Once you get used to NACA5, it is hard to switch to anything else. I am happy with Superlumina now, but had been perfectly happy with NACA5. My son used the Crimson Electronics cable to good effect. I agree. I could be happy with them, too. Cheaper than the NACA5, and more flexible
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I am confused. If A5 is the best, why does its maker argue with some vigour that Super Lumina is much better?
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Nick did you see Martin Colloms review of SL. He liked the interconnects very much. Comparing the SL speaker cable with A5, the former had more detail, better imaging and less coloration but he preferred the A5 because of better PRaT. In fact he thinks A5 is one of the best sounding speaker cables that he has heard and he has heard a lot!!
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I’d suggest there’s a lot of legacy hangups relative to Naim cables, speaker cable in particular.
You have two camps, those that will only use Naim cables (if they make it, it must be good or my Naim product was “designed” using it) and those who appreciate that all modern Naim products are quite happy when using a relatively wide range of cables and aren’t constrained by the explicit rules of old, in particular concerning Chrome/Olive NAP’s. Experimentation can be rewarding and many on this forum find postive results elsewhere, Kudos, Chord, Tellurium Q and so forth.
I was always of the understanding that Super Lumina came about as a result of Statement and was made with that NAP/NAC in mind, however it was found by some to work favourably with other 500 or Classic Series systems, although it remains somewhat polarising in that some love it whilst others dislike the changes it brings to their system.
I think it’s fair to treat NAC A5 as a baseline reference, it is a safe choice but for many can be improved upon and having tried myself different cables and different lengths know this to be the case. Certainly loaning and trying alternatives will do no harm and may prove a rewarding enhancement.
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I remember that, though not the details. I can certainly see what he meant by that, though I would argue that these things are very system and room-dependent.
Did he really argue that A5 was THE BEST? Your comment suggests a view with more nuance to it than that, but I may be misunderstanding.
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Not the best but at the time very good.
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I said it is the best option (not the best). Super Lumina was primarily designed to go with Statement kit.
I do find it quite amusing that a lot of folks who do not use NAC A5 with Naim amps are forever changing their cables around from one make to the other. Up & down like a yoyo. Veteran NAC A5 users ( and i suspect Naim do too) probably tend to just sit back and smile at all the madness going on. 
That’s what I do with my KS-1 I’ve only had two different speaker cables in over 40 years.
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I am only 58 and have been using A5 in Wimbledon or Tasmania (or both) since about 1991.
In 2017, I changed in Wimbledon to TQ Black downstairs, and in 2020 (iirc) I changed to TQ Blue upstairs.
Tasmania still has A5, albeit with replacement Naim plugs, but will probably be changed for Kudos KS-1 next year so that it fits around doors.
To my old ears, A5 is fractionally less clear and detailed than any of the above, but the gap to me was fairly small - it took input from a couple of people with more musical ability/ practice to point our exactly what was improved by the change (apart from the much greater ability to fit in a domestic environment).
I believe that you are right that SL cable was originally designed for the ultra-high-end amps, and it was only slightly later that Naim started to recommend vigorously that the rest of us swap to them.
Like @Skeptikal , I am not sure that my behaviour can fairly be described as ‘forever changing my cables’ or that these moves have been ‘up and down like a yo-yo’.
I am also not sure that Naim really smile at customers who do what Naim recommend (like buying SL cable), but of course you are entitled to your view.
In any event, I am glad if my cable changes amuse you.
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I see you use Kudos speakers so that makes good sense to use a matching speaker cable. I use a ‘full’ Naim rig from mains plugs to voice coils so maybe that is why it just feels so right (musically) to stick with NAC A5. I’ve never felt the need to change for anything else. I did all my experimenting with with other cables way back in the '90s. That was enough (mind well & truly made up), for me.
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Of the cables available 30 years ago, and subject to the vagaries or my memory (and that there are many I never heard), I’d strongly agree with your view that A5 was then a particularly good choice.
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Well; i was a sucker for Ethernet cables when i started out with my first streamer, network switches etc…so i know how that feels…
P.S i only meant being amused with regard to cables in general, not at anyone in person.
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Beats me why people keep changing if it works well just leave it there are far bigger differences in album mixes than cable signatures.
We will be having genre related cables next. 
If not already. 
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I asked that very question of Paul Stephenson (JV’s successor as Naim’s MD) many years ago when the CD555 and the ‘improved’ Super Lumina cable were launched at an event at Grahams HiFi 30-odd years ago. His ‘answer’ did not persuade me to jettison my NACA5, which I still use today.
Mind you, I think that he thought that I was a troublemaker, as I went on to ask him why Naim had never put Guy Lamotte’s legendary FL-1 ‘battleship’ electrostatic ‘copy’ of QUAD’s ESL57 into production!
(At least M. Lamotte’s wonderful ARO made it into production!)
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Because it’s much more expensive, and helps fill Focal Naim’s coffers - or is that too cynical?
In 49 years I’ve had 6 speaker cable changes. Each one was a step up and usually associated with a speaker change too.
QED 79 strand → Linn LK20 → Chord Epic twin → WH Phantom-> Kudos KS-1 → WH Spectre
I’m not expecting to have a 7th.
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I think you may need to check your timeline there, you’re a coupke of decades or so out bu my reckoning!
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You may well be right. My short term memory was affected by illness last year, so I may well have got my dates wrong. Apologies!
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No need to apologise, time often becomes blurred to me too. FWIW I think Super Lumina arrived around 2015.
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There must have been some other cable or interconnect of some sort launched at around the time of the launch of the NAP500, as I remember a testy conversation with Paul Stephenson in Grahams HiFi, my Naim/Linn dealers at the time.
Unless I am going completely round the twist, of course!
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