I use this stuff to hold my composter door open while I dump in another pile of potato skins. Naim Audio uses no output coils on their amplifiers which may explain why it works in an all Naim system but plugging this stuff into my gear made the top-end sound like a jackhammer with a loose bearing.

I was in the market for a speaker cable when I read Leonards praised review on the Naim speaker cable and thought I'd give it a spin. "For 5 bucks a foot, you can't go too wrong," thought I. I also borrowed some HT pro 11's from a friend and went home for an extended session of comparisons. After all was said and done the old saying still holds the proverbial water. As not to offend the fellow audiophile-ship with negative adjectives, I close with this...... " YOU ONLY GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR ! "

I do not understand where the diversity of opinion comes from about these cables, but I suspect it may be that our individual systems differ greatly in their "needs", and it is likely that our individual tastes vary. Witness the large number of speakers that are detail/treble/resolution oriented with less regard for the naturalness of the music. At any rate, on my NAD/Planet/Ruark system, the Naim cable was better than several wires: Audioquest, QED, Harmonic Tech (yes, you read correctly), and D.H. Labs SS. Several of these were bi-wired and the Naim was better. Natural, clear, lively and inexpensive. Like another reviewer said, for the price, try them!

Why would a dealer push $5/foot wire on me when I was inquiring about wire costing ten times that much? When he's honest and knows that if he can give me better cable for less money, I will be back to spend more on something else. The Naim wire has to be one of the best bang-for-the-buck items in all of audiophilia. Clear, clean, detailed and NATURAL. Without being tizzy. Really improved my Odyssey, Thiel 1.5 and Rega Planet system, which tended toward brightness with other wire. Very impressive even independent of price. Factor in the price and it's a no-lose proposition. Try it!

My home system is all-Naim, with the exception of the Royd Albion speakers. Therefore, I have Naim NAC A5 cabling, which is strongly encouraged by Naim (as it is part of the amplifier design specs). Because I had not been able to compare it to anything else, I was reticent about reviewing the cable here.
However, I'm slowly upgrading my office system. I started with a 15 year old Toshiba CD player, a Yamaha A-500 integrated amplifier, and crappo ghetto blaster speakers (a truly awful combination). Of course, cables were of the "free" variety.

Over the last three months I've switched the CD player for a Cambridge CD4SE, and the speakers for Royd Merlins. The CD player sits on a Lovan stand, more for organizational purposes than anything else (although it does sound slightly better with the stand). I found that the presentation still sounded a little rough on the high-end, so I tried the RadioShack Home Theatre Gold interconnects. Although I'm sure that I could get better cables, these are quite a huge improvement considering the $10 cost. I may get something else in the future.

This left my speaker cables, which were 16 gauge copper from RadioShack. I was finding that bass didn't have enough control at higher volumes, and the musical image occasionally seemed disorganized (depending on the music being played). Although I'm sure that this is partially caused by my lack luster amp, I had hoped to be able to improve it without changing the amp right away. The weak link was currently the speaker cable, so I decided that it was the next item to upgrade.

I managed to purchase two runs of Naim NAC A5 on eBay, and I hooked them into my system. It took a banana plug adapter and some short pieces of copper wire, but I managed to get them connect to the spring clips on my Yamaha amp. If I don't upgrade the amp in the next couple of months, I'll find a better solution for this connection incompatibility. For now, it will do.

As far as the improvements are concerned, the sound is much more warm and smooth. There is more weight in the lower mids, as well as better bass extension and grip. The whole tonal image seems more cohesive, and I feel that I can "hear into the soundstage". In the past the system had a nice bite, but it seemed somewhat artificial. With the addition of the Naim NAC A5, my system provides a much more natural musical presentation.

Strongly recommended!

I thought that these cables were only for naim systems. I was wrong. They are also great for bryston systems. I tried cables from MIT, TRANSPARENT, TARALABS, VAN DEL HUL, DH LABS, and few others. For me, naim cables sound closer to music.They are lively and very natural. Mids are wonderfully balanced with a natural warmth. Bass is pefectly under control. Highs are smouth and extended with no loss of details. They are stiff (gauge 10) and not very attractive. But they are so musical. I use length of 12'. I think this is the best length for these cables (they play very loud!!).

First of all: With (nearly) 2 children, a wife, a car and not to forget: the world highest tax in the world, I am not an audiophile that spend a fortune on Hifi-/AV systems (my wife will probably say something else!)
But when I buy something I feel that the quality must be okay. Since last year I have investigated in a German product called LOEWE systems (www.loewe.de).
I have brought the:
Television Credo 7681 ZP (with the subwoofer television stand Credo Stand 81),
VCR "ViewVision 5126",
Legro TA (Amplifier/Tuner (Linn's Majik in a new design),
Legro CD (Linn's Mimik in a new design) and
the Loewe speakers LS67 (handbuild using the D'Appolito principle)
and lately I upgraded my totally new CD-player with the ZAP filter and LClock XO from the Danish company LC Audio (www.lcaudio.com)
Interconnect: Stripline (also from www.lcaudio.com)

All in all an investment of over $8000.

Since our living room is not quite so large and my wife and our girlchild also want to live and play in the room, the distance from the Legro Hifi device and to the speakers are about 9 meters! This is for a real audiophile a living nightmare, because cables over 3 meters are prohibited. And also this is a living nightmare for my cheque book, because 16 meter of good cables costs a fortune! (If then even existsin these length!)
When I brought the system the dealer said that the cable "Nordost Flatline Gold" was a good cable for the system (also comparatively cheap: $500).
And yes, overall I think that it is a good cable for the system, but the cable has one weakness in my system: the bass!
On some music tracks the cable totally destroys the bass, namely on Celine Dion's ["Let's Talk About Love"] Tell him.
The track has this very special deep "heat-beat" driving bass. Also on the track "I Hate You Then I Love You" with Pavarotti provides problems.
The problem is that it seems to be that the bass won't "let go" or "stop" after a very deep frequency. It continues to play this annoying deep tone for about 1-2 seconds. All my other CDs are reproduced perfect: Bright, fast, highly detailed etc.
Now you can say: Why don't he not just throw the CD into the trashcan and then forget all about these troubles ... And here, I think, the real audiophile comes up to the surface, because we do not accept this solution. "There must been a technical solution", we said.
After reading reviews on several speaker cables, I went to the conclusion that I will give the Naim cable a try. And WOW ... after 2 weeks listening to the cable I'm totally satisfied . This is one of the best investments I have made! For about $180 for 16 meters cable this cable was the solution for my "bass" problem.
(and still all my other CDs sounds perfect). Nothing more to say! Last but not least I will give Leonard Antal right "Naim's speaker cable has to be the most overlooked, under-appreciated, ridiculously cost effective gear for the serious enthusiast.

P.S: Sorry about my english, I hope my review is readable!

Similar Products Used:

Nordost Flatline Gold

Naim's speaker cable has to be the most overlooked, under-appreciated, ridiculously cost effective gear for the serious enthusiast. I can't say enough about the improvement over the Tara 2nd Gen cables I've owned for the last two years. At $5 @ foot, this is stealing. Nothing fancy about the cable, just terrifically musical, which would not be if the cable delivered the signal with (boutique) design-loaded (-doctored) cables to the speakers, which are DAL SC-IV's, and quite deservedly famous for revealling everything upstream, including the studio engineer's brand of microphone. I've auditioned Nordost SMP's, Harmonic Technology No. 9's, and these do not deliver the music, just tweak it into most interesting but unnatural presentations, that tire the ear after the initial fascination (infatuation) with the design features of the cable. At $5 @ foot, what's the risk. Try these suckers before you spend real money.