In the middle of the comparison of the Chord Music versus Audio Quest Vodka. Not that easy. Yes the Chord Music is better. However difference is not as big as I expected it to be. Some wins in smoothness, focus and detail…, but worth several thousands of euros…, will need to sleep a bit more on it…
the audioquest diamond brings that refinement , details and naturalness vs the vodka. For much much less …
The less I get, did you test them against each other ?
yes, i have the vodka and the 2 diamonds, so could easily compare. Without run in the diamond was from the first minutes better . Nicer , with more textures and more real voices.
Echolane,…Tested against what,.best measurement value that TiberioMagadino prioritizes…or best soundquality 
.?
TiberioMagadino is in the minority with his opinion,.but he is definitely in the majority in spreading his message 
.
And there is nothing wrong with it,.you should “fight” for what you believe in.
• So true,.So true.
• As always.!
• As usual in other words…“Dare to be Openminded”.
• As you said,.the Musical flow,and the Musical feeling.
Not just “cleaner and clearer”.
A little story…
I remember when I visited Sweden’s largest Hifi-Show 2004 in Stockholm,.this with my new woman after a previous separation.
She was a musician,.and had grew up in a musical family.
But she had never had,.or listened to better music-systems before we met.
When we visited a listening-room at this Hifi-Show…in this room presented one of Sweden’s sharpest brains and constructor (I mention no name) his music-system.
He is very well known throughout Scandinavia for his technical knowledge.
After listening for a while,.my (new) woman said…
Is the music-system broken,.or should it sound like this.?
I replied…
No,.but it measures well,and some think it’s the most important.
What do I want to say with this,.Well…“Dare To Be Openminded” and listen for yourself in your own music-system.
Whether it’s measuring well or not,.it has nothing to do with the end result.
As an example,.many Tube-amps wouldn’t go to sell if you just looked at measurement results.
I say as Linn…“Just Listen” .
I finish this post with a picture of one of the Swedish Entreq’s ethernet-cables.
To this cable it should also be connected a so-called “Earth-Box”,.you see the plug for it in the picture.
I hung up this cable on the wall when I took the card,.so therefore maybe it looks a bit weird.
And,.how does it sound…Yes,.I may come back to that.
But not so bad .
/Peder🙂
Thanks for the feedback. Currently considering scenarios.
- Do nothing for now
- Get the Chord Music at close to 5K
- Get Ansuz PowerSwitch, additional Fraim level, Audioquest Diamond…
1 Like
the third is probably better than the second choice. But you can also try the cisco or wait for the Uptone EtherRegen, which is quite ready.
I think being open minded also covers those like me who, having paid handsomely for ‘streaming’ cables, are willing to try relatively cheap alternatives.
The BJC cat 6a is a very well made and excellent ‘sounding’ ethernet cable to my ears. Optimised to transfer bits, or whatever they are.
G
4 Likes
Here Melco cable nobody talks about … 3 meters = 77 €
Has anyone tested the Sotm switch?
see above, already posted. Simon S reported on that. I am curious to listen to it . Will probably try. But it’s more expensive than 640 dollars, because there’s an imput for a clock and additional ps. Total: more than 2k.
Spent a very enjoyable and, what turned out to be, informative evening at fellow member Nick Lee’s last night. Having recently moved and having a new and large dedicated listening room, Nick has spent time and a “few quid” getting his system sounding ace. I’d helped briefly with the instal when he moved and now that his dedicated mains has had time to burn in, things were sounding great.
There’s probably a need to cover the fairly dramatic impact Sonority speaker platform and shelves have had on the system but will leave that for Nick to consider discussing in a different thread.
In the meantime, Nick had suggested comparing a few streaming wankywires, having been loaned an Audioquest Diamond and Chord Signature from his dealer. Given the recent chat on here, I thought it might be interesting to see what difference there might be between “boutique” cables (dreadful term, but I’ll use it) and confirm the sometimes expressed view that they could make none.
To put things into context, Nick and I had been open minded enough to try a range of different streaming cables a few years back and discovered that, not only do they “sound” different, but that some are significantly better than others. The outcome on that occasion was that Nick acquired a Chord Indigo in preference to C-stream, AQ Vodka or Cinnamon, Meicord, several stock Cat5 cables and early Sarum, which he felt sounded the same as Indigo but, strangely, was louder, the latter element of which I agreed with.
On this occasion, we were joined by the very-unbiased, non-Naim owning Alex, who has a love of music, a good set of ears and has put together a great sounding system for little more than the price of one of these cables. As it turned out, Nick had already compared his Indigo with the Signature earlier in the week and preferred the former to the extent that he didn’t feel it would be a good use of our time to include it this evening. So, instead, he asked me to bring along my ChordMusic so that the comparison would be between it, Indigo and AQ Diamond, with Alex and I in the listening seats and Nick engineering the changes.
Having listened to his system with his usual Indigo in place for a couple of hours, Alex and I both felt that it - the system - was tremendous: detailed, lyrical with great scale and a real pleasure to listen to, covering everything from the Grateful Dead to Little Dragon, PLS Trio to Sarah Jarosz.
We agreed that the comparisons should start with something we knew inside out and which wasn’t the best of recordings and we settled initially on All Along the Watchtower and Gimme Shelter.
With the Indigo, All Along the Watchtower was fine; you accept the limitations of the recording but the song is intact, the multi-layering is evident, the bass line recessed, but you could tell it was Hendrix very obviously and the vocals were clear. It was good. Moving to the Music, the band got better, the timing seemed to improve, the soundstage widened, a layer of harshness which wasn’t noticed before was removed, everything was more coherent, more musical, more enjoyable. The scale of improvement was unexpected.
Move on to Gimme Shelter with the Music in place and everything sounded great: musical, together, Mary Clayton’s vocals - particularly when it “distorts” (I bloody love that bit) - brought goosebumps. Back to the Indigo and it collapsed: Jagger was singing down a tube, the soundstage disappeared, Charlie Watts didn’t give a crap and things were just not right. Huge differences, similar to removing an M scaler from its partnership with a Dave. Dave sounded great before the M scaler, but after hearing them together, going back is a big drop off.
And then on to the Audioquest and given the positive hype it’s been given here, I was expecting big things. Er, no. Weird. Massively accentuated rasp at the beginning of Gimme Shelter, Jagger in another room, band didn’t know what was going on, absolutely no sense of timing or music. Absolutely dreadful. Hmmm. Trying several other, more contemporary, tracks it was quite evident that Music is a vast upgrade if you really value the intent, meaning and effort of the band, if you actually value music.
I’m sure that, although Nick felt the same, his system sounds tremendous again today with the Indigo back in situ but, as Alex said, does it really matter which component it is that pulls everything together or how much it costs? The cost thing is, of course, a big issue, but he was essentially correct.
The sky didn’t fall in, no one got hurt, justice was done and, yet again, not a single specification sheet or test certificate was used to pre-determine the outcome. Just ears. Used like we we all do when we test out speakers, amps, power supplies, streamers and anything else (my, how I pored over the specifications sheet before buying the 500DR…not).
The evening, which became pretty late, proved to me that lumping everything under the “boutique” banner based upon price is lazy and generally un/ill-informed, a “taking back control” for the deliberately ignorant. I appreciate that there will be those who will refute my/our findings but hey, do I care? No, not really. Funny hobby this; whenever I get together both people who genuinely love music, comparison of equipment - whatever it may be - produces clear cut and totally obvious results.
Anyway, thanks to Nick for hosting an excellent evening and providing an opportunity to be able to view the comments from an informed position.
4 Likes
@BertBird,…I’m experiencing Chord Music a little better at everything…
• Better dynamics.
• Better timing.
• Better musical-flow.
• Better musical-feeling.
All musical parameters are improved a little bit,.but for what price…It is not cheap.
Another thing,.what I understand,you have switched back and forth between Chord Music and AQ Vodka.
Your Vodka,.you know how it sounds,plug in your Chord Music in your system and let it sit there at least two days…Preferably longer.
Then it has time to “add itself” to your system,.you will probably experience a marked difference.
This gives you a greater sense of what a Chord Music can contribute with.
Regarding Audioquest Diamond vs Vodka.
I also have both of these cables,.which you see on a picture earlier in this thread.
I share Frenchrooster’s idea of the difference.
AQ Vodka sounds a bit harder, more compressed, lesser musical flow than Diamond if I shall easily explain the difference.
BertBird,.Another thing,.I compared a AQ Vodka 0,75cm against a AQ Vodka 1,5m.
I thought AQ Vodka 1,5m was better,.the difference was very small but still audible.
This was a quick test,.tomorrow we will do that test again.
Then we’ll compare both AQ Vodka and AQ Diamond 0,75cm vs. 1,5m.
So,.I’ll get back to you about the results.
/Peder🙂
Thanks, very interested in the results. I now have the Chord Music in longer. So will keep it in as well in tomorrow and reflect.
The Chord Music cable piqued my interest … until I checked the price.
Someone is ‘avin a laugh. 
2 Likes
@Dave,…Thank’s,.an excellent writing 
.
One question:
On two occasions when we tried different boutique-cables (I hate as you that name),.one was Chord…so they sounds “broken” the first night.
We let them sit in the music-system until the next day,.and then they sounded good.
Very strange,.could it be the cause of AQ Diamonds results.?
For we are three here who have AQ Diamond,.in different systems,and all sound good.
Even my Cableoholic-friend,.who has much more expensive ethernet-cables bought a AQ Diamond when he heard mine in his system.
Very weird🤔.
/Peder🙂
@raym55,… At these levels,.whether it’s a Dave-dac or a Chord Music-cable,it’s the performance you pay for.
A Chord Dave-dac or a ND555 also does not cost much in the manufacturing-stage.
/Peder🙂
1 Like
A helluva lot more than an electrical cable. The ND555 is largely hand built, assembled and manually tested at manufacturer by trained expert British technicians…and of course the ND555 contains myriad of cables that are formed, shaped and routed as part of the manufacturer. The Naim cable manufacturer and conditioning part of the factory is tiny compared to the device construction areas.
It might be the same for the DAVE, it’s just I have not seen those being made or spoken to the technicians that build them.
Very insightful. Now running through some well known records and experiencing much better what the Chord Music brings to the table. Let’s see how I decide at the end of my tryout…