Hi Guys, Just thought I'd get back to you with some personal observations after my AC-9 finally got some hours on it (I have just passed 375).
As I had previously posted, my initial impression was quite enthusiastic... so much so that I quickly ordered several more to fill out my remaining components. What I had noticed at first were characteristics quite consistent with Topround's , namely "Very open, dynamic, a black background and deep bass".To this I would add an impressive sense of space between instruments...
This is what 'caught my ear' so quickly and had me so excited.
Unfortunately, my experience also continued to agree with Topround's, as he states: "After about 50 to 100 hours it started to sound a little tipped up and a bit shrill at top". Let me add " A low level sense of haze or fine grain filling in the aforementioned 'blackness' ".
He continues:"I went back to my old cable and was relieved of the offensive sound. I lost some air and slam and some bass, but the musicality was back". I agree here as well although when it comes to bass I wouldn't say I lost some, it just seemed to return to a more integrated, call it 'organic integration' with the rest of the frequency range such that it wasn't as pronounced/attention grabbing, and without the slight grain I had mentioned...
After about 150 hours I decided to swap it from my transport into my DAC and see what I could tell. My first conclusion was that it was less 'influential' on my DAC... I had expected the opposite. In my mind, I had always figured the DAC should appreciate a digital (extra shielded/extra noise rejecting) cable more than a simple transport, but in my system, it was the other way... The DAC did not give me the instant benefits initially observed when the cable was new (why should it as it's now breaking in with less results?) but the sense of graininess was still hazing over the big picture and the richness I had been yearning for was continuing to digress.
What to do now? I wasn't willing to completely give up on it yet, after-all, it IS a very thick cable and may very well require an especially long break-in before reaching its ultimate abilities.
So.... I slapped it onto my [always powered up] subwoofer and let it cook another 200+ hours.
Which finally gets me up to today. At 150 hrs I wasn't even too impressed with it as a subwoofer cable... (and we all know that's not a good sign). While the grain was gone (my sub crosses over to my main speakers via an external electronic crossover and only receives a signal of 50Hz and below) it still did not sound as fluid, integrated or smooth as my other sub cable (remember "Company X"?) but it did have a certain 'slam factor' which I'll give it some credit for. As I reached the 300+ hour stage I'm thinking it has smoothed out somewhat more; I had needed to play with the sub volume levels at first to compensate for the differences between it and the 'company X' cable ('company X' was better integrated with the main system volume, the AC-9 was actually a bit 'drier' at first and even with the extra slam factor [when called upon], it still needed added volume to integrate properly) does that sound really odd?
Anyway, it's still on my sub right now and I've turned the volume back down to where it belonged [with my 'company x' cable] and it's doing fine. If they were both the same price which would I choose for my sub cable? It's pretty much a toss-up at this point, but when you consider the value, the AC-9 would get the nod. What this has done is allow me to take the 'company x' cable that had sub duty (their big power amp compatible model) and substitute it into my pre-amp which had been using their slightly lighter gauge 'designed for pre-amps and smaller amplifiers' model cable (I love overkill when it comes to gauge size on PC's).
As for the shipment on AC-9's which were headed my way: after all the experimenting with the one cable alone I felt I had a pretty good feel for what it was doing and when I considered the break in time and the less than ideal access behind my racks to some of these components, I decided to pay the local UPS store for the return shipping and sent the whole box of them straight back to AA. All done. Yes, I know, it would have been kind of exciting to dress an entire system in a brand new power cable (We all know how thick they are...) and see what happens but I just didn't think it was worth it, as described...
Finally: might I try the AC-9 at some point (after a few more hundred hours or so) on my transport or DAC again, just to give it one more shot? I probably will... maybe it's a 500 hour cable?! It sure looks like if there were such an animal, this one would be it! But for now I will say it's doing a good job on my subwoofer and at its price, there's a lot to be said for that. All in all:YMMV but with extensive break in it makes a good value sub cable and worth checking out elsewhere in your system if you have the time and patience to experiment for yourself.
Happy Lissn'n
