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Fake Audioquest sky cables

One of my friend had bought an audioquest sky cable from someone that i do not know. My friend knows that i am using audioquest sky cables, and when he tried the cables in his system he had some doubts about their fake or real, then he came to me. My friend sky cables has different color shielding and different kind of 72 v dbs and same connectors but different signs on them. When we tried my friends sky vs mine, friends sky has no stage, no 3d images, sloppy bass, and very highs were very harsh. There is no doubt that this cable is fake. He emailed photos of the cable to the audioquest, and they gave very vague answers, as far as i understand from my friends telling, there are two versions of sky, early model looks like my friends sky, later model looks like mine. I think they mentioned sonic improvement between two models, but not like our comparisons. I heart fake sky cables many times, but never met one. My friend is trying to give back cable, i do not know whether he succed or not. Have you ever seenor heart fake aq sky, did you have a chance to compare with a real one, are your findings similiar with us ?
altanpsx
mktracy's avatar
mktracy
91 posts
 
About 7 years ago I ran across a couple pair of fake AQ Sky IC's.I was working at Sound Factor at the time. We called AQ and talked to Andrew who had me send them the cables.About 1 weeks later they sent them back and said they where fake. AQ places a serial# in the cable itself so they know if its theirs or fake. Also all higher end AQ cables are cold welded not soldered. AQ is a great company and they do stand behind there products, I have 4 pair of the original Sky cables and I have sent them back for upgrade. They simply have a stunning sound and presence to them.
stringreen's avatar
stringreen
6,475 posts
 
Audioquest Sky is one of the best cables in the world. ...however, Audioquest has no right to destroy your property.  I suspect there may be a legal issue involved, though, it might not be worth pursuing unless you yourself are a lawyer.
wolf_garcia
6,711 posts
 
If Audioquest tells you in advance they're gonna trash the fakes you send to them, that's all they need to say. No issue of rights at all. I use several AQ cables bought used and they're not extremely expensive versions in the first place so I haven't worried…and they work very well.
mbaudio
8 posts
 
Audioquest (AQ) destroying somebody’s else property is, most likely, illegal but who will even consider challenging it in a federal court (maybe a class action would make sense here). The main reason why it is a really bad idea is mentioned already here: after destroying a cable there is absolutely no way for a victim of a scammer to get any portion of his/her money back unless the transaction was insured by a 3rd party. Probably the only way to get money back would be to obtain AQ’s statement which is linked to the specific fake cable. For that reason, AQ could thermally (laser?) brand fake cable’s connector (let’s say with the 3-letter code such as "ABC" for the total of 15,600 unique combinations) and attach a related dated & coded statement stating that the cable is fake. They could charge a fee for such a service because losing all the money on a fake cable is much worse. By destroying fake cables they are serving nobody except themselves. I actually have such a case now: I purchased an AQ cable from an Ebay seller, evaluated it, discovered it is underperforming, returned it to the seller, and he is about to send it to AQ for authentication while my refund is depending on a result of this process.
wolf_garcia
6,711 posts
 
SInce AQ says exactly what they're going to do if the cables are determined to be fake, it's not illegal in any sense...you shouldn't send them to them in the first place if this is an issue. 
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