What most important in the sound of your cables?

Well you basically covered speed, clarity, natural, and fullness. All nice features to have, but hardly companions, IMHO. All cables I have heard of vary between the full musical weight camp (sometimes too slow) and the speed and resolution camp (sometimes too thin). Most manufacturers try their best to balance these traits the best they can, but you obviously cannot go East and West at the same time. So where their efforts fall is the subject of debate for many.

Years ago, I was more into chasing the ultimate in resolution, but I found that listening sessions became shorter and less frequent due to increase in listening fatigue (too much information). Nowadays, I tend to prefer cables that lean slightly to the natural or musical side of the fence. Sure, I don't want slow cables that lull me to sleep, but I'm more into a relaxing musical experience now than I am in chasing the highest level of resolution that won't allow me to relax and enjoy the music. As always, YMMV.

Interesting Calvinj. I have not heard any of the High Fidelity power cords, only the CT-1 interconnects which I own. IMHO, these interconnects strengths are organic, natural, full-bodied sound. I would not say that they are fast sounding cables at all though. They present too much musical weight to be considered fast cables. In my experiences, cables that offer great speed and resolution, Nordost, Stealth, Tara Labs, etc., do not offer the power and musical weight of cables like High Fidelity and Purist Audio.

Power cords I'm currently using include Nordost Valhalla, Elrod EPS-2/3S, and RSA HZ Crown Jewel. Of these, the Valhalla offers the most speed and resolution by far. The Elrod's are more musical and weighty, and the HZ CJ lies in between the two, though a bit closer to the Elrod's. I've been running the CT-1 between preamp and amp, while using KCI Silkworm+ and Silkworm+ SE between sources and preamp.

06-13-14: Dfontalbert
Simply to be unobtrusive - add and detract nothing.

Well that is a very common philosophy, but really means nothing in reality. Since no one can compare the sound of any cable directly to the sound of no cable at all, one can only say what the cable sounds like attached to a certain piece of equipment. Whether the sound is favorable or unfavorable could be due to the cable or the piece of equipment.

Certain cables will sound better with certain pieces of equipment, but that is more of an electrical match than it is a statement of a certain cables ability to be "unobtrusive".

Cable burnout....I'm with you Lak!!! Just like women, many cables can sound glorious at first, but after living with them for a while, I always seem to find their flaws.....and then their flaws seem to magnify themselves in my mind and I wind up moving on. After a while you realize that they are all just different. Nothing is really better, just different. They all have their strengths and weakness'.

I never heard of Veloce before you mentioned them Calvin. Then again, I don't keep up with the glossy rags like I used to. Are you still running Vienna Acoustic Beethoven speakers?

That seems like an awful lot of electronics and cables for those speakers if you are. Maybe it's time to upgrade speakers next. Ha! I've been stuck in that trap more often than I care to admit. LOL!!

Well, how about that? I just did a little research on Veloce, and it turns out that they are based 7 miles away from my home. That's even closer to me than Walker Audio! Small world. I've been over Lloyd Walker's home a couple of times.

Unfortunately, their prices are high enough to keep me away. Maybe I'll keep an eye out for a used LP-1 phono stage, that's about it.

I like the Vienna Acoustic sound too Calvin. I owned the Beethovens (original) and then the Strauss for a couple of years each about 9-14 years ago. I never had them paired with electronics or cables that were as expensive as you are using back then though. Decent gear, preamps and amps that cost about $3K each, but not mega-buck stuff. When I went upscale with my electronics and cables, I went up to the Verity Audio Parsifal Encores, which were like $21K speakers. Beautiful speakers, visually and sonically.

Since the economic turmoil of 2008, I've scaled back quite a bit, back to some normalcy now. My current setup is about $30K, versus around $125K back about 5 years ago. I have no plans of letting things get out of control again.....unless I hit the lottery. LOL!!