Strictly for fans of Audio Note UK (all things Audio Note UK) PART TWO

Bob Neil used to be an Audio Reviewer for Positive Feedback and wound up liking Audio Note so much he became a dealer for them (and stopped reviewing). He's been selling gear for many years - he's getting up there in years so it sounds like he is operating as an appointment-only dealer now. AUDIO NOTE | Amherst Audio

 

Bob has been responsive to my emails and calls. Agree that the inventory is low. Mike at Audio Archon in Chicago has been super helpful and where I bought my AN-E Sp HE's last month.

 

I have a question, what turntable would you suggest for an amp OTO phono signature and ANe-He- lx? I have this feeling that changing the speed 33/45 with the TT2 deluxe would bother me in the end? Or am I seeing problems that are not there. Thanks in advance!

 

Have you considered a TT2 Deluxe with TT PSU? Then you don’t need to change the pulleys to go between 33 and 45.

 

Bob Neill is fantastic. Outstanding ear. He had a tremendous sounding system at RMAF 2008 with JM Reynaud + Blue Circle. I nearly purchased that combo over Audio Note.

I have done business with Bob on some speaker cables within the past year.

 

I bought a set of SPx bi-wire speaker cables from Bob Neill a few years ago. They were demos and Bob gave me a great deal which was important since I wouldn’t have been able to afford them at full retail. And even better, after experimenting with bi-wiring and concluding I preferred the sound with a single SPx, I reconfigured the cables so I now have one pair of SPx speaker cables and an additional pair of SPx cables that I use for internal wiring in my speakers.

Bob is a great guy to deal with and you know you’re buying the real thing and not fake AN cables.

 

Second that. I have the TT2 Deluxe with TTPSU and I like it a lot!

 

Thanks Richard. I spoke with Bob of Amherst and Vu of Deja Vu today. Both are gentlemen and willing to speak to you and give sound advice. Vu has the Soro on hand, as well as the Synthesis a40 and a100 Titan. He also has the speakers I just purchased from him a couple of months ago. Going to head down to Va. and do a triple blind test. Can’t wait!

 

Did you proceed with these?

 

There is so much fake Audio Note cable out there coming out of China. There is more fake cable than real cable. AliExpress is a prime example. Put in Audio Note in the search. Unbelievable.

 

Why would anyone shop on AliExpress considering it's well know to be a cesspool of fake goods?

 

I could think three reasons in case of Audio Note cables:

1. A person thinks he has found a really great deal. The promise of huge savings makes one want to believe you've lucked out...
2. A person thinks that as pretty much everything is made in China these days --> so must be AN cables --> so these on AliExpress must be grey market ones; real deal, but sold on the side by the manufacturing plant's personnel without the brand mark-up.
3. A person knows they are fake, buys them with intention to re-sell them as genuine 2nd hand product in EU/US market = profit.

There are for example quite a few "real AN UK - not fake, bought from AN dealer!" listings of AN Spx cable coming from ie. Italy, in which you can clearly see from the pictures the cable having text:
'... finest 27 conductor AN-SPX standard pure silver...' Poor chinaman's translator autocorrected the word STRAND to STANDARD

Then on the other hand some of the latest AN cable fakes are hard if not impossible to spot from the pictures alone; ie. that Isis rca looks like a real deal, and no spelling mistakes.
(Although, the current real Isis rca has light brown/translucent lettering, not sure about the earlier real Isis rca... so there's already confusion there and I think the real Isis power cable has had and still has black lettering...)

 

I think the pictures shown in that ad are real ISIS. What you're going to get will look nothing like the pictures. I agree the fakes are generally really easy to spot if you look carefully. I've seen a few. Even the feel of the insulator is different. Stiffer. And the connectors are generally trash. Lightweight and aluminum.

 

i bought 2nd hand Spx cable from a reputable ebay seller (hanoitubes). I had bought tubes from him previously and he is expensive but they were great tubes and he has some rare stuff. i don't mind mentioning his name because i never got a chance to give him some ebay feedback and this is not second hand - this happened to me.

he said he had bought the cables from AN UK. they were in appropriate packaging and they were $3k AUD versus $15k or so for new.

at some stage Bryan had a look at them and queried their authenticity. inspection revealed them to be these alibaba fakes with "standard" written on them and a non-litz construction.

i was mortified and amazed i had missed what in retrospect were such obvious tells. wishful thinking and lust for AN silver got me.

anyway i got my money back but only just. the seller absolutely abandoned ship saying it was up to me and he sold them "as is". only credit card company involvement that swayed it along with a letter from Bryan backing up the fake claim. Paypal are very hard to talk to and they do many things to put you off i think. a lot more seller orientated than i recall from previous transactions.

the cables are actual silver and so they do have some characteristics of real Spx cables i thought ("air"). but i installed a genuine set straight after they were identified and oh boy! the real ones do a lot of stuff the fakes do not - no doubt about that. much more clarity, much quieter, etc etc. fakes had a lot of distortion in hindsight.

i must admit i did not think i was the sort of person who would spend thousands on fake cables but i didn't pay attention and i made bad assumptions. lesson learned (maybe)

 

I think it's best to try and go through dealers with Audio Note - one advantage of Audio Note is they make so many products that customers are often trying to upgrade - which means the dealers know if customer A is trying to sell his Lexus cable or his M6 preamp in order to buy an M9 or Sogon - so if you're patient maybe you can get these second hand and know they're real. The dealer doesn't mind because he gets to sell a set f sogons and also makes you happy.

Too many cheaters out there for my taste. Even with known Brick and Morter sellers in Hong Kong trying to scam you - Wiwi tubes in Hong Kong Wi Wi Tubes- for audiophiles are well known to remove the silk screen from tubes and put their own ones on to fake New Old Stock ones. If you're new to tube amplifiers you will be cheated. The giveaway is that the silk screening is brand new so getting a supposed 70-year-old tube with perfect silk screen is suspicious - but the guy will take a $9 tube remove the silk screen put on the NOS labels and charge $100. He stays in business though because sometimes he does give you the real deal - but you better know what you're buying.

 

Really? Some people prefer the sound of regular speaker cables and jumpers to bi-wire cables? I've never heard bi-wire cables so I'm puzzled.

 

Yes, that’s right, and I am certainly not the only one. Bi-wiring sounds less coherent, less “together” than single-cable wiring with jumpers IMO. And even better is single-cable wiring without jumpers, i.e. where the speaker has only a single pair of binding posts. That is the most coherent.

 

If one wanted to have a single wire AN speaker, it’s not that hard to do internally if the speaker is out of warranty. AN wouldn’t recommend this course of action and do prefer their current design. All I’m saying that it is possible. This is referring to the internal x over version only, the Sig x overs are not so easy.
Personally, I’m happy as they are.

 

@Salectric Does coherence refer to that sort of hyper separation of instruments one experiences sometimes?

 

@SetANE
By coherent I mean better blending of the two drivers so that the 2-way speaker sounds more like a single driver speaker. When I try bi-wiring I am more aware of sound coming from two different drivers.

 

I know what you mean, but there are speakers where biwire works well. I've been able to hear deeper into the music. Music becomes more involving than with a single run plus jumpers.
Maybe it's more than the speaker itself. Perhaps it's a synergy between amp and speakers.

 

It’s a matter of trade offs. Bi-wiring does change the sound in ways that can be seen as improvements; a bi-wired speaker can sound faster and more detailed for example, more lively, but in my experience it is less coherent. I guess it depends on what priorities are most important. My ears are sensitive to any loss in coherency so that has perhaps greater significance for me than it may for others. Deciding whether bi-wiring is “better” is not black and white; it’s more nuanced.

 

Wow. I had no idea. In that case (being an audiophile) I'll ask if everyone uses the stock jumpers or is there an upgrade?

 

I have used single run + jumpers (Audio Note factory supplied copper plates), and bi-wire. I've also used non-Audio Note single wire + matching jumpers on Audio Note and non-Audio Note speakers.

In all scenarios, the differences were subtle to my ears.

I don't think I would recommend bi-wire over single wire + jumpers for most people, unless cost is not a factor and expectation for sound improvement is low.

 

Is there an optimal layout for single wire and jumper connections on the speaker binding posts?