Offer #1: We’ll Loan You Selected Nordost Courtesy Cables
Now you can audition the world’s finest cables, Nordost, with your components in your home and no obligation to buy. Provided you’ve purchased at least one component from Lyric that we feel will perform significantly better when used with them, you’re eligible to borrow courtesy cables by Nordost from our carefully chosen loaner inventory (of selected cables in specific lengths only). While we’re sure you’ll appreciate what Nordost can do for your system, taking advantage of this free offer doesn’t obligate you in any way.
Offer #2: If You Do Buy Nordost, Get Free Burn-In
Experts agree that cable sounds a lot better after being broken in, a procedure that alters both its conductor and insulating materials. Conventional burn-in is done by running your system on a continuous basis, and it can take months, but those who purchase their Nordost cables at Lyric can skip it entirely. We’ll burn in your cables on VIDAR, the company’s lab-quality signal generator, at no charge. The process takes 100 hours, and it will allow your cables to deliver optimum sound the minute you hook them up.
Some Facts About High Performance Cable
You may be wondering why so many home music listeners overlook cable.
One reason is the enduring belief that lampcord or 12-gauge wire is all that’s needed. A similar attitude about conventional interconnect cables and power cords has also prevailed over the years. Moreover, skeptics have been very strident, denying the importance of speaker wire, interconnect cable and power cords in voices so loud that they add considerable noise to the issue while distorting facts.
The truth of the matter is better cables, especially cables made to Nordost’s specifications, can do a great deal for sound.
Consider an analogous situation. Not so long ago, conventional wisdom held that the only components making a real sonic difference were speakers. And many people argued that a few measured specifications — power and harmonic distortion in the case of amps — told the whole story. But serious listeners now agree that various turntables, disc players, preamps and amps differ from one another considerably in their musical abilities. The same is true of cables.
We do have a few cautionary words. Most cables we’ve auditioned color sound. Nordost, however, has worked hard to develop products that enhance musical realism. Nordost cables are decidedly more neutral and more transparent than any other cables we’ve heard. Without adding coloration, they widen dynamic range, lowering the noise floor to reveal considerable inner detail. You’ll hear low-level nuances you never knew were present on your favorite source material.
A Bit About Nordost
Nordost, founded in 1992, is an American firm dedicated to cable. The company manufactures all its products in its own facilities along the Massachusetts high-tech corridor, and it sells them in more than 40 countries around the globe.
Before being produced, every Nordost prototype cable must pass listening tests conducted by an international panel of experts that includes the company’s three founders and groups based in the United Kingdom and Scandinavia. Cables are added to the Nordost line only after those expert listeners approve. The firm’s employees then fabricate them by hand, and they’re covered by a lifetime warranty.
When Nordost was founded, its principals forged an alliance with a cadre of specialists who had helped develop cables for the computer, medical and aerospace industries. That gave the fledgling firm access to talent normally reserved for larger companies working on such demanding projects as NASA’s Space Shuttle program, and it resulted in a new and exciting audio cable series called Flatline, which facilitates signal transmission.
Flatline also embodies a company philosophy that speaker cable should look as good as it sounds. High performance audio cables all too often resemble garden hoses, but Flatline cables have a thickness of just 5 millimeters.
All Nordost cables are made with a proprietary extrusion process and employ fluorinated ethylene propylene (FEP) for the jacket surrounding the conductors. Nordost was the first industry company to apply extruded FEP construction techniques to its cables, and it results in extremely durable products that will reward you with a lifetime of peak performance.
Nordost cables also employ solid oxygen-free copper conductors, either in a flat ribbon configuration or round micro litz arrangement. This prevents strand interaction and significantly reduces the audible distortions that skin effect and magnetic field interactions cause.
Combining extruded FEP insulation with these solid conductors results in signal transmission speeds ranging from 88-90% the speed of light, which is 20-25% faster than signals travel over conventional cable. Nordost cables also have a capacitance 3 to 10 times lower than traditional cables. The benefits are sonic neutrality and an ultra-wide dynamic range with a noise floor so low that even seasoned listeners are surprised by the amount of low-level inner detail on their recordings.
Reviewers Agree
In 1993, Ernie Fischer in Canada's The Inner Ear Report became the first audio reviewer to acknowledge the acoustic purity of Nordost cable. Since then, the major English language audio magazines — from Stereophile and The Absolute Sound in the U.S. to England’s hi-fi+ and What Hi-Fi? — have singled out Nordost as the maker of the industry’s finest cables. One respected writer called the company’s Valhalla series “the least colored and most neutral cabling ever to hit the market” while another gave it his “very highest, most unconditional recommendation.” You can read more from the experts, many of whom use Nordost in their own reference systems, in the Reviews section of Nordost’s website. Go to the Audio/Video Brands page of our website for a link.
