I will preface this by saying I am (well, was) well known as anti-AudioQuest. In the past, I've never had success with their cables in my systems and I had all but written them off as a new-age Monster cable where marketing took precedence over performance. For the past two years, I've had a close friend of mine whose opinion I trust fully continually tell me to consider AudioQuest as a new line. I was assured these were not the same cables of years past, yet I couldn't get that sound out of my head. After two years of frustration in trying to find an appropriate line of cables that offered more than just a generic and slightly different take on a typical build, I decided to give them a chance.
I was NOT prepared for what I heard. That 'sound' that was stuck in my head? Nowhere to be found. What I was left with was a very neutral cable that diminished the noise floor, allowing better separation, better image consistency, improved depth, improved width, and even better speaker invisibility for lack of a better term. I committed immediately, which was a statement to itself as I had tried no more than two dozen cable companies within those two years and not committed to a single one. I had heard my system with an extremely low noise floor before and nothing I heard was able to deliver that same kind of performance - until AudioQuest.
How impressed was I? When considering a cable company, I was looking at investing in about $20,000 worth of product. I felt like I could unlock most of the abilities of my system within this range. Now, how impressed was I? That $20,000 number is now over six figures...
The most impressive thing about this lineup now is that, as you move up the line, you don't get a different flavor of sound. You get BETTER sound. Tone is pretty much consistent across the line, but the performance improves consistently. With almost every other company I've worked with, the different tiers of products have different sounds to them. You do get improved noise floor, but you also get a tonal shift that can be a blessing or a curse. For instance, even though the Platinum Eclipse is the flagship from Wireworld (and a superior cable), I found the Silver Eclipse to just work better with my gear. Synergy and all that... Well, throw that out the door with AudioQuest. An improvement is an improvement is an improvement.
I know most of you aren't going to run out and throw damn near five figures at a power cable because of this. That isn't the point, but this is. Honestly, the $365 Monsoon is one of the best power cables I've heard at any price, as long as we forget the rest of the AudioQuest power cables exist. Case in point, my reference cables were in the $3-4,000 ballpark and these Monsoon bested them easily. The same can be said for the Robin Hood speaker cable. While not cheap at $1800, it bested a cable that retailed for several multiples of that price. Step up to the Thunderbird at about twice the price and its a completely different world yet again.
Keep an eye on the lineup. New products are continuing to roll out and they are learning small things here and there that are improving on existing designs. There isn't a full rollout of new designs yet in the interconnect or speaker cable land yet to reach as far as down as the power cables do, but hopefully that will come with time.
AudioQuest is on to something and the rest of the cable world needs to take notice if they want to compete.
I was NOT prepared for what I heard. That 'sound' that was stuck in my head? Nowhere to be found. What I was left with was a very neutral cable that diminished the noise floor, allowing better separation, better image consistency, improved depth, improved width, and even better speaker invisibility for lack of a better term. I committed immediately, which was a statement to itself as I had tried no more than two dozen cable companies within those two years and not committed to a single one. I had heard my system with an extremely low noise floor before and nothing I heard was able to deliver that same kind of performance - until AudioQuest.
How impressed was I? When considering a cable company, I was looking at investing in about $20,000 worth of product. I felt like I could unlock most of the abilities of my system within this range. Now, how impressed was I? That $20,000 number is now over six figures...
The most impressive thing about this lineup now is that, as you move up the line, you don't get a different flavor of sound. You get BETTER sound. Tone is pretty much consistent across the line, but the performance improves consistently. With almost every other company I've worked with, the different tiers of products have different sounds to them. You do get improved noise floor, but you also get a tonal shift that can be a blessing or a curse. For instance, even though the Platinum Eclipse is the flagship from Wireworld (and a superior cable), I found the Silver Eclipse to just work better with my gear. Synergy and all that... Well, throw that out the door with AudioQuest. An improvement is an improvement is an improvement.
I know most of you aren't going to run out and throw damn near five figures at a power cable because of this. That isn't the point, but this is. Honestly, the $365 Monsoon is one of the best power cables I've heard at any price, as long as we forget the rest of the AudioQuest power cables exist. Case in point, my reference cables were in the $3-4,000 ballpark and these Monsoon bested them easily. The same can be said for the Robin Hood speaker cable. While not cheap at $1800, it bested a cable that retailed for several multiples of that price. Step up to the Thunderbird at about twice the price and its a completely different world yet again.
Keep an eye on the lineup. New products are continuing to roll out and they are learning small things here and there that are improving on existing designs. There isn't a full rollout of new designs yet in the interconnect or speaker cable land yet to reach as far as down as the power cables do, but hopefully that will come with time.
AudioQuest is on to something and the rest of the cable world needs to take notice if they want to compete.
