Atma-Sphere with which speaker cables?

Hello, Mark.

I have the M60 MK2.III. This is my third, and best pair of M60s.

I also have a pair of Coincident loudspeakers - the Digital Master, with matching Troubass subwoofers. Have used them together with my Atmas a great deal.

Basically, my thoughts are as I said above. In my opinion, with this combination, one must be careful so as not to spotlight the weaknesses of the amplifier, which can really impact the presentation negatively. The key is to try to allow the speed, openness, and extension to come through, without putting forth harshness and lack of soul.

Running into the Atmas with a balanced IC is always a good move, as it pays benefits in the distortion/noise floor areas. I don't always do so, but please allow me to suggest that once you find your flavor in cabling, even if your preamp is single ended, have the cable constructed with a pair of XLRs on the end that goes into the amps. I have two cables with RCAs on one end, and XLRs on the other, and they always reinforce in me that this is the right way to go with these amps, even if they are not my favorite sounding cables overall.

I've found that more romantic cabling and driver tubes to work best for me, in that they flesh out the mid/upper bass which imparts the warmth I require. But, with some of these cables, such as the JPS, you do lose ultimate bass (and a good bit of treble) extension and impact at the very, very bottom, which is surely a tradeoff. Coincident's own cabling mates very well with the Atmas, yet the CST and TRS give radically different portrayals. I find the Coincident cable can sound too slow and lush with many other combinations, which kind of makes me wonder if they still aren't Israel's reference amplifier, and the cabling is possibly designed to form a synergistic match between the amp and speaker. TRS is flat out the weirdest cable I have EVER encountered in the audio hobby. When it works, as it often does in this combination, I find it works spectacularly. And, when it doesn't fit into a system, I find it fails just as spectacularly.

Based on what some people I really trust have done, I'd like to try the Alpha Core and the Purist Audio also.

I'm a little late to this thread, but I having great results runing older MA-1's with Cerious Technologies liquid speaker cables, and XLR to feed the MA1's as well. I have not really compared to other cables, and I am running the Cerious T00/bass speakers, so obviously YMMV. I am am about to try some Zero autoorformers in the system, since the speaker is 4 ohms.

My MA-2 Mk3's seem to like the Jena Labs cables I am using.

I've been using Alpha Core Goertz Silver cables with my Atma-sphere amps for several years with no complaints. Yes, the Alpha Core cables are relatively high in capacitance, compared to some others, but this will not at all negatively affect the performance of the amps. The amps are completely stable into the load presented by Alpha Core Cables, and the amount of capacitance involved will not attenuate HF response. (SS amps will often go bonkers when used with Alpha Core, but not tube amps.) You wrote something about "impedance". This is actually a virtue of the Alpha Core cables, as they tend to have a very low "characteristic impedance" (4 to 8 ohms) compared to other commercial products (which can be as high as 100 ohms, e.g., Nordost products). Characteristic impedance is defined by the square root of the inductance divided by capacitance; thus it is independent of the length of the cable you are using. I tried my Atma amps with Nordost cable (see above) and the results made my ears bleed. I returned the Nordost shortly thereafter. Other cables with low characteristic impedance that might work well with Atma are Transparent and MIT.

I have heard, but have been unable to confirm that the impedance of the MI-2 cables is 2.5 ohms

Yes, the characteristic impedance of the MI2 is 2.5 Ohms. Inductance is 6 nanoHenrys/ft, capacitance 0.95 nanoFarads/ft.

Tim