IC´s:Stealth Indra, Prana Cosmos or Kubala

Thanks for the kind comments JD . I am rather obsessive but you are yourself serious and dedicated . People who know you respect you as a person of experience , knowledge and attention to minute details that many seasoned audiophiles overlook as cumbersome. One look at your fabulous system is enough to see that. Again , thank you. On the Pure Note issue , I am not in any way dissapointed with their performance. I still have a pair left for a bedroom system . They are fast , detailed and a steal for the price they sell for when the half off sale is offered. To compare them to the above cables is not fair for a few reasons . Performance being foremost but they sell for a fraction of the cost and to be fair , its not fair to compare . They are simply not in the same league but their price performance ratio is outstanding. Break in is legnthy and critical with them also. Again , thank you for the unexpected nice comments on my compulsive obsessive disorder. hehehe

Brainwater: Were your Paragons the newer "enhanced" version"? Pure Note went to a ribbon wire in this version for higher accuracy. I have owned the originals which were a bit lean and dry. Compared to the Valhalla, the Enhanced Paragon has much more body in the mids and a better focused high-end compared to my well worn Valhallas. Of coures this is JMO in my system.

Eddykale , I purchased them a week before they introduced the " enhanced " version . I was a bit dissapointed there was no announcement to this effect on their site before I bought mine. The new version may indeed be a different animal.

All I can say(as the third owner of Oritek X-2's) is that the X-2's are incredible.

Jadem6

The strength of the Valhalla are speed, tight definition, dynamics and open airy top end. The weakness is they can be overly revealing and edgy in a bad system. They are also too thin on top; this has held true on every system I have heard them in. The thinness was mistaken by me for dynamics and openness.

I will be the Devil's Advocate here because for me the Valhalla is "the" most neutral cable that I have ever heard--or should I say "never" heard.

Jadem6--you hit it right on that the Valhalla will light up the deficiencies of a borderline system. All others to my ears are only adding a sonic signature or some form of coloration which is pleasing to your ears and hide the inadequacies of a system. I have used all of these cables heretofore mentioned and I keep coming back to Valhalla. The only other cable on my short list which I would consider is the Kubala Sosna Emotion. If you find there are inadequacies in your system when using Valhalla, IMO I would address these rather than covering them over with a cable that adds a sonic signature. The Valhalla is absolutely "neutral" and plays the music the way it was meant to be heard.