Revisiting Chinese Knockoff Cables

The last word

The YouTube video at the bottom is a good summary read .

Read for yourself the fake dissection review following … Since the fakes are not “knockoffs” in build, so who views them as knockoff peers too in sound performance? If you do in YOUR system (extreme limitation emphasis added), Fine . No worries , and carry on sir. Each to his own. 

http://www.element-acoustics.ca/audio_visits.php?aid=41

Fake Cables Discovery 1 - counterfeit Nordost

Nordost's roots were in the Military, Medical and Aerospace industries. It gives the company access to the most advanced materials technologies known to man. Ever since the launch of the first audio products in the early 1990s, Nordost has always insisted on the highest quality, extruded FEP for use in cables' dielectric and jacketing. FEP has many advantages; primarily, it is the most consistent and best performing dielectric material available, with the exception of air; which is where micro mono-filament technology comes in. The micro mono-filament technology is a process developed by Nordost to reduce the effect of the insulation material. It uses a thread of FEP which is helically wound over each highly polished conductor. A precision FEP jacket is then extruded over the thread and the conductor. A number of proprietory methods are used in this difficult and extremely precise manufacturing technique. 

Now that we understand the construction of a genuine Nordost cable, it's simply not easy to make.  We can see that counterfeit cables DO NOT have the technology and manufacturing technique, and it is very costly to duplicate the same construction. Therefore, the counterfeit cable can only duplicate its appearance.

Couple things we can notice on these counterfeit Nordost cables:

Fake Nordost uses cheap and rubbish rubber /PVC insulator.
They don't have the manufacturing technique for proper twisting; instead they need an inner wire for the twist.
They have poor printing; sometimes misspellings. They also don't have serial number, and often no box.
They have poor soldering points, and also counterfeit connectors. 
The counterfeit can't twist conductor like Nordost, they have to use inner wire 
Counterfeit cable has poor printing, and often in time, misspelling 
This counterfeit Valhalla power cord even comes with fake Wattgate plugs. 


YouTube [Fake ODIN2 dissected vs the OEM ]

https://youtu.be/GZxnb_kxZIg

As I often do, I think about my systems weaknesses even when Im not listening to it. Do you? Today's case in point: CHASING DOWN WEAK BASS. Where I was focused on my S/PDIF cables, it occurred to me to check what power cord I had on my Audio Alchemy PS-5 outboard power supply umbilicaled to my AA DDP-1 DAC/PRE. The PC mfg was recommended from a friend and sold on Amazon. Now in fairness to him, he said to get the copper version, but I bought the silver over copper: �Oxygen Free Copper Core】The US power cable is 10AWG Oxygen Free Single Crystal Copper Conductors with low harmonic vibration point and high damping provide optimal transmission.
�Rhodium Plated Plug】it is with US version +C15 Rhodium Plated Plug + Aluminum Alloy Shell making it less susceptible to outside interference, ensure crystal-clear HiFi effects.
�Pure Copper Shielding】the power cord is with High density Red Pure Copper Braid Shielding for low-interference signal transmission,making consistent reliability. Heck of a deal for ~$40, but...

I just swapped it out for a Tekline Audio boutique cable circa ~ 2005 @ ~ $500. Even cold, it has a lot more low end grunt. I'll give it a couple hours then rotate my Pangea Premier SE coax with my NEARdost Odin 2

TBC

@akg_ca 

Yes but they still sound good!

@evank

sound “good” is a highly subjective, and biased relative term . If they stir your drink, carry on,

BUT until you actually personally audition the OEM ODINs on a high-end system, then you will witness how much the OEM ODINs totally smoke the fakes .

the fakes performance wise can fully live up to their listed $$ pricepoint. ….but they ain’t close to the ODINs or any other NORDOST model line above their very bottom entry level

The Comrades hiding from intellectual property counterfeit prosecutions in their Far East repressive proletariat have an active, and dare I say successful; illegal market capitalization on an illusion of quality on the cheap. It’s an online selling of uber-cheap build fakes ergo grossly inferior cheap quality build cables, BUT with an appearance and similarity to OEM models with a purposeful fraudulent counterfeit branding.

There’s two complimentary components to this Chinese counterfeit fake cables thread:

(1) The well travelled obvious ethics issue, or rather a minority cohort’s agnosticism to it, that fuels their run on buying illegal, cheap build inferior fakes from a repressive regime based solely on price , …. that … ultra politely… is not a good look at best …full stop

(2) The equally well travelled and Uber-obvious accepted audio philosophy is that quality build and audio performance cable requires a high quality materials / components factor along with labour . These Chinese fakes are not alone. If you go to the OEM website comments on counterfeit fakes, it highlights crap,units from Romania, Bulgaria , amd other locations in Europe too. These Chinese Ali-express fakes and all their peer fakes with cheap prices requires a matched race-to-the-bottom build quality ( and price) that is obviously an anathema to this principle.

TAKEAWAY :

(A) Let’s just rebrand and recast the counterfeit fakes to what they actually are : a very inferior mass build with cheap bottom quality components (connectors, cable, and no shielding) that are full fair audio performance value limited to their listed ad price-points.
(B) And with reference to the vast majority of audio prior posts herein on all of CAM, AGON et al, the fakes were designed, made, and sold as illegally branded units limited to legit OEM comparisons solely in appearance similarity only.

Build quality matters in audio performance. If cheap Chinese fakes sounded anywhere near OEM performance levels, why don’t the speaker and the audio equipment presenters just use the cheap fakes instead at the audio expos ? It would be a helluva marketing tool …if they actually worked well of course ,,,(oh … that pesky detail…)

OEM NORDOST ODINS EXPLAINED AND REVIEWED

http://www.theaudiobeat.com/equipment/nordost_odin.htm
http://www.stevehuffphoto.com/nordost-v ... end-audio/
http://www.soundandvision.com/content/n ... din-cables


The key points extracted from the above

(1) THEY PERFORM IN A SENSATIONAL MANNER, BUT THEY ARE NOT FOR EVERYBODY AND THE REST OF THE SYSTEM IS PRESUMED TO BE IN LINE WITH THE ULTRA-HIGH-END STRATA OF THE CABLE .

You could easily spend six figures to connect all your gear with these cables, so the big question is how much improvement do they realistically provide? They’ve garnered glowing reviews in the audiophile press, but I contend that any improvements are most noticeable when the rest of the system is similarly ultra-high-end—anything less will drown the effect of the cables in other problems. But if you’ve got the audiophile itch—and the scratch to match—I’m willing to bet you can’t do better than Odin.

(2) THEIR HISTORY IS UNIQUE.

Nordost came to the field of audio cabling in a rather odd way. The company was founded in hard science -- developing and manufacturing cabling for ultra-high-precision aerospace, aviation and medical applications. Hint: think NASA Space shuttle.

Somewhere along the line a clever Jack decided that the same technology just might be the proverbial cat’s meow when applied to high-end audio. Whoever he was, he was right, and the company now makes cables for every wallet -- from the bargain-basement Best Buy shopper to the enthusiast who owns a penthouse overlooking Central Park or Malibu Beach.

(3) YES THEY ARE EXPENSIVE TO MAKE AND THUS EXPENSIVE TO BUY THEM

There are reasons for Odin’s extreme cost.
- There is a lot of very high-purity metal in these surprisingly heavy wires, and a lot of it is silver. At $50 a cable in a fake, there is zippo = nada, and likely just scrap silver coloured tin sheath over the cheapest non-OCC hardware store Cu you can find core , to deceive a buyer.
- Odin is also very hard to make. The micron-level precision tolerances necessitated by the design result in a crazy-high scrap rate. There are also nearly ten years of research and development in this product, and that investment of man hours has to be recouped.
- there is a high percentage of culls to weed out in OEM production.

TAKEAWAY :
I’m not a NORDOST cables user much less their ka-Ching $$$$ reference class NORDOST cables guy so I don’t have a horse in this race

BUT..l there is a best of breed performance reason why NORDOST VALHALLA, and especially ODIN …along with CARDAS CLEAR BEYOND , and it’s CARDAS CLEAR models , together form the largest share of the exhibitors cables choices to showcase at the audio expos….full stop.