Denon1,
I like the Shuntaya Zitron series and their Alpha series, as well. You can pick up some bargains on Audiogon. They are the best buy in high end audio cables for my system. Except for some DIY cables (see below). I see Shunyata are bringing out a new line. But the prices are "reference prices". Just reading about all this gives me cable fatigue. Elrods do well on some components in my system where Shunyatas do not work as well. But they are very pricey. I run most of my cables in series using my own modded DIY Furutechs. And I do other mods in my system to optimize cable performance.
For my system, the best DIY bargain is silver wire for speaker cables. They beat every contender I have ever used -- by a wide margin -- including Elrod, Synergistic Research and Huffman, among others. As Ozzy has observed, there is so much BS in the cable business around the latest and greatest speaker wire offerings. BS baffles brains, as we used to say.
In my experience, it is only the conductor that matters -- despite all the talk from makers about various metals, dialectrics, cryogenic treatment, quantum tunneling, ribbon configuration, magnets, patents and patents pending, geometry, active shielding, special coatings, proprietary formulas and other nonsense. All these makers have their chest out ready to put their wonderful cables up against any and all contenders. They all produce amazing cables that "punch way above their price points" -- many of which are genuine "game-changers".
There is no end to all the improvements -- from MKI to MKII to MKIII, from SX to SX+ to ZX to ZX+, from Super to Ultra to Reference to Super Reference to Ultra Reference. If only prospective buyers who don't know any better would fall for the marketing -- of mostly ho-hum products offered up in attractive packaging -- and hyped to the hilt -- with A/V shows and reviewers auspiciously quoted and YouTubes to drive home the point.
Talking about cable fatigue, I hazard a guess that cable makers who bring out one line after the other with one improvement after the other have never done A/B comparisons of their cables with those of other makers. I have written elsewhere on the Forum that I can guarantee the follow. If some of the well-known cable makers were brought into a room and a blind test was done with their cables most of them would not be able to identify their own -- despite the ebullience of makers regarding their latest offerings and all the superlatives in gushing text. There is so much BS in the cable business. Caveat emptor.
I will be posting about the previous digression regarding Huffman cables when I have the time to do all the documentation. I am snowed under with work launching a new product and I do not have the time at the moment.
