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Review: Acoustic Zen Absolute Interconnect

Category: Cables

I was looking forward to audtioning Robert Lee's new highest reference Acoustic Zen interconnects & speaker wires which he calls the Absolute. They represent his latest thinking regarding the state of the art in his house of wires. About two years ago I had gone through a lengthy audtion process, which included five highly regarded sets of wires from well known companies, untill I decided to replace all my wires with AZ Silver reference II & Matrix reference II and Satori speaker wire. I'm a great fan of AZ for two major reasons;1) They offer great "bang for the buck" out standing performance for the cost ratio.2) They have,for me, a wonderful combination of tight/powerful bass,great details,transparency,dynamics,natural timbres, along with being musical and a smooth "sense" of ease. The process of audtioning the Absolute began with inserting a Absolute interconnect between my DAC and PRE-AMP along with putting the Absolute speaker wire in. Since I bi-amp there are four sets of interconnects so I put the Absolute interconnect at the front of the system. Well, it turned out to be a very gratifying experience! It not only tremendously improved the above stated virtues but added the following;1) A giant soundstage with excellent layering of players in a sense of real space.2)A sriking sense of air/three-dimensionality around everyone in the soundstage.3)Much improved/natural timbres.4)The new cables added that wonderful "organic/musicality" that I think we all strive for in our systems. It strongly reminded me of the experience I had when I audtioned my Pass Labs-350.5 to my then current amp an Edge NL-10. The Edge, which is still a great amp with many reference level characteristics, just kinda sounded sterile compared with the musicality of the 350.5. I know thats a very subjective way of explaining my experience, but its hard to use objective language at times to explain why a component just sounds more like the experience of real music. These wires are not inexpensive(2000.00 for the interconnects and 2800.00 for the speakers wires) but offer so much without any apparent shoutcomings that I think they are very fairly priced and compete with many reference level wires at a much lower price.So I think Mr. Lee has done it again, great sound at a reasonable price! As a final note I want to mention, even though we all know it all ready, that important factor of system matching and synergy long with your personnal taste make home audtioning a must for us serious audiophiles! I highly recommend you try these wires out if your a fan of AZ or looking to upgrade you wires in your sytem.

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teajay
jb8312
247 posts
 
I, too, am I big fan of AZ. I am currently AZ all around, Silver Ref IIs, Holograms & El Ninos power cords (if you want to talk bang for the buck the Le Nino Power cords maybe the single most impressive value I have ever purchased) I am a reviewer at Postitive Feedback maybe I can get Robert to sent me a review set...

Thanks for the heads up!
lrsky
1,118 posts
 
I too, recently replaced my Kimber Select 3035, on the top and bottom, of a biwire speaker, with the Acoustic Zen Shotgun, top of the line cable. It is nothing short of remarkable. Clearer in the mid's and highs, and better in the bass, relative to the Kimber, (that is on my system), and admittedly all systems have different reactions to cables.
The Acoustic Zen is what was used with the $150K Von Schweikerts at the 2004 Live versus Recorded comparison with five other manufacturers, in a consortium put together in a ballroom, so everyone could display together.
We had Chris Huston, recording Misty River, each night, playing back for comparison's sake, live versus recorded.
Robert really does a great job.
rsbeck
887 posts
 
How could you folks have been such fans of AZ if the sound of their previous
cables was so inferior to these? These cannot sound so much better than the
previous ones without the previous sounding the same measure worse, right?
What do you suppose AZ could have done to the new cables to make them
sound so much better? What was the big breakthrough?
guidocorona
4,298 posts
 
TJ, the Acoustic Zen site indicates the Absolute cables to be made from a Silver Copper Hybrid. Does this mean that some strands are made from copper and others from silver, or that copper strands are silver coated, or that a Silver/Copper alloy is employed?
teajay OP
1,689 posts
 
Rsbeck, I think you took my comments out of context in my review. What I would call the house sound of Acoustic Zen cables in general is very musical and yet detailed etc.,so the Absolute cables are an evolution towards the standard of real music. They take what the original AZ cables provided to a higher level plus adding that sense of organic/musicality that gives a sense of ease and flow that real music seems to have. So the original AZ cables are still pretty damn good,not inferior,but the new Absolute cables are just that much better. As far as your question about what Robert Lee did from a technological prespective to get these improvements I don't have that type of expertise, but I believe if you call AZ and ask Robert what he did he would share this information with you. He's really a great gentleman and fun to talk to.
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