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Chinese fake cables How fake, how good?

I have noted a number of warnings about cheap Chinese fake cables on this site but curiosity led me to the Aliexpress site where I found a number of presumably fake big name cables from predominantly Cardas, Nordost and Siltech at about 15% of the USA or Australian price. I found Cardas Clear Light interconnects at about US$100 and decided what the heck let's give them a try at that price. Before buying I asked the seller the daft question as to whether they were genuine and got the reply that they were an OEM and constructed the interconnects from genuine Cardas cables and connectors. They arrived in a plastic bag rather than the Cardas box , not a great start but the cables looked real, and when connected, much to my surprise, they sounded really good. After 100hours or so burn in they sounded great and better than the Nordost Quatre Fils I had been using. I then took them to an Australian hi end dealer who sold real Cardas and asked rather ingenuously whether my cables were the real deal. The dealer would not commit but agreed to compare them to the real thing on a set up costing at a guess around A$100,00. Neither I nor the sales person could tell any difference so he then tried them against the Cardas Clear. Then there was some difference, not extreme but subtle, and certainly IMO not worth the price difference even if you bought the genuine Cardas Clear Light. So are these cables really fake and even if they are given my experience they are well worth a try. Maybe I'll try Nordost Odin or Siltech 770i next.
128x128mazian
akg_ca's avatar
akg_ca
2,281 posts
 
They are a POS rip-off and must-to-avoid

ignoring their obvious illegal and unethical practices, there are a buzzilion threads out there highlighting the crap construction
here’s just a sampler highlighting all the the junk build rip-offs and why they comparatively perform like crap.

http://www.element-acoustics.ca/audio_visits.php?aid=41https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/chinese-odin-cables.15229/
https://www.vandenhul.com/product/the-mainsstream-hybrid-halogen-free/
https://www.avforums.com/threads/ebay-warning-chinese-fake-cables.1218411/
https://www.stereophile.com/news/091106vdh/index.html

https://mniec.wordpress.com/2012/06/27/fake-van-den-hul-d102-mkiii/
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 
Commies do not respect intellectual property rights or international laws of commerce. 
mazian's avatar
mazian OP
408 posts
 
When I started this thread I mentioned that I had the chance to compare fake Cardas Clear Light interconnects with the real thing and could hear no difference. I have since tried the fake Nordost Odins and find them to be better than the fake Cardas cables. I have no idea whether they sound anywhere close to the real Nordost Odins as I don't know anyone who has the money or is silly enough to spend A$30,000 for a pair of interconnects. I even doubt if Australian Hi Fi stores have these cables in stock given the impact on their inventory costs. What I do know is that to me the cables sound excellent and I would be very surprised if the excellent Holo connectors are not genuine.

Leaving the ethical issues around fakes aside as a separate issue to the quality and sound of the fake Chinese cables as everyone has a right their opinion on ethical matters. However it appears from many of the responses on this thread that many, no lets say most, contributors feel they have a right to express an opinion on the sound of these fakes based on pure bias and ignorance without having heard, seen or bought any of these fake cables. akg_ca above cites a number of links to support his/her negative views but I suspect no first hand experience. Even these links are in some cases based on no first hand experience or worse are from the Audio industry itself which has a clear vested interest in maintaining the inflated cost of genuine audio cables and therefore being very negative about the copies.

The only opinions which IMO matter are from those who have heard the fake cables in their systems. I note that most of the contributors in this category, like myself, are positive about the value for money of these fake cables and even one contributor who has bought and dissected the cables seems impressed with the quality of the fake Odins.

I don't know if there will be many more contributions to this thread but it would be nice if they were based on actual experience rather than bias, heresay and ignorance.
teo_audio
2,197 posts
 
Making a fake Teo Audio cable would be pretty darned tricky.....

The closest we've come to that, is someone who took one apart and re-terminated it and called it as simply 'used'. It was immediately visible as being re-terminated. 

The list of things one has to do to make a real one is easily over 15 items long and each is custom lore, that is easily visible as all wrong, in a fake. One can't even source some of the materials for said attempt, at all.
boxer12
8,656 posts
 
" everyone has a right their opinion on ethical matters"

Seriously(!) mazian, there is no middle ground on this issue. 
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