Master Built-What are Owners Hearing That They Didn't Hear With Other Cables

PeterA

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In regards to the high frequencies, at first I actually thought the MB cables were rolling off my highs but then I began to hear high frequency sounds that I never heard before on some of my recordings. This surprised me so I started paying closer attention to what was happening in my system. I finally concluded, these cables introduce no discernible high frequency roll-off (to my aging ears at least) but rather present high frequencies in such a natural, neutral way that it sounded rolled-off to me at first. What I quickly realized was happening is that all the glare and harshness introduced by my old cables was no longer present and that my ears having become accustomed to that sound, found the natural balance of the MB cables at first to be lacking in the upper registers.

The highs with these cables are so free from the usual colorations introduced by other cables that it took time for my ears to settle into the sound and appreciate what was being presented - natural, extended, unadulterated, crystal clear highs. As a testament to the natural presentation of these cables, and without exaggeration, I've held listening sessions with audiophile friends where we listened to music at high levels for 8 hours straight without any listening fatigue whatsoever. In fact, I continued listening to music for a couple more hours even after my friends left (and much to my wife's chagrin) :D

If you think you've heard cables with good high frequency response, you should take a listen at MB Ultra cables - they will change your perception of what are natural sounding highs.


Cheers, Joe

Joe, that was a great report. I hope you don't mind, but I quoted only the section where you discuss the high frequencies. I found this particularly interesting because it is exactly the way I experienced the high frequencies in MadFloyd's new speakers. I, too, thought the highs were a bit rolled off at first, but upon further listening, I realized that the new tweeter design had the even more extension and clarity, but none of the artifacts that cause fatigue. Almost no distortion, glare, or brightness. Just natural highs, pardon the pun. It did take some time to get used to because the "hifi" sound was less, but the "music" was more.

Anyway, I really enjoyed your description of the sound of these cables. BTW, do you mind sharing what cables they replaced so that we can have some added context for your comments?
 

LL21

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Joe, that was a great report. I hope you don't mind, but I quoted only the section where you discuss the high frequencies. I found this particularly interesting because it is exactly the way I experienced the high frequencies in MadFloyd's new speakers. I, too, thought the highs were a bit rolled off at first, but upon further listening, I realized that the new tweeter design had the even more extension and clarity, but none of the artifacts that cause fatigue. Almost no distortion, glare, or brightness. Just natural highs, pardon the pun. It did take some time to get used to because the "hifi" sound was less, but the "music" was more.

Anyway, I really enjoyed your description of the sound of these cables. BTW, do you mind sharing what cables they replaced so that we can have some added context for your comments?

BTW, totally agree on your points regarding high end, natural, 'seemingly muted' when in fact not muted at all. I remember similar results to what i believe you are saying with products that shield emi/rfi on the connection cables to the back of the Wilson speakers (Entreq wraps) and in fact in Tripoint/Entreq products generally.
 

Steve Williams

Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
The other huge impact for my ears was hearing Jimmy's system in Manila and I've said here many times that his is the best sounding system I've ever heard and I've heard some world class systems over the years. Jim's entire system had all Ultra including the speaker wiring. I remember telling Jim that his sound was totally uncolored.
 

rbbert

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Steve, do you have a link for prices for the various MasterBuilt cable lines?
 

mountainjoe

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Anyway, I really enjoyed your description of the sound of these cables. BTW, do you mind sharing what cables they replaced so that we can have some added context for your comments?

I noted this in my system description - repeated here:

My SCs are 8' bi-wired MB Ultras which replaced a pair of Audio Art SC5 cables (and previous using older Nordost purple line bi-wire cables). For ICs, I use MB Ultra 1m RCA between the phono stage and preamp (which replaced a 1m pair of Darwin Ascension Plus cables); the preamp to monoblocks use 12' Darwin Ascension Plus XLRs.

Cheers, Joe
 

ack

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Whatever this cable does, is not what its manufacturer thinks it does. This is what they say:

"The new Ultra Extreme alloy was developed during a contract with CERN to provide a “super conductivity” cable with close-to-zero resistance and/or signal loss; this alloy was used in the Large Hadron Collider."

Yes, that would be misleading. The alloy "used in the Large Hadron Collider" - as you pointed out in the next few sentences - would be superconducting at extremely low temperatures. Therefore, to allude that it would behave the same at room temperature is quite misleading. Frankly, I've been waiting for years for a cable manufacturer to come out with such a claim, although they have not straight out claimed that... yet.

LHC has a site dedicated to their superconductors: http://lhc-machine-outreach.web.cern.ch/lhc-machine-outreach/components/cable.htm

"Copper is an insulation material between the filaments in the superconductive state, when the temperature is below -263C. When leaving the superconductive state, copper acts as a conductor transferring the electric current and the heat. Niobium-titanium is an superconducting alloy."

Translating into English, normal conductors increase their resistivity as you lower temperatures. Hence the reason copper becomes an insulator at -9 deg. Kelvin.

Superconducting material such as Niobium-titanium however, suddenly enter a state where they lose all resistance and hence become superconductors. They are used to build powerful magnets to accelerate particles at LHC/CERN.

Our interest is of course room temperature. At room temp, the reverse of all this happens. Niobium-titanium at room temp has 20 times higher resistance than copper! Let me repeat: Niobium-titanium has twenty times higher resistance than ordinary copper.

So clearly they have their wires crossed at MB if they think making such statements actually hold water, pun intended. :) What they produce better not be a superconductor....

I have never heard of a superconductor at room temperature, and in fact, that's everyone's nirvana. However, it is claimed to be achievable, but at extremely high pressures; more at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room-temperature_superconductor and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-temperature_superconductivity ; of note:

In 2015, hydrogen sulfide (H[SUB]2[/SUB]S) under extremely high pressure (around 150 gigapascals) was found to undergo superconducting transition near 203 K (-70 °C), the highest temperature superconductor known to date.

... 150 gPa == 2.176e+7 PSI, if we care to know; not to mention that H[SUB]2[/SUB]S is a gas, not a solid.

So I am utterly confused and suspicious about this "alloy" in the cables, and the CERN connection.
 
Last edited:

Steve Williams

Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
Yes, that would be misleading. The alloy "used in the Large Hadron Collider" - as you pointed out in the next few sentences - would be superconducting at extremely low temperatures. Therefore, to allude that it would behave the same at room temperature is quite misleading. Frankly, I've been waiting for years for a cable manufacturer to come out with such a claim, although they have not straight out claimed that... yet.





I have never heard of a superconductor at room temperature, and in fact, that's everyone's nirvana. However, it is claimed to be achievable, but at extremely high pressures; more at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room-temperature_superconductor and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-temperature_superconductivity ; of note:



... 150 gPa == 2.176e+7 PSI, if we care to know; not to mention that H[SUB]2[/SUB]S is a gas, not a solid.

So I am utterly confused and suspicious about this "alloy" in the cables, and the CERN connection.

I'd say we are off topic Tasos but so was the post which prompted yours
 

YashN

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Jun 28, 2015
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For my ears the change in my bass response was an immediate and noticeable change. My amps are 32 wpc class A SET and although the bass previously was very good it wasn't in the big leagues. When this cable went in both Leif and I looked at one another as we both had the same WTF moment. There is also top end detail on these cables as well that I just have never heard before as well. The change however is full spectrum as the micro detail fills in all the empty space.

I can't speak about those particular cables, but this is the exact same results (unmistakable) and same reaction I had when I build my own power cable for my SS amp, not expecting any changes at all... :D I was alone at the time, but after the fact I did comparisons with a couple more people for which the changes were really obvious too.

Once you've tried this for yourself and the result isn't even hard to detect but very obvious, you sure enjoy it!

This said, I can't say for sure that someone else will have the same results with their gear.

I have yet to build a dedicated cable for my SET Tube Amp, but I will for sure.
 

fas42

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For my ears the change in my bass response was an immediate and noticeable change. My amps are 32 wpc class A SET and although the bass previously was very good it wasn't in the big leagues. When this cable went in both Leif and I looked at one another as we both had the same WTF moment. There is also top end detail on these cables as well that I just have never heard before as well. The change however is full spectrum as the micro detail fills in all the empty space.

For my ears the dynamic range, the decay, the resonance, ambient sound and timber were better than I have ever heard in my system as when I compare it to what I have used before

Finally these cables IMO are about as neutral as any cable I have ever heard. They add nothing and when listening there is nothing jumping out at you saying "listen to what I can do here"
:D ... I had to smile at that comment ...

The interesting thing is that it's like a switch in one's brain - either the sound has "got it" ... or it hasn't. There's almost nothing in between - but once you've heard it you can never accept the normal stuff, with a straight face, again.

The real point is that "the cables get out of the way", and "the system gets out of the way" - this is the goal. Interestingly, this is not the end point - a system can get much, much better; but a major hurdle in the journey has been cleared ...
 

YashN

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BTW, totally agree on your points regarding high end, natural, 'seemingly muted' when in fact not muted at all. I remember similar results to what i believe you are saying with products that shield emi/rfi on the connection cables to the back of the Wilson speakers (Entreq wraps) and in fact in Tripoint/Entreq products generally.

In my own DIY power cable I used a satellite coax for each of the Live and Neutral lines. Perhaps not ideal gauge-wise but sufficient as a test. Of course, these are double-shielded: there's a film around some PET core first, and then there's a mesh shield around it. The Mesh shields are then both connected at one end and at the other end this goes to Mains GND.

I was flabbergasted, especially since I thought there would be no change, it's just power, right?

You won't find me entering big back-and-forth discussions with people who believe otherwise though: it's a waste of time. We know what we hear in my system when we do the swap between this cable and the original 'lamp-cord' one and it's not even subtle. It could be as well that in some gear, work has been done to make the gear as impervious as possible to a change of cable.
 

mountainjoe

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So I am utterly confused and suspicious about this "alloy" in the cables, and the CERN connection.

My understanding is they use ultra pure copper alloyed with rare earth elements but why not just read what they say on their website - http://www.masterbuiltaudio.com/technology

Generally speaking in regards to your comments about the relevance of CERN & aerospace applications etc., being an engineer like you, I can appreciate that the deep experience the MB folks gained in designing cables for ultra low reactance and very low noise & distortion (shielding), would be directly applicable to designing cables for audio. I've never heard or read (through VSA or the new MB website) that they use the same cable formulations for audio as they did for those other applications - simply that they gained a lot of insight into the constituent elements of cable/shielding design for very demanding applications and applied that knowledge to their designs of audio cables.

As you'll note on their website, they applied their scientific approach specifically to the design of their audio cables but also augmented this with blind ABX testing and feedback from folks in the industry using their cables with various equipment and speakers.

While I appreciate a scientific view and skepticism, I think perhaps folks are taking some of the (mostly anecdotal) information too literally - I've personally tried to get details about the construction and alloys used in these cables but the MB folks are not disclosing this as it is highly proprietary information (as anyone can appreciate). The other factor with MB is that they have access to test equipment that can measure extremely low levels of reactance and distortion - I don't know for a fact, but I would guess that most other cable manufacturers out there don't have access to the same test equipment as the cost of these is not justified if you are just building audio cables. This is another bleed-over form their work in the aerospace industry.

Cheers, Joe
 

amirm

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Thanks for opening/starting a dedicated thread on this topic, Steve. It saves us from having to search the thousands of posts in your system thread, LOL. I don't see hyperbole in your opening post, just an extremely enthusiastic report from a new user who hears something he really likes. Now, if you had said that the addition of these cables made a more profound difference than the addition of any other single component to your system, I would ask about your adding an analog front end to your system and the relative change that brought about.
I hope Steve forgives me for posting this from two years ago about Shunyata cables:

Russ

you're lucky you have a stereo amp and not monos as then you would need a total of 3 Typhons :(

I have said repeatedly that the addition of the Triton/3 Typhons to my system was probably the single most important change I have ever made to my system with such astonishing favorable results

I also agree on the sonic changes with the Shunyata power cords. For now I am staying with my Anaconda PC to the Triton and 3 Anaconda umbilicals for the Typhons as I just live the sound I have and for now I don't want to mess with a good thing

:)

Seriously, I am just surprised Steve has moved on from Shunyata after so much praise for it in the past.
 

LL21

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I hope Steve forgives me for posting this from two years ago about Shunyata cables:


"Quote Originally Posted by Steve Williams View Post
Russ

you're lucky you have a stereo amp and not monos as then you would need a total of 3 Typhons

I have said repeatedly that the addition of the Triton/3 Typhons to my system was probably the single most important change I have ever made to my system with such astonishing favorable results

I also agree on the sonic changes with the Shunyata power cords. For now I am staying with my Anaconda PC to the Triton and 3 Anaconda umbilicals for the Typhons as I just live the sound I have and for now I don't want to mess with a good thing"


:)

Seriously, I am just surprised Steve has moved on from Shunyata after so much praise for it in the past.

Wasn't Steve's email referencing the Shunyata power conditioners/cables? I think his recent purchase of Masterbuilt was their speaker cable (presumably replacing his long-term reference Valhalla Gen 1s)?
 

mountainjoe

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Seriously, I am just surprised Steve has moved on from Shunyata after so much praise for it in the past.

The thing I've found is you can't imagine better sound than the best that you've heard so that is always your baseline until you hear something better. I started with the MB Ultra SCs and after installing these and letting them break-in, I couldn't imagine that adding the MB Ultra IC could make a significant impact as I was hearing the best sound I had ever heard out of my system - that is until I installed the ICs and was blown away by yet another jump in quality.

Mind you some of these changes are subtle but nonetheless impactful to the whole of the musical experience (gestalt if you will).
 

fas42

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The thing I've found is you can't imagine better sound than the best that you've heard so that is always your baseline until you hear something better. I started with the MB Ultra SCs and after installing these and letting them break-in, I couldn't imagine that adding the MB Ultra IC could make a significant impact as I was hearing the best sound I had ever heard out of my system - that is until I installed the ICs and was blown away by yet another jump in quality.

Mind you some of these changes are subtle but nonetheless impactful to the whole of the musical experience (gestalt if you will).
A corollary to getting better sound at this level is that "bad" recordings suddenly go topsy turvy - they begin to become your best, or absolutely fascinating musical experiences - one can judge quality gains by how well these shine up ...
 

Steve Williams

Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
The thing I've found is you can't imagine better sound than the best that you've heard so that is always your baseline until you hear something better.

something he doesn't understand Joe but you are right on in your assessment
 

YashN

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Wasn't Steve's email referencing the Shunyata power conditioners/cables? I think his recent purchase of Masterbuilt was their speaker cable (presumably replacing his long-term reference Valhalla Gen 1s)?

Interesting. I had assumed it was the power cable.

Now, what about their power cables?
 

microstrip

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Yes, that would be misleading. The alloy "used in the Large Hadron Collider" - as you pointed out in the next few sentences - would be superconducting at extremely low temperatures. Therefore, to allude that it would behave the same at room temperature is quite misleading. Frankly, I've been waiting for years for a cable manufacturer to come out with such a claim, although they have not straight out claimed that... yet.

I have never heard of a superconductor at room temperature, and in fact, that's everyone's nirvana. However, it is claimed to be achievable, but at extremely high pressures; more at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room-temperature_superconductor and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-temperature_superconductivity ; of note:

... 150 gPa == 2.176e+7 PSI, if we care to know; not to mention that H[SUB]2[/SUB]S is a gas, not a solid.

So I am utterly confused and suspicious about this "alloy" in the cables, and the CERN connection.

I referred it in Steve's thread before, but perhaps it is how they want to use it - the niobium-titanium core is used as a support of the core conductive layer. The strands are just thin copper tubes tubes filled with a resistive material. They do not claim to use SC's - just materials being used in SC's

Anyway, I am just hypothesizing!

Ack,
I did my best to put a plausible explanation - do you disagree with me?
 

mountainjoe

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A corollary to getting better sound at this level is that "bad" recordings suddenly go topsy turvy - they begin to become your best, or absolutely fascinating musical experiences - one can judge quality gains by how well these shine up ...

Quite true Frank - I can now listen to some recordings that were simply too harsh to listen to before the MB cables (especially the ICs to my phono stage). Jethro Tull's Thick as a Brick album comes to mind as one example:cool:
 

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