Cardas or Nordost for Simaudio/Magico


Looking for new cabling for Simaudio 330A amp/390 Pre Streamer into Magico A3 and have narrowed down to Cardas or Nordost primarily as I understand that Simaudio often shows with these cables.  Cardas level would be Clear Cygnus (or maybe stretch to Clear), Nordost would be Heimdall 2 (or maybe stretch to Frey 2).  Need PC, Speaker and XLR IC.  Currently using Acoustic Zen.  Ideally, would like a bit more detail and improved soundstaging.  Probably will buy used and so just want to pick one and go with it.  Appreciate any input.

dokosan

I would think Cardas. Magico are very very revealing speakers and Nordost are pretty revealing. The combination is going to reveal the leanest of the Simm. 

I’d recommend trying Cardas Clear, Clear Reflection and Clear Beyond. I recommend auditioning for a week each. The sound will be of the same character with a difference in bass and midrange. The Reflection will be be the warmest / sassy and the Clear Reflection most detailed. You should take your time... these should be great fine tuning for your system. 

@dokosan I’m familiar with AZ cables. They lean warm sonically but they’re not bad cables. If you had stock power cords I would say start with power. 
Another reason for my recommendation on the order/approach is that in my experience stating from downstream components will make most difference, good or bad. That order is - speaker cables, interconnects between pre and amp, then move on to the interconnects from source to pre. If you want to start with power cords, the one on the amp will make the biggest impact - amp is what drives your speakers and if you have subpar cables there you have a bottleneck. 

I would definitely go with Cardas Clear. I own the A3’s and have an authentic Clear unbalanced interconnect between the phono stage and the preamplifier. Before I bought it, I listened to it in my rig. The overall sonics convinced me to drop the cash for the Cardas Clear.

A good buddy just got rid of his A5’s. He had the top Nordost speaker cables and may have had other Nordost in the chain? 

The reputation I’ve heard about Nordost is that they’re bright. IMHO, this isn’t a good match with Magico.

I’m also auditioning Cardas Parsec 9 meter XLR cables between the pre and power amps at the moment. I didn’t notice any improvement in sonics from a pro XLR cable I’d been using.

+1 @ghdprentice - Use cables for tuning. I took that advice and tried Cardas Clear for my rig.  It works.

The reputation I’ve heard about Nordost is that they’re bright. IMHO, this isn’t a good match with Magico.
 

The first generation of nordost were a bit thin sounding. 
I would not call the current gen Heimdall 2, Frey 2 and Tyr 2 bright. Fast, accurate and transparent yes. I would also not recommend using Nordost in a system where certain sonic quantities need to be masked. It’s all system dependent.