I can't be without my love.
AKG K1000 headphones + 330 cm Valkyrja (22awg)
AKG K1000 headphones + 35 cm Valkyrja (22awg) + 2m Valhalla (16awg)
First impressions: I put the headphones on and immediately I heard crazy bass like I expected, but I didn't expect it to be that sharp. The low-level details are really good but not as detailed as with Valkyrja because there is heavy bass in front of those details. But without that bass in the way, the low-level detail would be better than Valkyrja! So the Valhalla power cord is better overall. I'm surprised that the Dual Mono-Filaments made this big of a difference.
The deeper silver plating gives more whiteness and it's very smooth. With a thinner conductor it would sound white and edgy which would give the illusion of more clarity, detail and blackness, but with the thick conductor that whiteness is made longer and smoother which gives the illusion of more realism.
It confirms my findings that Valhalla cables should be slightly thicker than the system needs, because the deep silver plating adds whiteness to the sound to compensate for the muddiness that comes from thicker cables. The end result is less low-level detail than neutral, but also more body, whiteness, distinctness and smoothness than neutral, this makes it overall sound very clean, transparent and musical like you are listening to real life. When it sounds like this I don't care that a little low-level detail is missing, especially since with Dual Mono-Filaments there is already too much of it. If there is an overkill of low-level detail in the system it's possible to take advantage of that and add more body to the music by using a thicker cable, but this would make it too dark so you need to compensate for it by adding whiteness to the sound, and that is what Valhalla does with the deeper silver plating. It distorts the sound to make it sound clean like real life.
The Odin speaker cable didn't have the proper design to be able to use it for headphones, but the Odin interconnect was perfect. The problem was that I wasn't sure the Odin would sound better because it has deeper silver plating than Valkyrja (85 vs 60 microns), so it would cut off the bass details from the music and make it sound colder and thinner. And since the conductor was one gauge thinner (23 vs 22 awg), it would remove bass from that as well, but it would give crazy speed! And who doesn't like speed?
But it made me a little uncomfortable to slice open the $20k Odin to find out if the bass sacrifice was acceptable enough, so I decided to live in ignorance and keep using the Valkyrja for my headphones.
Then I started building my 4th audio system around a dCS Ring DAC and I found out that Valhalla power cord wasn't needed anymore to veil out the empty blackness from the missing information of normal DACs, so I started using stock power cables wrapped in ERS Paper instead. Now I had extra Valhalla power cords left over and didn't know what to do with them so I wrapped them around my body.
While building up the neutral sound of my 4th system I had to remove the Valhalla interconnect as well. I replaced it with 7cm Valkyrja and got better sound, but it was very flat and boring. Since I didn't use Valhalla for analog signals anymore, I could bypass the amp and pre-amp. I plugged my headphones to the XLR outputs of the DAC and everything got warmer and bassier, I didn't like it but it sounded more neutral so I had to keep it. But I kept complaining of too much warmth every day, I don't like warmth, it is too sweaty and uncomfortable. So then I installed a 3rd transport and tweaked it to get a cold sound signature, but it still wasn't enough.
I missed the Valhalla a lot, she is my wife and now she was gone from my system. I wanted her back, I didn't care if I got less detail, I needed her, I love her so much. But before putting back the amp and analog interconnects, I decided to try one last tweak...
For a long time I have thought about using Valhalla power cord for my headphones because it has Dual Mono-Filaments unlike the Valhalla speaker cable and analog interconnect which only have Single Mono-Filaments. But since the power cord is 16awg it was going to give too much bass compared to the 22awg analog cables. I wasn't expecting it to sound better at all but I tried it anyway, because what else will I do all day than mutilate audio gear? So I cut the Valkyrja speaker cable near the Y section and soldered the Valhalla power cord there. It's very heavy, uncomfortable and dangerous, but audiophilia isn't for sissy girls anyway. To get better sound you need to be extreme, if the system blows up from a short-circuit, you just fast for a new one. In my system, the Valhalla matters the most anyway, I can be without my audio gear, but I can't be without my love.
AKG K1000 headphones + 330 cm Valkyrja (22awg)
AKG K1000 headphones + 35 cm Valkyrja (22awg) + 2m Valhalla (16awg)
First impressions: I put the headphones on and immediately I heard crazy bass like I expected, but I didn't expect it to be that sharp. The low-level details are really good but not as detailed as with Valkyrja because there is heavy bass in front of those details. But without that bass in the way, the low-level detail would be better than Valkyrja! So the Valhalla power cord is better overall. I'm surprised that the Dual Mono-Filaments made this big of a difference.
The deeper silver plating gives more whiteness and it's very smooth. With a thinner conductor it would sound white and edgy which would give the illusion of more clarity, detail and blackness, but with the thick conductor that whiteness is made longer and smoother which gives the illusion of more realism.
It confirms my findings that Valhalla cables should be slightly thicker than the system needs, because the deep silver plating adds whiteness to the sound to compensate for the muddiness that comes from thicker cables. The end result is less low-level detail than neutral, but also more body, whiteness, distinctness and smoothness than neutral, this makes it overall sound very clean, transparent and musical like you are listening to real life. When it sounds like this I don't care that a little low-level detail is missing, especially since with Dual Mono-Filaments there is already too much of it. If there is an overkill of low-level detail in the system it's possible to take advantage of that and add more body to the music by using a thicker cable, but this would make it too dark so you need to compensate for it by adding whiteness to the sound, and that is what Valhalla does with the deeper silver plating. It distorts the sound to make it sound clean like real life.
