As I said in other posts the biggest upgrade in terms of cables was a cheap 30mts “fridge” power cable between the main electric box and a local made power block, that I had to pass in the pre-existant tubes.
Then was a old VDH Magnum speaker cable that replaced the NACA5, a sweeter sound at the moment, some 20 years ago. One day I have home demo of a SuperLumina, no major benefits.
Then I had VDH power cables for everything but the NAPSC. A cleaner and punchy sound.
The interconnects between Naims are the usual stuff, I have a Chord Cobra DIN RCA for a old Pioneer tuner.
anyone try the silver Gothic ELLA with the deltron DIN5 180s to connect a cd player to their preamp? I wonder how it differs from the copper Witch Hat Morgana?
after a few decades using only naim A5 cables I went heretic and now use witch hat phantoms. also liked the beguiling, seductive Morgana interconnect but then my wife found us.
I think a big advantage of Naim systems is that all components have been optimally matched to each other in extensive testing. This also applies to racks (Fraim) and basically also to the cabling. Naim even offers the (relatively expensive) Superlumina series as upgrade options for cables. Apparently they see considerable potential in the sound. Many users on the forum also use cables from other manufacturers. Some updates have been found by many users to be advantageous over Naim products (e.g. Tellurium Black 2 speaker cable over NACA5). However, there is no consensus on this and ultimately only trial and error in your own system will help. There are numerous reports on this in the forum and this is also part of our hobby.
However, the Uniti series is an exception. For example, there is no suitable isolation platform originally from Naim. Also the standard power cords are very poor (no Powerline lite outside UK). Many users have added Naim Powerline to Uniti Nova and report great sound improvement. I use a Uniti Atom “only” and a Powerline seemed to me in proportion too expensive. But an Vovox excelsus power cord brought an immediately audible significant improvement. It is also worthwhile here to borrow test cables and try them out. In my system, the Vovox was more neutral and open than, for example, Audioquest in the same price range.
Yes, do demo some other cables on loan from your dealer.
Different cables do make a noticeable difference. By that I mean, makes it sound different, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. Only trial and error will tell you which ones you prefer, as all our tastes are slightly different.
Other makes to consider are; The Chord Co, Mark Grant Cables. I’ve had good results with these in the past with my system and my ears.
Chord is good, extracts some more detail but adds a flavour, you might like it or not. Chord is pretty much used for interconnect and speaker cable.
Nordost is not so common with Naim, except for power cable. I know people found beneficial using Nordost blue power cable for sources and red power cable for amp.
Honestly I don’t know Atlas.
Sometime ago many people were fan of TQ, some still are, I think the interconnect is overpushing the bass while the speaker cable is weak on the bass, ideally they can compensate if you put them both, but I don’t like them.
Now Witch Hat are very popular, I find phantom a speaker cable that is performing good job at a decent price, good detail and presentation, better than A5 and Chord epic twin, some say Kudos KS-1 is even better and cheaper.
Upper range of Naim cables is pretty expensive.
Now using Oephi Ascendence speaker cables I have understood that Phantom do colorise the sound rather much over to the warm side not having such detail, timing, dynamics and insight into the music as my Oephi cables add. Not saying Phantom are bad. I did enjoy them a lot but it is a coloured presentation to my ears. Not having heard KS-1 I at least read in from others that they are more on the same side of things as my Oephi cables.
used 15’ pairs of cheap inflexible naca5 for decades, last year I jumped ship, swapped in WH phantom. better bass, way more flexible. also tried the fabulous WH morgana 5 pin180 between my CDS3 player and Nait XS2 but soon returned it because paying 4 hundred for a 1 meter wire is just offensive. I now use a Gotham GAC 4/5 with neutrik rean rcas, only $26. well balanced not rolled off nor dull like the stock naim. Gothic Ella from the UK I bet is great but again at 2 hundred I probably will never try it.
I see used CHORD Cobra 2 kicking around for sub-Naim Standard prices. Worth? I know it’s old but I dig the dark green jacket and they seem to be terminated nicer than some of the other home brews.
It may be just the printing of the arrows, not sure they terminate them differently depending on the direction you need. If so that implies there are two variants of every cable and I have not seen that on any ordering page.
Often direction cables have the shield common to earth at just one end.
Speaking of old Chord cables. My dealer recently found a NOS Chord Chrysalis DIN-4RCA rec in/out for me. The Chrysalis is made from the same cable stock that Naim used for their standard interconnects.
When running an all Naim system I changed from NAC to Townshend Isolda at a huge cost. I tried quite a few cable and found these to be the most revealing.
I’ve kept them then then and now on my new system. HOWEVER in my opinion the NAC is a better cable for the money, the cost per meter doesn’t match the improvement in terms of investment. It is more audio jewellery. I know a lot of people will disagree.
Your a lot better putting the money into upgrades that have a major improvement such as acoustic treatment or Power supply upgrades.
