A while back I mentioned picking one of these up as the price has dropped siginificantly from the original RRP and could be had for a song (from various sellers).
For those who've been lucky enough to miss the rants and opposing opinions these discussions/arguments often end up becoming, I'll fill in a little on the history here. Been through a bunch of cables over the years - van den hul (The Name), Audioquest (Turquoise and Copperhead), generic (Computergear), Monster (Interlink something or other), DNM Reson and QED Qunex 2. All of these ranged from £8 to around £80 for the DNMs. None of them really exhibited any major differences - they're all copper, the music didn't sound vastly different and nothing like the "night and day" differences suggested in some of the blurb.
So why bother with a pair of even more expensive cables from yet another manufacturer? Well, the logic's kind of "surely a £225 cable will highlight a significant difference over one at a quarter of the price" and so, £80 lighter thanks to an accepted offer with Music Matters who shipped it out the other week, the Atlas cables navigated their way here (sorry...).
They're robust alright, pretty stiff, a tad thicker than the QEDs I use, about the same as the Computergear ones. Plugged them in an didn't listen to them for ages - I don't personally buy-in to the "burning in" theory with a cable but didn't want to be in the position of not giving them a fair crack of the whip, so let them sit connected to the amp from the CDP and used the QEDs on the Spitfire II. Finally started listening to them late this week.
End results for me are a slight difference between the QEDs, noticeably different, but don't read that as being justifiably ten times different given the costs of the cables at full price. Even at £80, the QEDs aren't poor by any comparison.
Where are the differences? A little more openness around the music really. The measurements fans on other sites will no doubt scoff, but they scoff at anything that doesn't fit in their (limited) frame of reference. Am I happy with the end result? Yes and no. Is the difference worth £200-odd, no way. Would I spend £200 on the Navigators? No. Am I happy at spending £80 on them? Sort of, but when I think that the £80 would have gone some way in paying for a new amp which would've delivered greater results.
Ultimately, has my position changed? Not really. My stated position is I haven't heard a difference in sub-£80 cables and had never heard an expensive one. I now have, but the gap between the Qunex and the Navigator isn't as great as one might expect but there is a slight difference between the two. Would I lose any more sleep over it, or buy other more expensive cables, even at reduced prices? On this evidence, no but would recommend anyone tempted checks out the deals on older Atlas cables out there just now - just don't expect "night and day", more "late afternoon and dusk" really.
For those who've been lucky enough to miss the rants and opposing opinions these discussions/arguments often end up becoming, I'll fill in a little on the history here. Been through a bunch of cables over the years - van den hul (The Name), Audioquest (Turquoise and Copperhead), generic (Computergear), Monster (Interlink something or other), DNM Reson and QED Qunex 2. All of these ranged from £8 to around £80 for the DNMs. None of them really exhibited any major differences - they're all copper, the music didn't sound vastly different and nothing like the "night and day" differences suggested in some of the blurb.
So why bother with a pair of even more expensive cables from yet another manufacturer? Well, the logic's kind of "surely a £225 cable will highlight a significant difference over one at a quarter of the price" and so, £80 lighter thanks to an accepted offer with Music Matters who shipped it out the other week, the Atlas cables navigated their way here (sorry...).
They're robust alright, pretty stiff, a tad thicker than the QEDs I use, about the same as the Computergear ones. Plugged them in an didn't listen to them for ages - I don't personally buy-in to the "burning in" theory with a cable but didn't want to be in the position of not giving them a fair crack of the whip, so let them sit connected to the amp from the CDP and used the QEDs on the Spitfire II. Finally started listening to them late this week.
End results for me are a slight difference between the QEDs, noticeably different, but don't read that as being justifiably ten times different given the costs of the cables at full price. Even at £80, the QEDs aren't poor by any comparison.
Where are the differences? A little more openness around the music really. The measurements fans on other sites will no doubt scoff, but they scoff at anything that doesn't fit in their (limited) frame of reference. Am I happy with the end result? Yes and no. Is the difference worth £200-odd, no way. Would I spend £200 on the Navigators? No. Am I happy at spending £80 on them? Sort of, but when I think that the £80 would have gone some way in paying for a new amp which would've delivered greater results.
Ultimately, has my position changed? Not really. My stated position is I haven't heard a difference in sub-£80 cables and had never heard an expensive one. I now have, but the gap between the Qunex and the Navigator isn't as great as one might expect but there is a slight difference between the two. Would I lose any more sleep over it, or buy other more expensive cables, even at reduced prices? On this evidence, no but would recommend anyone tempted checks out the deals on older Atlas cables out there just now - just don't expect "night and day", more "late afternoon and dusk" really.
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