Purist Audio, Venustas or Aqueous

First a comment about power cords: Dominus is essential for amps and (believe it or not) DACs. You can get away with other fine PCs (Venustas, etc.) elsewhere.

All my ICs are Venustas. I don't think there would be any discernable any sonic difference between Venustas and Aqueous since the only physical difference is in the jacket (not the conductors.) And personally, I feel that the 100% Ferox jacket (Venustas, Dominus) provides better shielding -- with comparable mechanical isolation to the Ferox/fluid combo (Aqueous, Purist Anniversary)

Finally (and this may not concern you, I don't know) the Anniversary Purist and Aqueous products will only be made this year and then discontinued. Whereas the Musaeus, Venustas, and Dominus will continue in production. And generally, discontinued products don't hold their resale value as well as current models.

Boa2, since you have both, I assume you made A-B comparisons. What are these "huge" differences?

Boa2, thanks, I just read that other thread. I can only conclude that in my (very articulate) system, the Venustas probably sound just like the Aqueous does in your system.

In any case, I certainly wouldn't want any further high end extension; the bass is very fast and plentiful with the Depth sub. So perhaps the Anniversary series would work better with most systems.

What I'd really like is to A-B a Dominus phono cable with my Venustas. I can't imagine it's that much better, but many people seem to think so. Except if it is, then I'll want to hear the Siltech before I write a check . . . . . . . . ha ha!

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I second the Venustas, and I wonder if I have the same reasons as Tvad though. The objective differences are as follows, and come right out of the Purist catalog bi-wire spkr cab. for ea. product:

1.) Venustas effective ga. = 8AWG
Aqueous effective ga. = 12AWG (2 sizes smaller)

2.) Venustas metal = copper/silver
Aqueous metal = copper/gold

3.) Venustas = 100% Ferrox Shielding (cable dia. = 1-1/8")
Aqueous = Foil with drain wire (cable dia. = 3/4")

4.) Venustas shock damping = Ferrox, 1-1/8" dia.
Aqueous shock damping = Contego, 3/4" dia.

Subjective differences (mine ;--)) would be

1.) The Venustas has much better current carrying capacity due to larger wire and the fact that silver is a better conductor than gold.

2.) The huge Ferrox jacket represents not only a better RFI and (especially) EMI shield, but also a much more sbstantial shock absorber than the fluid at approx. half the diameter.

3.) In the Aqueous, if you look at the cutaway drawing on the Purist site (vs. the Venustas drawing) you will see that the Venustas bi-wire cable consists of TWO PAIRS of 8 ga cable, while the Aqueous the two pairs TOGETHER add up to the specified (and smaller) 12 ga.

My conclusion -- the Venustas is (physically at least) twice the cable. If you want to better the Venustas, you'd have to get either the Dominus Ferrox Rev. C (8 AWG) or the 20th Anniversary Purist (7 AWG) -- both outrageously expensive.

Tvad, any other thoughts. . . . . ?
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Inpieces -- to your question, a tentative 'yes', but it would help to know what your system consists of.

Think of the Venustas as a "Dominus Lite" ;--) It has the sonic character of the Dominus, just a tiny bit less. Or, if it makes you feel better, you can think of the Dominus as Venustas on steroids!

My point is that the original "Ferox Trinity", Musaeus, Venustas and Dominus, represented THE watershed moment in Purist's cable development. Their incredible definition, and unbelievable silent background surpassed (and still surpasses) almost everything else available, including most of the great names (like Transparent, and such) Purist cables do have a couple of genuine rivals IMO: Siltech, Aural Symphonics, Stereovox, and Stealth included. But when you factor in price, Purist is still (don't choke!) the best value of the group;--)

Everything before the "Trinity" products, like the Elementa, Colossus (I think it was) hinted at the direction their designs were going but never quite 'got there'. Also, Musaeus is a bit ordinary sounding unfortunately. probably due to the fact there's just not quite enough 'stuff', conductor size and Ferox volume, to put them over the top sonically -- so although they're considered 'entry level' (cheaper) they don't represent a great VALUE, and you can find many other products that do as well for less money IMO. Venustas and Dominus however, even the original versions, offer (IMO) at least 80% - 90% of the performance of any of the various products/versions that came later (to stimulate sales, naturally). That's not a criticism, but the reality is that VERY FEW systems have the resolving capability to allow comparisons between the Dominus and anything further up the line -- excepting Provectus, which is Purist's first solid core conductor product, if you need solid core (like for ultra low capacitance speaker cables mated with electrostats) and now they're in a class by themselves since Virtual Dynamics crashed!

I couldn't afford to use Dominus system wide, so my system is all-Venustas -- except for the Dominus PC's, which have a well-deserved, almost a 'cult following', all their own!

It should be mentioned that when using any of the ultra sophisticated design, ultra expensive cable brands, the special benefits they all can provide are not realized by sticking a Purist here, and a Siltech there. You really need to (eventually ;--) use a given brand/model throughout your system. That's because in this realm, each brand is so unique (you might even say 'peculiar') in both design and construction, that all the cables together can become a component in themselves. Think of it as one LONG cable connecting everything in your system!
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Hi J Mc -
As I tried to express in my previous, the Musaeus model, although made of the same "stuff" as Venustas and Dominus, just doesn't provide the same qualities (even in lesser amounts) as its two more expensive brothers. Many people feel (and I still do) that the Venustas line represents the best price/performance tradeoff of all the high priced cables available. It's one of those products where you'd truly have to (at least) double what you spend just to get a 10% performance increase -- and then only if your system (or hearing) is resolving enough to hear the improvement ;~)

There are some other little exceptions too: for instance the Dominous Power cords are in a class by themselves -- which is to say that in my (ever humble ;~) opinion, nothing else I've tried comes close (not even the
Venustas.) For high power applications/devices, it's in a class by itself; which, considering its cost, makes it a (relative) bargain ;~))