Balanced Cable recommendations for Ayre equipment

Reterminate your Hero with Neutrik gold XLR's, part nos. NC3FX-B and NC3MX-B. If I remember correctly, the two white conductors will go to ground (pin 3) and the remaining two different colored ones (red and blue?) go to either pins 1 and 2, so long as you connect the same color to the same pin at each end. You can probably sell the RCA takeoffs to pay for the entire project.

I have an all Ayre system, and have tried many, many cables...all balance, because balanced is the ONLY way any Ayre component can do its work the best. Oddly, the worst cables are the Ayre and Cardas designs, the best being the Audioquest Sky series and the Anti-Cables. These 2 cables sound very, very similar using Ayre. The cost differential dictated my use of Anti-Cables. They transformed my system.

I second the anti-cables, they're the best by far of any cables costing 25x their price! The only downside, they take an enormously long time to break-in(interconnects 400-500hrs.)speaker cables 150-200 hrs. leaning more toward 200hrs. Most people don't allow for the break-in time, that's why you see them for sale a lot and the bad reviews some give on them.

Very interesting, I have been running Ayre amps for years with a lot of different front ends.

Over the years, I have tried a number of different cable brands and models.. Audio Quest, Discovery, MIT, Tara, XLO, etc.
I always ended up came back to the sound of the top end Cardas cables. They just sound "right" in my system.... until I tried some NBS cables. Crazy expensive but they are very fast, dead quiet and great balance top to bottom.

Everyone you ask about the efficacy of Cardas/Ayre cables with Ayre electronics will tell you that they were designed for each other. I am here to tell you that if you use Ayre components, (I have Ayre V1xe, K1xe, and C5xe), there are far better alternatives.