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Audioquest Firebird Zero

I've tried several speaker cables over the past year; Shunyata Alpha and Sigma, Wireworld Silver Eclipse series 7, Audioquest Oak and Redwood, Audience Au24 SX, and I own Clarus Crimson speaker cables. I prefer the Clarus over all of the aforementioned speaker cables. I've had the Audioquest Firebird Zero speaker cables on loan for three days. My initial thoughts were everything is a little clearer through them compared to my Clarus Crimson. Not a night and day difference, but definitely clearer. The Clarus are slightly more 3-dimensional to my ears. My wife on the other hand just keeps saying the AQ sounds sharper, clearer, there are less impurities in the music. I'm not sure what she means by impurities, but she keeps repeating it. Maybe she means a darker background? My plan was to have a home audition of the Thunderbird Zero speaker cables, but they had banana plugs on the amplifier end and I can't use them. I took the Firebirds with the logic that if I can't hear a difference between them and my current cables I didn't need to have a home audition of the Thunderbirds. $14K for an eight foot pair of speaker cables is freaking crazy and sad! It would be easy for me to dismiss it  because there isn't a night and day difference, but once you hear the difference it's very hard to ignore. Financially I just can't justify spending $14K on speaker cables and hope to hear the AQ Thunderbirds sometime next week. Once again I'm reminded that absolutely everything makes a difference. For those that can easily afford $14K, $20K or more speaker cables I understand, because cables can be equivalent to a component change. Does it ever end?
ricred1
mulveling's avatar
mulveling
1,915 posts
 

I had a similar question for AQ, and was advised that the William Tell Silver biwire would be a better choice than Thunderbird biwire (I did mention I have 96dB Tannoys). The cost for these 2 configurations is very close. I was also told this would handily beat my double run of AQ Kilimanjaro, which is their 12 AWG (9 AWG for a double run), 2nd from top Everest, all PSS silver cable from 2 series ago. The Kilimanjaros still sound fantastic to me (lots of detail AND body), so I’m taking my time with any upgrade.

And @ctsooner is making me want to snag a used Dragon for my Niagara 7000 or the solid-state Phison amp, dammit.

ctsooner
2,480 posts
 

I bought the WT Silver true bi wire ((Zero and main cable). I loved the Thunderbird, but I felt the WT Silver were more neutral in my system and room. They seem more open with a better defined stage, including depth. Just so smooth with zero fatigue. Voices seemed a bit better fleshed out. I was listening/auditioning in shop, so not my main system.  

dalims4
236 posts
 

I owned the Thunderbird Zeros for a couple of years. They are miles ahead of what the Silversmith Fideliums will do for you. I had the Fideliums at home for a couple of weeks. They weren’t that great. Nice bass, huge loss of high end detail with the Fideliums. If you didn’t know what you were missing you’d like them.

ot
8 posts
 

Hey all!

Just got my new Thunderbirds (Zero). Only had a few minutes with them but they sounded great. Was hard to do an efficient AB test against the William Tell bi-wires, which blew me out of the water when i first heard them (before that i had the Robin Hood bi-wire and i recall hearing a big difference there). By the time i disconnected and moved everything today, I'm not sure my brain remembered how good the WT sounded to measure up against the TB. Both sound amazing, but i'll be keeping the TB for now (until next upgrade, oh no!) 

Anyway, what i wanted to tell everyone is that i now have a 3 meter (10ft) pair of William Tell bi-wire for sale at very (very!) good price. I also got a great deal on them as they were previously a demo pair for a European dealer i buy lots of AQ stuff from (especially power cords).

Feel free to email me

amyr

(at)

bezeqint.net

 

Shipping will be from Israel.

Peace.

O'

 

bwguy's avatar
bwguy
228 posts
 

Glad to hear you loved the William Tell bi wire cables.  I just ordered some, but unfortunately need 15 feet. Can’t wait to get them.

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