ND555 Impressions

Scrolling back up, this post has run about to about 10 times its intended length. Oh well. I’ll call it my cardio for today.

I ran AQ Forrest Ethernet cables many years ago, to the derision of just about everyone. I’ve been told that if I can hear a difference between Ethernet cables my system is “fundamentally broken”. So I don’t think I can add much in the way of wisdom, just some anecdotes from someone who’s ears won’t hear the same things that yours will, because two sets of ears never do.

As a Forrest user, I was already susceptible to the suggestion that Ethernet cables can sound different, and I was kept appraised of AQ’s then forthcoming range and had an opportunity to test drive each model at home, as well as get back the full cost of my Forrest. How could I refuse? . I thought that all three sounded different. Cinnamon certainly sounded more open and detailed than my stock CAT5 or CAT 6 leads, Vodka sounded more open, more detailed and for want of a better word, more “full bodied”. Diamond was different again.

To our ears, in our system and our room, we both thought that the difference between Vodka and Diamond was not significant, didn’t necessarily represent an improvement, and that the Vodka offered the best price versus performance package in the range. It didn’t seem to be directional and between NAS to switch, HDX to switch and switch to DAC, three AQ cables sounded better than two plus a stock cable, or one plus two stock cables, in all possible combinations.

When you consider that the Hub is far away, on the end of a 25m run of stock CAT6 cable, the subtle changes in presentation and musical communication heard when swapping cables at the end of the run, albeit off a dedicated switch, might be hard to believe - until you hear them for yourself. This was with DAC/PS555, which at the time I was hanging from an HDX-SSD, taking files from a QNAP TS-420.

When the NDS replaced the DAC everything changed. Once it had run in and everything had settled down, and after the HDX was moved out to be replaced by Minimserver on the NAS (which significantly improved the musical communication in our system), we became slightly dissatisfied at times, with what we considered a somewhat spiky presentation. It didn’t grate but it did sound a bit off occasionally. We have used AQ cables (and other makes) in a number of places in our system over the years and we knew that in a less than ideal environment, AQ had a potential to sound a bit hot, a bit scrubbed.

I’m not a fan of Chord the cable company, having been on the end of some awful customer relations when I was looking at Sarum as a digital interconnect. However, seeing no point in cutting my nose off, I tried some C-Stream between NDS and switch because it wasn’t expensive and it had been recommended several times. It seemed to take the occasional edge off the presentation without adding or taking anything else away. Exactly what we wanted. Things don’t usually resolve so easily.

But it’s more complicated than that. It always is. Our system is like Trigger’s broom, and everything we have done to the mains supply, equipment support, system itself (which has changed out of all recognition in the past 15 years), and room furnishings have a potential to change how the speakers play the room.

Our system development is not so busy nowadays, although we still tweak occasionally, and have a list of things to investigate like, Melco, Roon, the newer 800 range, maybe moving away from Naim for something more compact and space efficient (we’ve never heard a top end Linn system which we didn’t love. We just haven’t loved it enough).

I tend to spend more time listening to my music than listening to my system. It’s fascinating and rewarding to still, up to 50 years later, gain yet more insight into something I thought I already knew by heart. To hear how cleverly things were arranged, how skilfully they were performed and the telepathic, almost magical interplay between a really tight group of talented musicians who know more than just how to play their instruments. It’s like time travel. And it’s still a drug to me.

The practical upshot is that I am so in love with my music and the sheer joy of listening to it that I forget to keep upgrading, and may well still be far off my system’s full potential. But somehow I will find the will to go on :grinning:

7 Likes

Sorry to pester you on the Vodkas. I am finding them both beguiling and disappointing, the latter in particular when it comes to capturing the full tonal texture of classical instruments. How long did yours take to burn in and settle down? Mine were pretty up and down for the first 5 or so days, but seem to have stayed the same for the past few days.

Yes - exactly what I found at first. In fact I retained my Cinnamon Cable as ‘emergency backup’ rather than trade it in as I could have for the reason I did not know where Vodka would finish.

They revealed a lot of surprising musical things that the Cinnamon didn’t and I did not want to lose the spatial perspectives and clarity on percussion and even bowed notes I was hearing - but the Vodka was a bit tending to hard and blunt even after ten days to two weeks.

But for some reason I stuck with them, probably because I have experienced the same and worse with other cables - I hated my SL new cables for a long time compared to my Dealer’s run-in demo set - but after a few weeks and in total a few months they were great and sounded right.

The Vodka seems to be one that also runs-in slowly and continues improving over weeks of use. What was a hard-edge eventually becomes more detail revealed and the edge is gone - and on it goes. The more capable and open your system the longer it takes as the run-in seems to travel over time like a slow wave lower and lower in level picking-out more detain at first badly then properly.

I now really like them.

A tip - do make sure they hang free at the ND555 box end for as long as you can as the ‘free’ cable length seems to be part of the way the cable loses vibration - it sounds nicer and more easy-dynamic when the coupling of the wiring into the ND555 on any of its connections (including Vodka Ethernet) does not touch another cable, the floor or Fraim on the way.

On classical - I was immersed in a performance last night and it was like it was real instruments in my room and I really had the sense of the Artists fully into their work - there may be better to come but I’m pretty pleased with it so far now.

I regularly attend recitals of live Classical music with either a single instrument or two and the non-recorded ‘live’ sound has that immediate reality of the instrument itself and the Artist playing it that I’m getting a lot more of with the Vodka ND555.

DB.

1 Like


This stuff is absolutely horrid, and consumed in large part by relatively “low life” consumers. Maybe they’d be called chavs.

3 Likes

I agree with your observations. The Vodka’s are doing a great job…

I have just installed Cinnamon in my system together with some shorter lengths of ‘Viablue EP-7S’ … wow what a difference - and they have not been run in yet. Better stereo depth, detail, bass texture and slam … I am delighted. From experience - I suspect things will get significantly better. I am just confused as to why it should make a difference- but it does … bits are obviously not just bits!

1 Like

Interesting test results on the cables on the ear.net…, I saw similar test results on other sites…

Lend me an ear
My first change is from Supra Cat-7+ to Audioquest Cinnamon playing a piece from Eric Satie, a performance by Alexandre Tharaud of Gnossienne No. 1 . I immediately notice an increase in air and a wider stage with the Cinnamon. The recording room has grown and the playback is a little more fluid, more natural I would say. This change is far easier to hear (since last time) now that I have AudioQuest Carbon rather than ordinary CAT-5 wire elsewhere in the network. This is an excellent result for a cable that is, to say the least, affordable for most of us. Moving up to AQ Vodka gives a big step up the ladder, even the first note shows that dynamics can be increased with a better Ethernet cable. The recording room does not alter in size, nor is the stereo stage larger than before. The cable does however add more drama to the music; enough to be worth the extra money? Yes, even with my Naim it’s easy enough to hear that it will give you more listening pleasure. The last step is from Vodka to Diamond. This preserves all the gains had stepping up from less expensive to very expensive, at the same time the Diamond is even more fluid on the ear and has a better defined and more stable stereo image. I have to admit that the steps from Supra to Cinnamon and to Vodka are greater than from Vodka to Diamond.

Like everything else in hi-fi the last step costs the most and adds just a little bit. At the end of the track the Diamond reveals more, the piano sustain will hold on longer. Playing the same track again shows that the piano is further away from the listener than with the other cables, resulting in less stress, like you moved from the front seat to a better place in the concert hall. With every step the music became more subtle and fragile. Be careful what you wish for, going back to Supra CAT-7+, which is a good cable no doubt, is not a pleasure after the Diamond. The piano is suddenly unnatural, harsh, standing in a small room and lacks harmonics and overtones. To compare this to whisky drinking, Famous Grouse tastes fantastic until you enjoy Glenmorangie or Glenlivet.

On solo piano it was quite easy to hear the alterations, let us see what a large orchestral work brings. I choose from 2L The Nordic Sound a violin concert played by the TrondheimSolistene, recorded in high resolution FLAC at 24 bit and a sample rate of 192 kHz, for what it matters the Satie was ripped from CD into FLAC. Moving from Supra to Cinnamon brings more weight, removes harshness and adds the acoustics of the recording room. Once again the Vodka is a major step in gaining realism, the stereo image is wider in every direction, far beyond and outside the speakers. It’s a little in your face I would say, like you are sitting between the musicians. Details are added immediately and the bass is further extended together with more impact in that region. The solo violin is a little softer, easier on the ear and more fluid. The Diamond does its trick again, moves the orchestra a little backwards, adds more weight without the bass getting too loud, gives you the extra detail you look for and the music flows into your room with extra smoothness overall. Sure, the Diamond is the best of the lot, the Vodka is the best value for money I would say. But be careful, Vodka in a system that is already upfront might become too much.

The main system
In this case with the M50, Audia Flight and fact.12 I pick a CD made by Rachelle Ferrell, one of the best female jazz singers around in my opinion. Her Live in Montreux 91-97 CD was partly recorded on her debut at the festival in 1991 and she became at once everyone’s favourite. Prayer Dance opens with the public applauding, the bass comes in followed by piano and drums before Rachelle starts singing. The step up from Supra to Cinnamon redefines the applause, the piano gets more dynamic, but the overall sound gets rough and I want to lower the volume. This is a different result to my first test some months ago and I can only relate it back to the change from standard CAT-5 cable to Carbon between the switches or from upgrading my room switch to SE2800. Vodka does the trick, the harshness has gone and the public is better defined and bass is tighter. Piano is better separated from the other instruments and Rachelle comes closer to me. The stereo image gains in height, a result that’s very close to results with the Naim system, although the Audia Flight and fact.12 put the results under a magnifying glass. The Diamond knows every trick in the book. Moving Rachelle back to the stage, the cable warrants the applause to be lifelike, piano is dynamic but less overexposed than with the other AudioQuest cables. The voice is rough where it should be, soft when Rachelle cuts the volume. In the recording every fault comes forward, including a microphone that is not fully up to the volume the can produce. It’s a very fine results that make a costly set-up shine even more.

Conclusion
We should have expected a famous cable manufacturer to make its best sounding cable the most expensive, but this is not always the case I can assure you. Sometimes cables are made more and more expensive for export markets and the increased price has nothing to do with sound quality. AudioQuest proved to me that we still have honest manufacturers around the globe. This Ethernet cable comparison was mainly between Cinnamon, Vodka and Diamond cable. The conclusion is that Cinnamon is certainly a step in the right direction compared to ordinary CAT-5 cable or even to some CAT-7 cables. Vodka is in my opinion on the edge of affordable and very interesting, but its tendency to move the soundstage forwards limits an overall recommendation. It has to match with all other components around it. But if it does fit in you become very happy. The Diamond cable is the best. Period. But very expensive indeed and I would only use it in extremely high end systems.

So do Ethernet cables have their own sound? This is no longer a question but a statement. The cable between switches is less important than the ones connected to the end points (NAS and/or streaming device), but a decent type like the AudioQuest Carbon is certainly worth the price in high end systems.

This is not the end of the story, I want to point out that for the previous and above tests I made use of a NAS and streaming devices. If you add the cost of cables and switches to both the NAS and the streamer, you might pay the same for a very good music server with storage on board and digital out (such as the M52). In that case only commands are send over the LAN and access to the internet is limited to metadata and covers. A decent CAT-5 like Pearl will be fine. One limit in the case of a music server, as soon as you add a second device in another room to play music from the server the cable party starts for you too. Act wisely and make a plan before you invest. One room or more rooms, high end or background music? Use AudioQuest or another decent brand but please, not the cheap CAT-5 with its flimsy connectors that came along with the router.

3 Likes

Many thanks, Gary, that’s most reassuring. I’m hating them at the moment. The strident treble softened after just a few days but the bass and midrange at the moment are far from lifelike despite the impressive and largely organic separation. Bass extension is also somewhat lacking.I have paid attention to cable dressing as you recommend.

I’ll maybe give them another week or so. I have them on what appears to be a pretty relaxed a 60-day trial from Future Shop.

Assess them after another two weeks and keep or return makes sense if I in your position.

The review on the Diamond version may offer a future improvement ahead for me, but I’m pretty happy with the Vodka right now and I think it is good to settle for a while when you get your system singing and you are enjoying a wide range of music.

The ‘bringing forward’ comment comment can also be that the other cable puts things back - I got used to both presentations, but the Vodka has a better low-bass rendition in my system in terms of power and clean-delivery that seems right. Matching to the rest of the system is always important at all levels of system performance capability IMO. I’ve never found a ‘one fits all’ solution for cables that always gives great results in all systems.

DB.

i would say that the diamond is more unforced , not laid back, vs the vodka. More natural. Some glare and hardness is gone.

I have a really long run of cat-5 in my walls from the room with my routers down to the room with my ND555. I have a Cinnamon cable from the wall outlet in the ND555 room to the ND555. Of course I could do the experiment, but spending many hundreds to thousands on just that “last 1.5 meters” is hard to justify intuitively.

I am similar Bart … I have 20m of Cat6a buried in my walls…my cinnamon is 8m long…the 2 Viablues total 1.5m … and connect from a wall outlet to NUC and then patch the Roon NUC to a switch and then cinnamon to ND555

@Darkebear

Hi, not wishing to hi-jack this long running thread, but, having visited the Futureshop website to look at prices, I read that they are convinced that ethernet cables are indeed, directional.

Feeling a bit bored, I had a look at the Audioquest Forest and Cinammon cables which run between my Cisco switch and my ND555 and HDX.

Taking the “direction of the music” as being out from the switch to the ND555, and into the switch from the HDX server, they were both the “wrong” way round, following the last stripdown.

I’ve turned them round, and it does sound better, so is this expectation bias, an overactive imagination on my part, or does it really make a difference? :thinking:

:small_blue_diamond:Bart,…I understand you,…And also agree with you,.BUT :grin:

As you know, you are moving forward your references all the time.
I am basically an analog guy,.and to pay what a AQ Vodka cost a few years ago…Yes,.I thought it was absurd.
But now I have three Vodkas and one Diamond.

Same thing with my friend,.Cableoholic.
When he first showed a couple of contacts,.(see picture,just the contacts,not the cable) for £695:-.

Well then I thought that there had to be something really wrong with the guy :grin:.
Now I myself have such contacts.
As I said,…you are moving forward your references all the time.
Soon you also have AQ Vodka,.or any other such cable.

/Peder🙂

i have 2X 0,75m diamond. So like the cost of 2 powerlines.

I think what is causing these differences is nothing to do with the digital signal getting errors - that definitely does not happen at all - but is the same thing that causes the Mains Plug leads (Powerlines) to make the difference they do.

Something due to electromagnetism interacting with dielectrics in the cables and the results getting back into sensitive system parts.

I talked to the Naim Designer of ND555 at a very recent event and discussed at length all of these things - his very open acknowledgement that these things do make a difference was refreshing. I discussed Ethernet leads too and he had the same experience - and don’t know why either, other than they do have an effect.

DB.

2 Likes

:small_blue_diamond:Dave-marshall,…It makes a difference.

You do not imagine.
This discovered one in our group,.for the first time 10-12 years ago.

/Peder🙂

Ah well, glad to know it’s not just me, then … on with the music.

Even if it is just you - this is the right approach IMO.

DB.

1 Like

Exactly, when all’s said and done, it’s how it sounds to one’s own aural receptors, after all. :smile:

1 Like