 Clou Cable 212 Red Jaspis
Headphone Replacement Cable
Among certain audiophiles I'm thought a little weird
because of my seemingly irrational love for headphones. What can I say? Some of my best
listening experiences, man and boy, have been through cans -- and, when recording music or
performing certain critical listening tasks, I still find headphones an essential
high-resolution audio tool.
But even among headphone enthusiasts I'm considered a leetle
strange, due to my preference for the better dynamic designs over electrostatic models.
It's not that I don't like 'stats -- I've always owned at least one pair ever since I
heard (and bought) a pair of Stanton electrostats in 1972. I even managed to pry a pair of
Stax Omegas out of Tom Norton's hands (briefly) during my tenure at Stereophile and
they truly are amazing transducers. But 'stats, like every other headphone, have their own
signature colorations and ergonomic idiosyncrasies and I guess, at the end of the day, I
simply preferred those of truly good dynamic designs. Specifically, the Sennheiser
HD 560 and its progeny, the limited-edition HD 700 and more fully developed
HD 600.
Of course, good as they are, the HD 600s aren't
perfect. However, what I once thought was its greatest bug now proves to be a feature.
Lemme 'splain.
The 580s and 600s are modular designs. Every discrete
element, from earpads to cable harness, can be snapped together (or apart). After a while,
the tiny spring clips that connect the cable to the earpiece lose some of their bite. You
can spot an experienced HD 600 user by the casual way he or she keeps jiggling the
connections to keep the cable's prong firmly seated in the clip. This, need I mention,
gets mighty old.
But the same modularity that causes this problem allows
users to substitute new audio cables for Sennheiser's stock cable. And that, my friends,
is a good thing.
We shall hear it by and by
Yeah, I know there are cynics out there snickering, now
you're buying add-on cables for headphones? Yes, yes I am -- and what's more, I now
realize how little of what we've learned from high-end audio has been applied to
headphones. We've developed new headphone amps and new headphone drivers, but has anybody
actually questioned any of the basic assumptions we've kept since the first stereo
headphones were developed in the mid-1950s?
Like what, you ask? How about this whole three-wire
common-ground signal concept? It was developed as a matter of convenience and a bow to
manufacturing concerns of the time -- what else in audio has survived without change for
the last half century? Other than the silliness of the audiophile (go here to see how
little things have changed: http://hifilit.com/hifilit/Mad/Mad.htm). But I digress -- we'll speak
more of this when I review HeadRoom's BlockHead in a few weeks.
Aftermarket cables for the Sennheiser HD 580 and
HD 600 are now readily available -- and, I expect, there will be more to come. The
first I received were from Clou Cable, a Swedish company that actually produces two
models: the Blue Jaspis, which retails for about $90, and the Red Jaspis, which runs about
$120. My review sample was supplied by HeadRoom,
the headphone amplifier manufacturer that also sells accessories such as this on.
Sennheiser's stock cable is made of Kevlar-reinforced
oxygen-free copper and has a rubber-based dielectric. Clou's cables are high-purity
silver-plated copper, insulated with Teflon. The cables are twisted pairs and the
principal difference between the Red and Blue models is the shielding -- the Blue Jaspis
sports two shields, while the Red Jaspis has three, and these shields are constructed from
different alloys designed to absorb different types of interference. Between the
twisted-pair construction and the shielding, the Clou cables are said to be impervious to
most forms of EMI and RFI.
And there's no question they're well built. Clou's
connectors seem at least twice as beefy as the Sennheiser equivalents, each leg of the
twisted pairs seeming almost as substantial as all of the Sennheiser cable, while
the shrink wrap covering the whole assembly seems rugged and substantial.
But -- and this, as you will see, is not a little but
-- all that wire, shielding, and shrinkwrap make for a fairly stiff cable. Unlike the
stock Sennheiser cable, it doesn't bend, flow, or drape easily. With the Clou connected to
the Sennheisers, you are always conscious of the weight of the cables, generally aware of
the wire lying rigid along your jawline and of its resistance to your unimpeded range of
motion.
Plenty to see and hear and feel yet
But what you get -- at least from the Red Jaspis, which is
what I auditioned -- is fabulously deep, rich bass, crisply detailed midrange, and
soaring, liquid highs. I found myself able to hear deeper into the recording, hearing for
the first time details I assume were previously obscured by hash and steady-state noise.
The soundstage seemed more enveloping.
Day and night? No, the Sennheisers started out on a fairly
high performance plane. But the difference seemed equivalent to stepping up to the 600s
from the 580s -- nothing changed its essential nature, but everything seemed just that
much more of what it was.
One of my favorite late-night records is Ian Tyson's Old
Corrals & Sagebrush & Other Cowboy Culture Classics [Bear Family 15437]. Its
mournful evocation of the dying lifestyle of the working cowboy appeals to my sappy
Southern romanticism (and the fact that this, one of the greatest paeans to the American
frontier myth, is the work of an Alberta farm boy nurtures my sense of irony). Besides,
it's just flat-out good music mated to some of the best-crafted lyrics I've ever heard.
The Red Jaspis definitely tightened up George Koller's bass
and gave Tyson's deep baritone greater body -- but the way it gave David Wilke's mandolin
extra zing nearly took my breath away. It just jumped into the center of my head! And
Tyson's collection of yips and yaws and yodels sounded so immediate and exuberant it made
me want to howl along with him.
And that's when I realized what the real drawback to the
Clou cable is -- if you're just lying there passively, they sound great. Actually, I
suspect they sound great when you're jumping around to the music or tending to chores or
even just roaming around the room looking for your next disc, but I couldn't say for sure.
You see, the cable is stiff enough that, when I turned my
head rapidly, it would resist that motion with enough pressure to keep the headphones
where they were. In other words, my head turned but the phones didn't -- I found myself
wearing the Sennheisers over one eye and the back of my head. Or, sometimes, I would find
myself not wearing the 'phones at all.
Associated Equipment: |
CD players: Audio Research CD3, Musical Fidelity Nu-Vista 3DAmplifier: HeadRoom Max
Headphones: Sennheiser HD 600
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Okay, being an audiophile frequently means
accommodating to your stereo beyond rational reasoning, so let’s assume I was willing
to listen to my headphones only when calm and still -- that would solve the problem,
wouldn't it?
Not really. These cables are stiff enough that I was always
conscious of their pressure. Even when listening while seated, I had to route the cable
carefully to keep it from catching or pushing on one earpad or the other. Worse, the
combination of stiffness and weight aggravated the old Sennheiser spring-clip problem and
I found myself reseating the prong within the clip nearly every time my head turned even
slightly in one direction or the other. Eventually, I began to feel like Alex in A
Clockwork Orange, unable to move or blink while glorious music tortured me with its
beauty.
Okay, maybe I exaggerate, but it was definitely a pain in
the keister and it made me think twice about listening to my headphones, which is not what
I call an unmixed blessing, no matter how much better the Clou cable sounded.
There is no lie worse than the truth misunderstood by
those who hear it
The Clou Red Jaspis cable unquestionably improves the
performance of Sennheiser HD 580 and HD 600 headphones. Its superiority over the
stock Sennheiser cable is unquestionable. Ironically, the very properties that seem to
contribute to its superior construction also pose its biggest drawbacks. It is stiff and
unwieldy, making it remarkably inconvenient.
But better it unquestionably is. In situations where
accuracy and the ability to hear deep within the recording is essential, I will use it and
be thankful for the ways in which it has made a reliable reference better. But the
tradeoff between the improvement and the hassles it brings with it makes this a close call
-- and I can conceive of a time when my patience wears thin and I question that decision.
Besides, now that I've heard what a difference a specialty cable can make in the
Sennheisers, I'm hoping some other clever designers are working on the problem, too. Maybe
even the guys from Clou.
...Wes Phillips
wes@onhifi.com
Clou Cable 212 Red Jaspis Headphone Replacement
Cable
Price: $119 USD
Clou Cable
Fallhagen 2
S-561 48 Huskvarna
Sweden
Website: www.cloucable.se
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