Hi-Line

It’s a very different presentation. I can see why some would prefer one or the other.

My system is sounding richer and calmer with the Hi-line.

Maybe tomorrow I’ll miss the enthusiasm and energy of the lavernder.

No bad choices at this level

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I bought mine second-hand from a gent who had it repaired before sending it my way.

Luckily no problems. All I do is listen and not think about it which is a good thing in my book. Only reason I’m thinking about it now is because of this thread (make sure I have the directional marker the right way/hanging loosely no broken collar). :slight_smile:

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Once you get used to the Hi-Line it’s qualities will become more & more obvious over the long run. Give it a couple of months and then go back to the lavender, I bet it will last no more than about five minutes and then you’ll revert back to the Hi-Line, with mind well and truly made-up.

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Don’t want to complain, after having it repaired twice, I’ve sold mine and went back to the Lavender :wink:

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I think the hiline is a nice upgrade over lavender. At first it was, perhaps, too bright, but that changed. It’s now overall the better cable, compared to the lavender. No downsides except the demand for cable dressing. However, since it’s quite stiff it’s easy to keep it hanging free from touching other things behind the rack.

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Hopefully Naim have improved the robustness of the hi-line’s decoupling rings. The ones I had were early production cables and I convinced myself (rightly or wrongly!) that the dead weight of the cable hanging, over time, imposed too great a load on the rings and eventually led to fatigue failure. I’m not a great one for regularly peeking over the back of the stacks and concluded I’d be better off with alternative cables. I still remember switching over from lavender to hi-line and being blown away by the significantly wider sound spectrum presented - it was not subtle!

Peter

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I’m often tempted by a Hiline for my Nat 05 but even 2nd hand would likely cost more than I paid for the 05 (£400 s/h).

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I think you’d be unlucky to pay more than £400 sh. I picked up a fairly rare RCA to DIN, for much less, and a search on eBay for sold items shows £350-380 more likely for 5-5 pin. With some astonishing outliers, lowest was £129 for a 5-5 pin! Still close to the cost of the NAT. But cost not the same as value, or a sensible way to necessarily think of SQ improvements?

[edit: I mean in the case of your NAT, it wasn’t a cheap source new, and a Hiline likely makes a good addition to it now, even if they cost about the same. I used to run nice old Audis, and the parts and consumables costs were commensurate with a car costing more than the price I paid for the cars! ]

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Someone sure got a bargain there :wink:

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Wait “someone” - have you added a Hiline to your inventory recently!?

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Just this week as it happens :smiley:

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I sold the Hi-Line which came with my ND555 on a popular auction site for just £250. It was less than one year old at the time of sale. They don’t attract much secondhand. I replaced it with Super Lumina, but on reflection I’d say that the Hi-Line was less ‘clinical’ than the SL.

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@Clive could you expand on that please. You’ve a very similar system to me. I’ve never tried the bundled hi-line that came with my ND555 as I already had a Super Lumina….do you think the hi-line might be preferable ?

Possibly, yes. I cannot do a back-to-back comparison obviously as it was sold, but I did wonder if the H-L might have been a bit more music and a bit less hi-fi. If you still have both, you really ought to check it out and report back here, of course - but do I really want to know….?

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The Hi-Line is amazing with live music! Play something like this from Deep Purple and it will have you almost spinning around on the floor like Angus Young from AC/DC doing air guitar! Which reminds me!:eyes::sunglasses::metal:

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I found the SL interconnect, compared to the Hi-Line, could sound a little clinical at first, and it takes months to really settle in. However, when it does, it is quite superb.

Thanks @mjkent. I’ve no real problem with the SL interconnect. In my current system though I’ve not compared it with anything else Naim or otherwise. Logic says it should be better than the hi-line but we all know that’s not necessarily the case with this hobby.

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Great album that

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Anyone else find the Hi-line quite a bit louder than the stock cable?

I’d say a normal experience when frequencies in the more sensitive range (mids) to your ears add more detail.

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