Upgrade to balanced XLR interconnects?

Jafox:

Your observation about a rolled off top end with the transparent ultra interconnect may be true for your system and room. However, I have to disagree with the generalization of your experience. I am using a 15 ft balanced Transparent Ultra XL interconnect between my ARC LS25 and ARC VT100 MKII with excellent results. The sound is extended and natural in the treble region. It is most definitely not rolled off.

You really don't have to spend a lot. For example, you may want to try out the DH Labs (silver sonic) Air Matrix. Its less than $200 and fully shielded (I think, check out the website its listed on the links here). Its working for me, but I am not so addicted to this stuff to spend thousands on interconnects. Hopefully I won't be there for a few years and NASDAQ will be over 10,000.

I am running Ultra balanced between ARC LS-15 and Proceed HPA2, they aren't broken in yet but it definately is not rolled off in my system.
Sawyer, any time you can get gear for what the salesmen pay for it, it is a steal...I doubt that is the only reason for good reviews.

I sure don't mean to nit-pick against Transparent Ultra, but unless you have seriously compared other cables in your system, even the rather 2D sounding Audioquest Diamond had more treble extension, it's hard to say the Ultra is not rolled off. I would really be interested to hear what other cables you Ultra owners used in your ARC system because other than Cardas and Silver Audio, I had to move up to NBS to really get tonal balance, resolution, top-end extension AND not lose the magical bloom of the ARC products. I use Magnepan 3.3s and the ribbon speaker clearly shows less extension and resolution on the top end with the Ultra compared to the Diamond, Straightwire Virtuoso, SilverAudio Appassionata and NBS Master and Statement. Other than this one "shortcoming" in the context of my system, the Ultra was a great cable for ambience and 3D musicality.

The ARC pre was a recent upgrade for me, so I have not been able to compare various cables with it. Maybe it's just a difference in preference for us. What I think may sound bright, could be just right for you and or your set-up. What works in my room may leave you feeling "dull". I was able to compare a set of Super to the Ultra. The Super at first sounded like it had more detail but after some swapping around for a couple of days it was just too thin sounding compared to the Ultra. Nice speakers, I have cats so they are out of the qestion for me...