Cable Asylum: REVIEW: Audio Note Pallas Cable by KevinF

Model:	Pallas
Category:	Cable
Suggested Retail Price:	$ on application
Description:	Digital interconect
Manufacturer URL:	Audio Note

Review by KevinF on July 28, 2010 at 02:01:28
IP Address: 109.224.143.233 Add Your Review
for the Pallas

With a modest amount of cash unexpectedly at hand earlier this year, I had an exchange of email with Audio Note’s Peter Qvortrup over what would be the biggest bang-for-the-buck upgrade to my current system.

His suggestion was to sell on the ‘gon or eBay the 42-strand SOGON that had joined my CD transport to my DAC for the last five years, and buy a length of the new PALLAS interconnect.

Pallas is designed for high transfer ability and low capacitance, intended for use between moving coil transformers and pre-amplifier inputs, and to a lesser extent, between CD transports and DACs. From inside to outside, it is pure silver foil coated in Palladium, an air dialectric in a plastic tube, a silk stocking and finally a braided sheath. This form of construction may be going for audio glory but it is hard to make and as a consequence availability is, says Audio Note, ‘somewhat limited.’ You can have Pallas without a screen terminated with either AN-P silver plated RCA plugs, or screened with XLR plugs. Mine is the unscreened variety with AN-Ps. I put it between a CDT Three and a 4.1 Balanced DAC.

In the ten years or so that I have been an Audio Note customer, I have grown used to the remarkable integrity of Audio Note’s word. I have never been sold an upgrade or a component that has not performed exactly as, or better than, it was predicted by Audio Note to perform.

The results of introducing Pallas to my own system were nonetheless quite a shock, so dramatic was the change. I had not though of SOGON as anything other than a truly excellent interconnect. Indeed, it is excellent. When I bought it, the SOGON had comfortably blown away the high-end Kimber cables I had at the time. And yet, five years on and back-to-back, Pallas made the SOGON sound comparatively leaden and slow-footed. Pallas allows my Audio Note system to perform with an enhanced swagger, somehow conveying rhythm more convincingly, with more bottom-end clarity, and a greater sense of air and openness.

A recording I have referenced before in reviews here on Audio Asylum is Joss Stone’s For The Love of You (Soul Sessions, 2003). I like it for its simplicity, Stone singing over a sparse electric piano figure. With Pallas in my system, her voice sounds less thick and heavy, more the (then) very young girl that she was.

In contrast, and from the sublime to the also-sublime-but-also-almost ridiculous, Pallas sheds new light on Planet Hell, (Once, 2004) by Finnish gothic-thrash-metal band Nightwish, where the song’s choral opening descending into alarmingly violent and dark heavy rock is given an extra and very satisfying level of contrast and weight.

In my system, and for my money, Pallas is a top-to-bottom improvement – just as Audio Note’s Peter Qvortrup said it would be.

Product Weakness:	Availability
Product Strengths:	Integrity

Associated Equipment for this Review:

Amplifier: AN P4
Preamplifier (or None if Integrated): AN M3
Sources (CDP/Turntable): AN CDT Three
Speakers: AN SEC
Cables/Interconnects: AN
Music Used (Genre/Selections): Opera to heavy metal
Room Size (LxWxH): 21 x 12 x 7
Time Period/Length of Audition: four months
Type of Audition/Review: Product Owner

Amplifier:	AN P4
Preamplifier (or None if Integrated):	AN M3
Sources (CDP/Turntable):	AN CDT Three
Speakers:	AN SEC
Cables/Interconnects:	AN
Music Used (Genre/Selections):	Opera to heavy metal
Room Size (LxWxH):	21 x 12 x 7
Time Period/Length of Audition:	four months
Type of Audition/Review:	Product Owner