The Sandman
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Earlier this month Mike came by the house with a *big* box of goodies for me to try out in the system - his own set of MIT cables, or more properly interfaces. This included the MI-2C3D Level 1 Speaker interfaces, MI-2C3D Level 1 XLR Interconnects, SL Matrix USB, and Oracle MA-X Digital Balanced Interconnect (AES/EBU). This replaced my Acoustic Zen Hologram 2 speaker cables, Matrix Reference II Interconnects, and WireWorld Platinum AES/EBU and Starlight USB cables.
At first listen, it was clear that there was a big difference with the MIT loom. We listened for a couple of hours and Mike was uncharacteristically quiet, not talking at all during any of the songs we played and hardly saying a word between tracks. As is often the case with major system changes, first impressions are hard to describe - you get a sense of what you hear but you haven't processed it yet.
Fast forward a couple of days - the sound continued to improve as the cables settled in but there was a very slight edge in the highs. I told Mike about it, we did some investigating and found that the interconnects running to the amps were set to medium impedance but the XS 300 amps have high impedance. I made the switch on both interfaces.
Bam! The slight edge was gone. Once settled in at the proper settings the sound was perfect!
So how do they sound?
First, there's a ton more detail - it's been a while since I've noticed "something I never heard before" on my system but now I get it all the time. And everyone who's heard them says the same thing. Breathing, tapping, fingering, audience noise - much more highly resolved.
Second, the background is quieter - but not in the sense that you see it as "blacker" - blacker would call attention to itself. It's more like there just isn't any background noise anymore, which makes quiet passages stand out more and sudden notes all the more striking.
Finally, it's like the pre-amp suddenly has several new control knobs on it: Texture, Tonal Richness, and Holography... and they're all dialed up to 8 or 9. Those knobs weren't there before, but if they were they would have only been set to 1 or 2 in comparison).
Texture and richness speak for the themselves - they're not squishy terms like "organic" or "musical". Holography... well, if my system was like a High Definition OLED TV before now it's like the Holodeck on the Enterprise (Next Generation). It seems almost that real. And everything is affected equally - male and female vocals, percussion, strings, horns, guitars, and OMG piano!
It's startling at times - the sounds are so real and they come out of nowhere in a sound field that fills the whole space in front of you and doesn't seem to have any relationship with the speakers or equipment in the room. Decay goes on forever. It doesn't sound like reproduced music - just music. And opening your eyes doesn't break the illusion at all.
I could go on but I think you get the idea - these MIT interfaces are not leaving my system (sorry Mike).
At first listen, it was clear that there was a big difference with the MIT loom. We listened for a couple of hours and Mike was uncharacteristically quiet, not talking at all during any of the songs we played and hardly saying a word between tracks. As is often the case with major system changes, first impressions are hard to describe - you get a sense of what you hear but you haven't processed it yet.
Fast forward a couple of days - the sound continued to improve as the cables settled in but there was a very slight edge in the highs. I told Mike about it, we did some investigating and found that the interconnects running to the amps were set to medium impedance but the XS 300 amps have high impedance. I made the switch on both interfaces.
Bam! The slight edge was gone. Once settled in at the proper settings the sound was perfect!
So how do they sound?
First, there's a ton more detail - it's been a while since I've noticed "something I never heard before" on my system but now I get it all the time. And everyone who's heard them says the same thing. Breathing, tapping, fingering, audience noise - much more highly resolved.
Second, the background is quieter - but not in the sense that you see it as "blacker" - blacker would call attention to itself. It's more like there just isn't any background noise anymore, which makes quiet passages stand out more and sudden notes all the more striking.
Finally, it's like the pre-amp suddenly has several new control knobs on it: Texture, Tonal Richness, and Holography... and they're all dialed up to 8 or 9. Those knobs weren't there before, but if they were they would have only been set to 1 or 2 in comparison).
Texture and richness speak for the themselves - they're not squishy terms like "organic" or "musical". Holography... well, if my system was like a High Definition OLED TV before now it's like the Holodeck on the Enterprise (Next Generation). It seems almost that real. And everything is affected equally - male and female vocals, percussion, strings, horns, guitars, and OMG piano!
It's startling at times - the sounds are so real and they come out of nowhere in a sound field that fills the whole space in front of you and doesn't seem to have any relationship with the speakers or equipment in the room. Decay goes on forever. It doesn't sound like reproduced music - just music. And opening your eyes doesn't break the illusion at all.
I could go on but I think you get the idea - these MIT interfaces are not leaving my system (sorry Mike).
