Gabriel Gold IC's are they really this good?

"Many people seem to enjoy them. I just found them too hard, bright and forward in my system. They may be right in other systems."

I am going to be politically incorrect and question that statement. Personally I think it is impossible for ANY of the gold-silver-copper alloy cables to be terribly harsh or bright. Adding gold seems to impart a "butter" effect to the signal, so I say if anyone is hearing harshness or brightness, it's that the cables are too revealing for some other part of the system. It might be the CD player, the DAC, the amps, the power . . . it might be the CDs themselves. Rock and roll, for example, tends to be two-realmed (high and low) so even one's musical tastes affect things.

That's not to suggest there's anything wrong about ameliorating some system excess by the choice of wires, amp, etc. My point is that as an objective evaluation of a cable, it isn't a sound principle to judge it by one's system unless one understands all the limitations at work in other areas.

I suspect gold alloy cable technology is going to be the hottest thing going in a few years, and I think the magnetic shielding idea will prove to be a brilliant concept that was first attempted by Audio Metallurgy. If it is "too" revealing, well that's not the cables' problem.

Ditto, Les

Les 3457,

it is possible to get gold to sound "bright".It happened in my system during burning-in period.More than 150 hours.I explained it in my previous posts.

I don't suggest that's what happened to the other guy, but it is possible.

P.S.
I also thought gold will get big soon, when Nordost, Cardas etc. get into it.But i don't anymore.
I don't expect gold to get big in the audio industry, as it not as cost-effective as other cables.Gold = too expensive = highest prices = small quantity sales.
Not that there's anything wrong with gold, GG Rev are the best ICs i've ever heard.But after 300 hours.

Priz,

Just a quick question. When you auditioned the Audio Metallurgy GA-0's, did they have the upgraded Next-Gen RCA's or the standard RCA's?

My point was, how do you know it was the AM cables acting bright, or instead, that they were revealing some aspect of your system that is bright?

This part of the thread discussion has come about from questioning how one OBJECTIVELY evaluates a cable. If we were talking SUBJECTIVELY, i.e., how a cable interacts with one's own system, then I'd have nothing to say. But an objective evaluation of Gabriel's or AM cables isn't so straightforward as putting cables in a system and seeing how things sound.

For example, in my case, I chose every single component of my system for neutrality or warmth, and my interconnects were the last things I chose. I know my DAC, my speakers, my CD player, my amps, and my speaker cables are all neutral or warm . . . and that makes the effects of my ICs quite noticible.

A system whose DAC converts the signal bright, for instance, may not be obvious if someone has ICs that mask that. So if they try a cable that is actually neurtral (and therefore revealing), compared to a less revealing cable they may think the revealing cable is "bright."

As I said earlier, I don't think there is anything wrong with chosing a cable that helps one's system. The issue (for me at least) is all the opinions floating around about some cable that are based solely on how it sounds in one's system. Few people have the same systems, so it isn't all that valuable to hear a cable is bright because "they are bright in my system."

I say, the GA-0s are revealing. Can your system handle it?? :)